46% registration growth and $200K+ in revenue for United’s premier technology conference

United Airlines needed more than an event production partner for their annual Digital Technology Supplier Conference. They needed someone who could manage a complex, multi-stakeholder communications operation from strategy through execution — and deliver results against hard numbers. That’s what we did.

Where things stood

The Digital Technology Supplier Conference is United’s primary forum for engaging technology vendors and strategic partners — a high-stakes event with real business consequences if execution falters. The 2026 edition required a multi-tier registration system, strategic messaging across a six-month campaign window, coordination across United’s internal teams, LSAV event production, and multiple third-party vendors, and customer service for complex international registration scenarios.

The infrastructure for all of this needed to be built, not inherited. And it needed to run without becoming a management burden for the client.

Our approach

The first strategic breakthrough came in the messaging. Early drafts leaned on standard conference language — collaborative, collegial, generic. We shifted the frame entirely: instead of inviting vendors to a networking event, we positioned the conference as exclusive access to United’s strategic thinking before it becomes public knowledge.

The line that moved registrations: “While your competitors wait for public announcements and industry reports, you’ll understand United’s direction from the source.” That reframe — from networking to competitive intelligence — changed the urgency calculus for prospective attendees.

On the operational side, we built the infrastructure from scratch: a secure multi-layered registration system within Tripleseat (without SSO capabilities), a conference app deployed via EventMobi, group registration functionality supporting up to 10 tickets per transaction, and comprehensive workflow frameworks governing attendee data, status tracking, substitutions, and international outreach. Weekly milestone reporting kept United informed without pulling them into day-to-day execution.

Results

• 46%Registration growth
• $200K+Ticket revenue
• 78%Rated logistics ‘very good’ or higher

• Zero major technical issues during registration or day-of execution
• Measurable registration upticks tracked within 48 hours of each email deployment, used to refine timing and messaging throughout the campaign
• Complex international registration scenarios resolved without escalation
• Group registration functionality implemented mid-stream without compromising timeline or quality

The most underrated skill in event communications is knowing when to stop describing what an event is and start describing what attending means. For a technology conference, that meant reframing attendance from a calendar commitment into a competitive advantage. When the value proposition is that clear, the logistics almost sell themselves.