Event organizers are feeling the squeeze.
Costs are up across the board—venues, labor, AV, freight, technology, staffing. At the same time, exhibitors are watching their budgets more closely than ever. They’re still investing in events, but they’re investing differently. Every line item has to earn its keep.
That’s why more organizers are rethinking a common assumption:
To increase revenue, you have to raise prices.
In practice, raising booth fees or increasing sponsorship tiers often creates the opposite outcome. Exhibitors downsize. They cut upgrades. They skip the show. And the event loses momentum over time.
The smarter approach is becoming clear across the industry: grow revenue by choosing high-value, outcome-driven tools—the kinds of things exhibitors actually want because they directly improve results.
One of the best examples is lead retrieval.
Lead retrieval isn’t a “nice to have.” It’s how exhibitors prove ROI, justify spend, and follow up effectively after the show. And when it’s offered the right way, it becomes one of the cleanest ways for organizers to increase event revenue without touching booth prices.
In this article, we’ll break down why lead retrieval works so well as a paid add-on, what organizers often get wrong, and how EventStack’s Fetch Revenue Share Program helps events turn exhibitor lead retrieval purchases into a sustainable revenue stream.
Exhibitors don’t usually reduce spend because they don’t believe in events. They cut back because the math stops working.
Think about how exhibitors approach booth programs. If you’ve ever watched a team plan an exhibit build, you’ve probably seen a familiar pattern: the budget gets eaten up by decisions that feel exciting in the moment but don’t actually move outcomes. Fancy tech. Over-designed features. Add-ons that look impressive but don’t increase qualified conversations.
The exhibitor version of this mistake is “buying stuff instead of building a strategy.”
Organizers can fall into the same trap.
It’s common to see exhibitor packages built around a checklist:
But what exhibitors really care about is:
When organizer packages don’t connect to outcomes, exhibitors become skeptical. And once skepticism sets in, price increases feel like punishment rather than value.
The lesson: revenue grows when you make it easy for exhibitors to invest in things that clearly improve performance.
Raising booth prices is blunt. It hits everyone the same way—even exhibitors who don’t need more, don’t want more, or can’t justify more. That creates friction.
Add-ons work differently.
They create a value ladder: exhibitors who want a baseline presence can stay in the base package, and exhibitors who want more ROI can opt into paid upgrades that help them perform.
The best add-ons share a few traits:
Lead retrieval checks every box—when it’s packaged and implemented correctly.
If you’re deciding what to offer as a paid exhibitor add-on, you’re looking for something that’s already tied to exhibitor success.
Lead retrieval is one of the few purchases that can be clearly connected to ROI.
Exhibitors don’t attend events to “get exposure.” They attend to generate pipeline. And pipeline starts with lead capture.
Without lead retrieval, many exhibitors rely on:
A lead retrieval tool reduces that chaos and creates a repeatable system.
A lead retrieval purchase isn’t abstract. It produces concrete outcomes:
It’s a tool exhibitors can point to after the show and say, “Here’s what we got.”
In many industries, exhibitors show up assuming there will be a lead capture option. The question isn’t whether they need it. The question is whether the official option is straightforward, fairly priced, and easy to use.
If you don’t provide a good solution, exhibitors will still solve the problem—but often with workarounds that reduce the event’s ability to standardize, support, and improve outcomes.
That’s why lead retrieval is such a strong add-on category: the demand already exists.
If lead retrieval is such a clear win, why do some events struggle to sell it?
Because it’s often positioned and packaged in ways that feel frustrating or unclear.
Common mistakes include:
Confusing tiers and unclear pricing
When exhibitors can’t understand what they’re buying in 30 seconds, they delay the decision or skip it.
If the app is difficult or onboarding is unclear, exhibitors get burned once and never buy again.
If exhibitors don’t get usable data—or don’t know what they’ll receive—they assume it won’t be worth it.
This is the same underlying issue as booth budget busters: buying things without a clear plan. Lead retrieval shouldn’t feel like a tax. It should feel like a professional advantage.
Here’s the shift smart organizers are making:
Instead of treating lead retrieval as a cost center—or a pass-through service—they treat it as:
This is the same thinking used in other modern event monetization strategies:
Lead retrieval belongs in that same category. It’s an outcome-driven tool that exhibitors want, and it’s a place where organizers can increase revenue without raising base prices.
This is exactly why Executivevents built Fetch, the lead retrieval solution within EventStack—and why the Fetch Revenue Share Program exists.
Fetch is EventStack’s lead retrieval tool designed to make exhibitor lead capture simple, reliable, and fast. The goal is to support exhibitors with a professional experience that translates into better follow-up and measurable ROI.
The model is straightforward:
The result is powerful: every exhibitor lead retrieval purchase becomes new revenue for the event.
No booth price increases. No new sponsorship category required. No awkward “we had to raise rates this year” conversations.
Just a clean revenue stream tied directly to exhibitor success.
This model works because it aligns incentives:
And importantly: it’s optional and transparent. That’s what preserves trust.
Offering lead retrieval is one thing. Selling it well—without backlash—is another.
Here’s what works.
Exhibitors don’t care about “scan modes” and “export formats” until after they buy.
They care about results. Position lead retrieval like this:
When the value is framed as outcomes, the purchase becomes easier to justify.
Most lead retrieval sales are won or lost based on timing and repetition. Don’t mention it once and hope it sells.
Place it across:
The goal is to make it feel like a normal part of preparing for success—not an upsell ambush.
If you offer ten options, most exhibitors choose none.
A better approach:
When buying is simple, adoption rises.
Some exhibitors are new. Some are seasoned. But most want to look like they know what they’re doing.
Language that helps:
This reframes the purchase as a best practice.
If you want lead retrieval to become a reliable add-on revenue stream, implementation matters. Here are the practices that protect exhibitor goodwill.
Post the pricing clearly. Avoid “contact us for a quote.” Exhibitors want quick answers.
Most exhibitor teams don’t want training—they want confidence. A 60–90 second video can do more than a long PDF.
If an exhibitor has a problem onsite, they need a fast solution. Support reduces frustration and increases renewal likelihood.
The best way to ensure exhibitors buy again is to prove value after the show:
Even a simple summary makes the tool feel worth it.
Lead retrieval revenue share becomes meaningful when you view it across adoption scenarios.
Here’s a simple way to estimate:
(Exhibitor count) × (adoption rate) × (avg license price) × (revenue share %)
Example scenarios (for illustration):
And that’s before you factor in multi-license teams, upgrades, and year-over-year growth as adoption becomes standard.
Even if the numbers vary by show, the takeaway holds: it’s incremental revenue you don’t have to fight for by raising prices.
The best events aren’t built on extracting more money from exhibitors. They’re built on helping exhibitors succeed.
Paid add-ons work when they’re aligned with outcomes:
Lead retrieval is the cleanest example of that model because it sits at the intersection of exhibitor ROI and organizer revenue.
When exhibitors leave the show with better data and better follow-up, they renew more often. They invest more confidently. And your event becomes more resilient.
If you’ve been looking for a way to increase event revenue without raising booth prices, lead retrieval as a paid add-on is one of the highest-leverage moves you can make.
It’s a product exhibitors already want. It’s tied to ROI. And with the right structure, it becomes a recurring revenue stream for the event.
That’s why more organizers are turning to EventStack’s Fetch Revenue Share Program—earning 10–15% back on every Fetch license sold and building a healthier event economy in the process.
Executivevents can walk you through the program, help you plan exhibitor rollout, and show how Fetch can become a reliable revenue stream—without raising prices.
Book a call to unlock the Fetch Revenue Share Program.
