If you’re a writer with a book out, or soon to be out, you’re likely gearing up for writers conferences and maybe have already attended a few. If you’re an aspiring author looking for an agent or just making connections, you’ll be checking out conferences to attend also. If you’re new to these conferences, or new to presenting at them, or just upping your attendance from one or two days to the entire thing, it can get exhausting fast. Especially if you’re on the introvert side of the introvert/extrovert scale. Here’s a few tips on how to survive.

Minimize stress and hijinks in the days leading up to the conference. Don’t tell yourself you’ll rest when you get there. You won’t. I like to prioritize sleep the week before the conference and minimize social engagements if possible.
Get a room in the hotel if you can. If you can afford it, this will minimize stress greatly. You’ll know exactly how long it will take you to get to Conference Land, if you forget something, it’s probably not a big deal to run up to your room to get it, and most importantly, if you find yourself hitting an energetic wall, it’s much easier to duck out to your room for a few minutes to decompress. It also makes changing plans easier.
Bring some food. Some conferences have lunch, some don’t. If you’re in an unfamiliar city and you’re mentally done, you may not feel like venturing forth to find sustenance or shelling out for room service when you’ve already plunked down $$ on the hotel, travel, and conference. I always pack a stash of Lara bars with me so that I have something if all else fails. Low blood sugar hits me fast and hard and it’s not pretty.
Study the schedule in advance and pick your most important item each day. If turning on the social muscle takes energy, you want to make sure you’re the most energetic when you’re on a panel or doing a presentation, for instance. Make that your most important item that day. If there’s someone you really want to meet, or an event you really want to be ‘on’ during, make that your most important item. During my panel day, I had planned to go see another few talks, but ducked out early because I was feeling exhausted. It was an easy decision to make because I’d already decided where I was going to spend most of my energy.
Bring business cards with your picture on them if possible. Yes, it’s old school, and yes they have those QR Code business cards that you can scan with your phone, but sometimes reception is crap at those things. And everyone is meeting so many people that no one has time to be entering everything into their phone. Likewise, most people end up with a pile of business cards at the end, if your picture is on yours, they’ll be more likely to remember who the hell they were talking to because trust me, there’s just too many names at once.

I’m certain a book could be written about writing conferences themselves. (How meta.) But these are my top five tips. Every conference is different, and you learn something each time. Most of all, have fun. Enjoy being a book nerd among your fellow book nerds. Make friends, get ideas, give ideas, try not to drink all the wine.

It's conference season! Five tips on surviving.