How to Figure Out Who's Coming to a Conference (Before the Conference)
Conferences don't tell you who's attending until you show up.
Which is strange, because knowing who's there is often more valuable than the talks themselves. You want to know if your potential customers are going, if that investor will be around, if it's worth the flight and hotel.
But conference organizers guard attendee lists. Like, they really really don't want you to see them. Terms of service, privacy policies, GDPR—all very reasonable things that also happen to make your life harder.
So here are some ways around that.
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1. Watch the side events
Every 3-day conference triggers at least 10-20 side events, often more. Breakfasts, happy hours, "intimate dinners" for 47 people. These get posted on Luma, Meetup, LinkedIn Events or Eventbrite (if you're 7,000 years old).
Those pages sometimes list who's going (as in, the RSVPs are public), and even more importantly - you can ask Perplexity to find the side events from previous years of the conference.
If it's a big industry conference and someone was there last year, there's a high likelihood they'll be there next year. People who went to "AI Founders Drinks Miami 2024" probably aren't skipping the 2025 version.
2. LinkedIn hashtags FTW
LinkedIn posts have hashtags. Search for the conference hashtag, filter by events to see who's RSVPing and also filter by posts to catch all the "I'm coming to CONFY-CONF" posts.
For bigger conferences, ask Perplexity to find the most-used tags from past years and work backwards from there. Actually, always ask perplexity for hashtags and also various permutations of that hashtag so you can go all Pokemon and catch them all.
In practice, you want to do this more than once - about a month before, a couple weeks before, the week before and the day or so before to get new leads.
3. The conference app, oh the conference app
Many conferences use apps like Hopin, Whova, or some white-labeled thing. If you register, you sometimes get access to the attendee directory before the event starts.
The app might limit who you can see—networking algorithms, privacy settings, whatever. But if you're clever with filters and patient with screenshots, you can piece together a decent picture.
Some apps even let you export your "connections" after you've virtually handshaked with everyone. My, oh, my.
Note - not all conferences do this. But the ones that charge $50k for a booth usually throw in something to justify it.
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None of this is especially ethical.
But neither is charging people $2,000 for a ticket and then refusing to tell them if it's worth attending.
The conference knows who's coming. Sponsors get partial lists. Speakers get speaker dinners. VIP ticket holders get a Slack channel where they all introduce themselves before the event.
You're just leveling the playing field.
P.S. If you're organizing a conference and reading this, maybe just... publish the attendee list? With an opt-in checkbox. People do want to know. It's half the reason they bought the ticket, and many of these people would love to have people reach out to them - that's why they're coming to the conference to begin with.
P.P.S. - Yes, yes, I know, it's stupid and irresponsible and people don't like spam. Fine - then instead of having people do it manually, offer to set up meetings. Help a marketing person out. We'd love you for it!