May 7, 2025

Turning Booth Buzz into Closed Deals: A Case Study in Pop-Up Podcasting

This week on Revenue Rehab, Brandi Starr is joined by Rita Richa, a B2B podcast strategist and executive producer with a track record of turning conversations into revenue. Together, they break down how Lenovo overcame lackluster event ROI by...

This week on Revenue Rehab, Brandi Starr is joined by Rita Richa, a B2B podcast strategist and executive producer with a track record of turning conversations into revenue. Together, they break down how Lenovo overcame lackluster event ROI by transforming traditional conference sponsorships into a pipeline-driving “pop up podcast” experience—turning fleeting booth traffic into meaningful, mid-funnel conversations and a year’s worth of content in days. They discuss the end-to-end playbook for integrating real-time podcast activations, coordinated sales efforts, and data-driven storytelling to accelerate deals and maximize event impact. If you’re looking to turn event spend into measurable pipeline momentum, this episode is for you.

Episode Type: Case Study

Revenue leaders who’ve been in the trenches share how they tackled real challenges—what worked, what didn’t, and what you can apply to your own strategy. These episodes go beyond theory, breaking down real-world implementation stories with concrete examples, step-by-step insights, and measurable outcomes.

Bullet Points of Key Topics + Chapter Markers:

Topic #1: Transforming Event Sponsorship With Pop Up Podcasts [06:04] Rita Richa identifies the inefficiency of traditional event sponsorships—“Too many CMOs are dropping six figures on conference booths only to walk away with bad scans, vague brand awareness, and no clear ROI.” She discusses how introducing a structured popup podcast experience enabled B2B brands to turn event conversations into revenue by “creating content with your ideal, you know, business targets, your ICP, your prospects...in real time at the event.” This shift made event investments directly tied to pipeline acceleration and measurable impact.

Topic #2: Driving Pipeline and Content Scale Through Experiential Coordination [09:18] Rita describes the end-to-end activation of Lenovo’s popup podcast, detailing coordinated touchpoints that move prospects from coffee sponsorship to booth engagement, culminating in short, strategic interviews rooted in case studies. “It’s the entire collective experience of getting your customer from point A to point B to actually even want to come to your booth and have those conversations.” By enabling sales teams as ‘super fans’ and centering content on relevant industry reports, the team achieved 15+ high-value interviews in two days, batching a full year’s content while accelerating deal movement.

Topic #3: Measuring and Maximizing Event ROI Beyond Brand Awareness [22:29] The discussion shifts to the trackable business outcomes derived from the popup podcast approach. Rita shares, “They were able to book like really significant follow up meetings and close a couple of, you know, deals because of this activation that if it were not to happen, like they wouldn’t have an easy way to like follow up with these people essentially.” Brandi Starr highlights the benefit of activating both top-funnel and middle-funnel prospects at events, increasing velocity for deals already in the pipeline, and providing actionable methods to improve event ROI for CMOs and CROs.

Key Learning

If you had to do it all over again, what’s one thing you would do differently?

Rita would focus on incorporating public relations from the start to boost exposure—think reaching out to event journalists or organizers ahead of time and making the pop-up podcast an event in itself. Treating the brand like a media entity, she’d look for ways to gamify and engage the audience even more, ensuring content is compelling enough that people want to stop, watch, and share.

The Big Win

By transforming a traditional event sponsorship into a targeted pop-up podcast activation, Rita Richa enabled Lenovo to batch a full season’s worth of high-quality prospect interviews in just two days, accelerate pipeline engagement with key decision-makers, and directly drive follow-up meetings and deal progression that would not have happened through conventional event tactics.

Buzzword Banishment

Rita’s buzzword to banish is "just another day in paradise." She dislikes this phrase because it projects a disengaged, apathetic mindset in workplace interactions and can unintentionally define someone’s personal brand as indifferent or uninspired. Rita argues that being real and genuine in responses fosters better human connection and avoids falling into autopilot, noncommittal communication habits.

Links:

Subscribe, listen, and rate/review Revenue Rehab Podcast on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , Google Podcasts , Amazon Music , or iHeart Radio and find more episodes on our website RevenueRehab.live

Brandi Starr [00:00:35]:
Hello and welcome to another episode of Revenue Rehab. I am your host, Brandi Starr and we have another amazing episode for you today. What if event sponsorship actually moved pipeline? Too many CMOs are dropping six figures on conference booths only to walk away with bad scans, vague brand awareness, and no clear roi. But my guest is here to tell you that there is a better way. So today's guest turned a traditional sponsorship into a revenue generating machine by flipping the script with a popup podcast strategy. Imagine this meaningful conversation with high value prospects during the event, not weeks after a full year's worth of content batched in three days and buzz that had people lining up to get behind the mic. This isn't podcasting as a side hustle. It's a post Covid hybrid strategy built for pipeline acceleration and content scale.

Brandi Starr [00:01:42]:
If you're tired of brand exposure being your only event KPI, this episode will change how you think about conferences, conversations and content creation. So let's get into it. My guest today is Rita Richa. Rita is a podcast producer and Strategy who helps B2B brands turn conversations into revenue. She co leads, co led Lenovo's live Pop up podcast series and serves as executive producer and at Reignite Media. With experience producing 300 plus episodes across tech and SaaS and has a background at Tesla and BMW, she knows how to blend storytelling strategy and event content to drive business impact. Rita, welcome to Revenue Rehab. Your session begins now.

Rita Richa [00:02:40]:
Well, thank you so much for that fantastic introduction. I'm so happy to be here and I can't wait to dive in.

Brandi Starr [00:02:47]:
Yes, I am so excited to talk to you because I am one of those people that absolutely loves business events. I look forward to them, I thrive on them, but I don't do as many of them because they're expensive and they don't always show the roi. But before we jump into that, our industry loves its fancy jargon, but let's be real, some of these buzzwords are just fluff and they can hold us back more than they can help. So tell me, what is one overused buzzword you'd love to erase from existence?

Rita Richa [00:03:24]:
Okay, so I thought about this because I wanted to be in line with, not reusing some and it's not necessarily like a marketing buzzword It's. It's kind of a saying that you hear in corporate a lot, where somebody asks you, like, oh, how's your day going today? And they'll say, oh, just another day in paradise. And that is a. That is a line that actually really bothers me, because back when I worked at BMW, there was a very lovely gentleman who I loved very much as a coworker. We were great colleagues. But every day I would ask him, how's your day going? He would start it with, all right, just another day in paradise. And I'm like, do you even want to be here, dude? Like, if we. I don't know.

Rita Richa [00:04:08]:
So it's just. It's really a mindset of, like, you know, starting your day off with this, like. Like, energy of, like, oh, this is a thing that's okay. That we've okayed, but I don't think it's okay. I think we need to just be real with each other and be human. Like, you can say, I'm having a great day or, buzz off. Don't talk to me. You know, like.

Rita Richa [00:04:30]:
But let's just not. Like, every single day without end, it was the same thing, and I was just like, okay, I'm either living in an episode of the Office or. Or I'm. I'm Groundhog Day. I don't know.

Brandi Starr [00:04:41]:
It might have been both. I know the. The one that gets me the answer to that question is when people say, it's going, oh, my gosh, yes. I don't know what to say after that.

Rita Richa [00:04:53]:
Like, okay, it makes it awkward for the other person. Like, right?

Brandi Starr [00:04:56]:
It's like, keep living.

Rita Richa [00:04:58]:
Yeah. Like, I don't know. It's like those Live Laugh Love posters at TJ Maxx where you're like, it's just become a thing. But, you know, I say that it's for being funny, but also, like, if we're trying to, like, build relationships with people, like, we have to be really careful the things that we consistently say, because it can, like, inadvertently become your brand. Do you know what I mean?

Brandi Starr [00:05:18]:
Like, yeah.

Rita Richa [00:05:20]:
So it's like, oh, you're the guy that just, like, is here but doesn't want to be here. Like, I don't know. So anyways, that's. That's my word of the day.

Brandi Starr [00:05:27]:
All right, so now that we've gotten that off our chest, I promise you, it is way better than just another day in Paris paradise here at Revenue Rehab. So let's talk about your big win. So, yes, I had the pleasure of hearing your story before and as soon as you started talking, I was like, oh, my God, more people need to know about what you're doing.

Rita Richa [00:05:53]:
Yes.

Brandi Starr [00:05:54]:
So let's start at the beginning. Tell me what was the challenge that you were facing and then we'll get into what you did.

Rita Richa [00:06:04]:
Yeah, absolutely. So, and, and in general, you know, I work with B2B brands and we really, we came across this issue where podcasting started being treated as like this hide side hustle thing that, like, you know, somebody else could do it, or there wasn't enough time to record all the episodes or even when we would do the content, like they weren't really being promoted and it just became this like, huge, like, lift. And so from like a business perspective, like, that was a problem that, like, I was seeing. But from a personal perspective, like, I actually, I have my own show that I started as a passion project for fun. It's called Bippity boppity Business. And just like it sounds, it's a Disney business podcast. But what I started, why I love my show is what I started doing is thinking about, like, instead of the podcast being just a thing that we do, like, what if it was an experience? Like, just like when we go to the theme parks and we have a great time with someone you're paying to go to an event, but you're also like, connecting and making memories. Maybe you're taking photopass pictures while you're there.

Rita Richa [00:07:15]:
Like, there's a lot of key touch points throughout the experience of the customer journey of going to a theme park in person. That started like, making me think to myself, maybe this could be done. And B2B, in a way, I wonder if we could do that because a lot of people would be spending a lot of money on their events and then the podcast budget would kind of be over here to the side. So it was a problem. And I was like, well, how do we fix that problem and make it a win win for everybody involved? So, yeah, we came up with the idea of pop up podcasts, where instead of just having a booth where you have switched swag and pens that people don't really want, you make content with your ideal, you know, business targets, your icp, your prospects, and you do it throughout the day and you create content in real time at the event because CEOs are often the ones that want to be the podcast hosts. But like, let's be real, getting our C Suite calendars in line together to do multiple interviews is like, I don't know, it's like genie in a bottle moment. Like you really have to wish upon a star to make that happen. So that's kind of the concept of like, okay, let's bring everyone that is who's who in the industry that's already here on the same day together to make content in real time and also have a shared experience from it.

Rita Richa [00:08:38]:
Make a memory, post the content while we're doing it, and really try to use it also as a tool to empower the sales team as well so that the sales team member at the booth has something more to say. Hey, try our demo, our SAS product. Do you want to spin the wheel? And people are like, I don't want to talk to you. Yeah. So that was kind of a summary of the problem and where it kind of was inspired from. And in this very specific form. Yes.

Brandi Starr [00:09:07]:
Okay, so let's ground our audience in a definition because, yes, when you said pop up podcast, I, I had never heard of that term before.

Rita Richa [00:09:18]:
Okay.

Brandi Starr [00:09:18]:
So I had seen people record episodes of a podcast while on site at an event. The concept or the term pop up podcast, I had never heard. And the way that you did it, I know, is a lot more than what I've ever seen. So help to tell the audience what is a pop up podcast.

Rita Richa [00:09:42]:
Okay, thank you so much. You're such a great host. I appreciate that encouragement in that context. So pop up podcast is. It's not like you said, it's not just the, you know, we have our microphone at the stand and we're doing podcasts. It's the entire collective experience of getting your customer from point A to point B to actually even want to come to your booth and have those conversations. So I'll give you the example of the work we did with Lenovo. Lenovo had actually a few different activations that were happening at the same time that inevitably led to this end.

Rita Richa [00:10:19]:
Part of the, of the experiential in person journey of getting to the booth. The first thing they did is they had a coffee stand where they sponsored a coffee bar at the conference. Right. So before you even go into the conference booth, before you are talking to anybody or shaking names, what's the first thing most people are going to do at the beginning of a long day? Girl, they're gonna get coffee. We're tired. Okay, so, so instead of just like, you know, doing the coffee inside of the hall, they did it outside of the doors, like right outside before anybody goes in. So you go up to the coffee stand and they have like salespeople there. And of course they're the ones giving you the coffee.

Rita Richa [00:10:58]:
And they're saying, by the way, we're actually doing a giveaway for a product if you're interested and signing up for the giveaway, hop on over to our booth to, to go learn more. In this instance, they were giving away like physical. A very nice monitor, right? Like that's cool. We're techie, we like nice things. Maybe I would totally be down for that. I would totally get a free monitor. So you have your coffee, you're caffeinated, and a salesperson is now walking you over to the booth because you have expressed interest in this free monitor. So, so they walk you over and then they are actually like scanning your badge while this is happening.

Rita Richa [00:11:37]:
Like the, the, the pop up part, like the podcast is it's not just when you're there, it's everything that happens around it, right? So anyways, the salesperson walks you there and they are now like your biggest fan. Like that's their job is to be your quote unquote biggest fan. So they're going to introduce you to me or whoever it is that's your host for the show and say, by the way, if you want to win this thing, all we need you to do is we need you to answer like a couple questions based on this case study that we've created on Generative AI, which was this example, right? So what was smart about the pop up podcast? It had intent in the sense that we weren't just talking to anyone and everyone about whatever we wanted. It was rooted in data and a case study study that the, you know, the company at the time was, is really focused on shining light on. They want to create content around. They want to bring this landing page to life to make it look like at different events in different industries. Everyone is, who's. Who is really talking about this report a thought leader piece, right? Like they are the innovators in this way.

Rita Richa [00:12:48]:
So I know I'm going into that, but I'll go back to the, the story here. So back to the salesperson. They're your biggest fan. They give you two options. They say you can either answer two premeditated questions. We had question cards that they could pull from with Rita to Win X product. Or if you're like, I'm chickening out and I don't want to do that. We have another activation or another thing that you could like guess a lock and like open a box to like win a different thing.

Rita Richa [00:13:15]:
Because we're not trying to pressure anybody into doing anything that they don't want. But most of the time, by the time they brought them over to me, we had the camera crew there, we had the lights, we had the setup. Now it's my job to be like, hey, how are you? Like, tell me about who you are and what you do. And we're really figuring out like who they are. And our target for this activation was CIOs. Like, that's who we really wanted to talk to. So if I kind of like was chit chatting with them, finding out they were a cio, let's be honest, a lot of us that are very techy or semi nerdy behind the scenes, we don't want to be on camera, right? So it would be my job to be like, don't worry, I just have like a deck of cards. You just pick one deck from like one card from the deck.

Rita Richa [00:13:57]:
We'll talk about it for five minutes. That's it. We're just going to talk for five minutes or less. And that's really key because I think when people hear podcast or pop up podcast, we're thinking about these very lengthy, long interviews that are time intensive and they take a lot of time to do and it could be a bit overwhelming for a random person to be a part of. So I call them mini interviews. When I'm really trying to position it to this prospect, I'm like, we have a five minute interview, mini interview. Just pick a card, we'll talk about it. And they're general questions.

Rita Richa [00:14:29]:
Just based on this report, I'm going to give you a fun fact about AI from our case study and you tell me your thoughts on it. That's it. And most of them were like, okay, like I can do that. So we sit them down and now that salesperson is like taking pictures of us behind the scenes cheering on that person. Like, they are being their super fan, they're building that relationship with that potential individual. And before the interview is like, even live like the next day, we really focus on making clips and turning them around. The next day, right before the clips are even there, I'm there with that person encouraging their salesperson to text them the photo and say, hey, here's a suggested copy you can use on your LinkedIn. Let's go ahead and post it and follow each other and tag each other on LinkedIn and let people know that you were here doing this interview.

Rita Richa [00:15:20]:
Because if you text the photo to that person and you don't text them what to say, and also if you leave them to their own devices to post it, they probably ain't going to Post it. Let's be real, we, we're busy, we gotta travel and go back. So my job was in that moment to make sure that the salesperson connected with that person. They took the picture and then I was there to make sure they posted right then and there. And sometimes I would even use ChatGPT, like right there to like generate a post and show it to them and be like, hey, you cool with this? Okay, great. Okay, let's go ahead and post it right now type of a thing. And it wasn't very, you know, you don't have to write a very long LinkedIn post. Just kind of something templated that we created in advance that was just like something some like approved somewhat beforehand.

Rita Richa [00:16:03]:
Like I'm here with so and so at this event talking about X case study. We really enjoy talking about X fun fact. Thanks so much for joining me. Can't wait to share your full length episode or whatever. So something very simple like that and what ended up happening, the outcome of that is in one day we, we did like over 12, 13, I can't even remember 13 interviews in like one day. And the course of two days we did around 15 interviews. So if you're mathing it the way that I can't math at some point, if you want to do one episode a month, releasing like you really have done a full season of a podcast while you're there. And then the beauty of this is that the content lives longer than, than the event does.

Rita Richa [00:16:54]:
Because what happens when you leave the event? Maybe you take a group photo with your team, maybe you take a photo with a person while you're there, but the conversation stops. So with marketing, what's the most important thing? Word of mouth. We want to keep that conversation going. We want to encourage grease engagement on our posts. So by utilizing the salespeople as well, we actually encourage them to become like LinkedIn evangelists in a way because they were posting on their own pages as well that they met this person too. And now anyone in their network is going to be commenting. So we're really allowing the entire ecosystem around events to bridge the gap between what happens at the event, the experience, experience that the person has themselves, the memories they make with that person and then also online, just really trying to stretch out and maximize the, the contact, the content rather that we are using. So yeah, that's long answer, but I hope that explains it.

Brandi Starr [00:17:57]:
No, it does. And yeah, it was, I was like this was definitely genius in how all the pieces so simply and smoothly fit together and even going so Far as thinking about someone who wanted to enter but wasn't comfortable with video having that alternative, it feels like you guys thought of everything. And so I'd ask, what challenges or roadblocks did you hit along the way and how did you navigate those?

Rita Richa [00:18:30]:
Very fair question. There are definitely some challenges. One challenge being a 24 hour turnaround for clips is, is, is a, is a great challenge. It's one that I pride myself on, but it's, it's a, it's a bit of a lift. It can only be possible when everyone works together and determines like, hey, like after these are edited, like where are they going? Right, Like I'm sending you the content. I can give you suggestions as to where you know, what placements, what channels they are best suited to. But you really need to have just like one team member on standby that's just ready to schedule at a moment's notice type of a thing. That's all they need to be doing.

Rita Richa [00:19:15]:
They don't need to be sending emails or anything. Like there just needs to be that on call, like social poster that knows at this time for these two or three days it's going to be a bit of a blitz, a bit of a lightning strike. And we just need you to know that when this happens you need to post it basically. Um, so that's, that's something that is a very real challenge. Um, but we were obviously able to overcome that. I just want to warn people that you can create all the content, but if it doesn't get posted within that timeframe of like right, like 24 hours, right after that person did that interview with you, at least one clip, like 20 seconds, 30 seconds long, a sound bite of that moment, they're going to forget you because they meet a lot of people at these events. So that's a challenge of making sure that you are aware of the ticking time clock, the importance of that. Another challenge is to be honest, the event itself, like every event, I guess I should say organizer has different rules as to what you can and what you can't do.

Rita Richa [00:20:20]:
So we brought a different set of lights than we initially were going to bring because we wanted to upgrade them, make them look a bit fancier. And the event was, was a bit hesitant about that. There's policies and procedures about, you know, different equipment that comes in. So I would just make sure, if you want to do this, like don't do this on a whim, like make the event organizers, your buddies, like really talk to them and let them know, like this is a Win, win thing doing, win win thing that we are doing not just for our brand, but also for your event as well. Like we are going to be actively tagging the event and you know, whoever runs it on our LinkedIn. So let's make sure we have some time on the calendar to really figure out what's okay, what's not okay. And, and we're not like kind of bumping into things at the event itself, you know, and we obviously had that approval before, but I think it would be even better if, if we had like a point of contact that we were talking to like way in advance that was like super excited to like partner with us, maybe a press release or two or something like that. I think that's the last part that I'm looking to improve as well is incorporating PR into this because it's very, very possible to like maybe get a journalist that's there to interview the journalist at the same time too.

Rita Richa [00:21:34]:
So I think we had really great content, we had really great connections. We definitely like, we met people in tech that were absolutely their high end prospects. And those conversations to this day, like a couple days ago even like the event was a while ago and I'm still seeing people liking and like, you know, resharing like the post from the event. Those are great. But as always, I guess we're business people and we always are like, what can I do better? You know, like, like I want to do more. So, so yeah, that's. Those are a couple challenges that come to mind.

Brandi Starr [00:22:07]:
Okay. And you talked about a few outcomes of the conversations that were had the content that was created the social buzz during the event. But I'd like to hear a bit more around the activation or outside of the activation itself. What was the measurable impact that this solution had on the business?

Rita Richa [00:22:29]:
Yeah, so something very tactical that we had done is we really try to invite people on who were leads already of, of the brand. Right. So we balanced it. We had folks there that had never seen me before or maybe I don't know how you haven't heard of Lenovo before, but maybe haven't heard of Lenovo before and just kind of like walked across the booth and we talked to them. But we were really intentional about being able to either A invite that person to be on the interview and try to reopen up a conversation that maybe had been lost for a while or B sending the interview. We did one interview in particular with an the executive of Global Sales, a full length one that was the only one that we did. She was Integral to this rapport and was a key thought leader in the case study where we interviewed her and then we could send that full length interview to said prospects that maybe were kind of out and not really sure if they wanted to continue the conversation with, with the brand. Right.

Rita Richa [00:23:35]:
So they were able to get like a couple of really important, I can't say what companies like on this recording, but they were able to book like really significant follow up meetings and close a couple of, you know, deals because of this activation that if it were not to happen, like they wouldn't have an easy way to like follow up with these people essentially. So instead of just like, okay, hey, you know, I'm going to pretend. Mark from like I don't know, Cigna, like, hey, Mark from Cigna, I see you're at the booth. Do you want to grab dinner? Or you see you're at this event, do you want to grab dinner with me? Like that's kind of how people do it. Instead of doing that, it's like, hey Mark, I'm actually going to be interviewing our, you know, global whatever person and we did a case study. We'd love your thoughts. Do you have five minutes or if they don't want to and they're busy. Hey, missed you at this event.

Rita Richa [00:24:30]:
Would love your thoughts on this report. This case study that we did, what do you think? Because again, the key component here is that it's based on a case study where people are really trying to show their expertise, the results they're able to achieve. And we turned it into a story. And that's the beauty of it. I think what gets lost is you could do this, you could do everything that I said now. But if you don't do it based on your data, based on your case study, it's not going to have that same level of appeal or impact because you're not showing up in the space as like the leader that knows what's going to be going on. Like generative AI is a huge topic right now and they are capitalizing on that and letting them know, like, hey, we surveyed over 600 senior IT leaders and we learned X, Y and Z about them. What do you think? Like that's a position of strength in my opinion.

Rita Richa [00:25:17]:
Versus Howdy, John. How's your, how you doing? How's the weather today? What do you think about technology, buddy? You know what I mean? It's different. It's different. Different. Yeah, yeah.

Brandi Starr [00:25:28]:
And I think you hit on a key thing is you talked about, you know, invites for dinners as being the Default. And it really is whether it's breakfast or dinner.

Rita Richa [00:25:38]:
Right.

Brandi Starr [00:25:38]:
And with any conference you only have so many meals that you can have.

Rita Richa [00:25:44]:
Right.

Brandi Starr [00:25:44]:
And so a lot of times it's like the salesperson is almost shooting themselves in the foot. Because if I've already got dinner plans and you invite me to dinner, it's a no, because I already have plans, not because I don't want to connect with you. And so that five minute conversation in the space that we're already in takes that barrier out. And one thing that I found really interesting with what you just articulated is most often we think about events as a top of funnel activity. You know, you go, you get the brand awareness, you know, f get more people talking to you, you are like feeding that top of the pipeline.

Rita Richa [00:26:29]:
Right.

Brandi Starr [00:26:30]:
But by connecting the effort to those people that were already in the pipeline, you were able to also leverage this activity as a middle of funnel activity as well to further deals along. And I think that is a key takeaway that I have in terms of being able to show ROI is not only did we bring these net new names that may or may not be in market, but we also increase velocity and likelihood to close of things that, you know, conversations that we're already having or in some cases brought, you know, opportunities back from the dead.

Rita Richa [00:27:13]:
Yeah.

Brandi Starr [00:27:14]:
And that is, that is one way that, that most companies, I would say are not thinking about events. And that's also a way I can see that you can get more approval for budget on events if you know your prospects are going to be there. Being able to tap into that not just as a brand activity.

Rita Richa [00:27:34]:
Yeah. And something else first of all, very well said, better than I could have articulated it for sure. So I really appreciate that. But something else that I really loved is that the executive that I did interview, I failed to mention that she also had a very important keynote. So she did a keynote there at the event. She was a speaker. So that's another avenue to kind of like promote this whole like pop up podcast ecosystem. So yeah, maybe you don't drink coffee.

Rita Richa [00:28:00]:
I know everyone doesn't drink coffee. I think I do. I think, I mean I drink coffee all the time. But even if you don't, maybe you went to the keynote, right? You went to the keynote, you sat down and at the end the keynote speakers like, you know, join us at our booth, like we're doing a giveaway type of a thing like come say hi and we're really trying to maximize every possible like space of the event, different aspects of it to really get the most out of it for. For the client. Yeah. So, yeah, it's definitely amazing, too, because the thing that I really noticed is, I mean, every hour consistently, the booth had at least one person in it that was interested in being there and wanted to be there versus other booths. We were looking at them because, girl, I was sitting there and I was looking at them.

Rita Richa [00:28:52]:
I mean, they'd be empty for hours, right? And so, like, we really want to build that traffic and kind of almost artificially create that consistent look that everyone is. The booth is very active. Like, there's people always there, and we're the talk of the town to the point where even vendors next door were like, can we be on the podcast? Like, oh, we didn't think to bring that here. Maybe we should have brought our own microphones. So, yeah.

Brandi Starr [00:29:21]:
And you know what? The other thing I think I take away from this, because Lenovo is all, you know, obviously a huge global brand that comes with budgets that, you know, some companies could only dream of. But even if you're not in the position to do something at this level, you know, at this scale, what I'm hearing from what you're talking about is the real impact of this was the level of coordination between the activations and the real purposefulness behind every single thing that you did and the ability to cut above the noise and do something less common. You know, you talked about the wheel at the beginning, and we've all spun a thousand wheels, and, you know, it's like you spin the wheels, and it's like, here's this Bluetooth speaker. And I'm like, I. You know, it's just more stuff that you have so much music, and there's only so much of it that's going to make it in my suitcase. And so that was one of my takeaways. And I know the best part of learning from others is understanding what really made the difference. And so, before we wrap up, I want to make sure the listeners walk away with one more insight.

Brandi Starr [00:30:43]:
And that's. Everything about this seemed to have gone so exceptionally well. If you had to do it all over again, what's one thing you would do differently?

Rita Richa [00:30:56]:
That's such a good question. If I were to do it all over again, I would, again, I think I touched on it earlier. I would try to incorporate public relations into this more, to get even more, like, exposure that this is a thing that's happening. Because if you treat it like you are a media entity at the event and you have that mindset, like, if you Were if your brand was a radio station, like, what would you do at this event? Right. Public relations would be a really important factor of that. So maybe trying to reach out to a journalist of if the event has, like, a magazine or an E magazine, maybe they have a blog. Maybe before you even go to the event, we can actually connect with the event organizers to say, like, hey, we're going to be doing this podcast, like, come, come watch us, like, while we record type of a thing. Like, make it an event in and of itself, you know, and that's a goal that we're working towards.

Rita Richa [00:31:57]:
And I think it can be done, but it just takes time and even more kind of like preparation. And I would also argue it also makes you have to really think about the content itself. Like, is your content good enough to where somebody would want to passively start, stop and watch it? How can you gamify it? Even if there's education or industry, you know, thought leadership, like, can we turn this into a debate? Can we turn this into an audience interaction type of a thing? Like, you know, those are really where my head is. Is going. Those things are where I'm trying to consider, like, how can we do it even better? And I think if we were to be on stage and do this podcast on stage as well and have that level of interaction and include public relations, I think it would make an even bigger buzz. So I don't know, maybe. Maybe some of you out here could try it and see what. See what? See if it works for you.

Brandi Starr [00:32:54]:
I love it. I love it. Every good session ends with a plan for progress. And we joked about being able to do better. And I do think no matter how amazing it is, there's always something that we could do to improve.

Rita Richa [00:33:08]:
Yes.

Brandi Starr [00:33:09]:
Um, so, Rita, I have enjoyed this conversation so much. Before we go tell our audience how they can connect with you to keep learning and definitely do the shameless plug for Reignite Media.

Rita Richa [00:33:22]:
Absolutely. Thank you so much. So, this has been a pleasure. My name is Rita Richa, as you heard earlier, you can connect with me on LinkedIn. We will drop the link below, but my personal LinkedIn URL is how you will reach me. I have a podcast that I do for fun called Bippity Boppity Business, and it's a podcast that talks about customer experience, branding, marketing, and if you happen to be a Disney adult fan too, you might enjoy it. But that's kind of what you can do is you can just go to bippityboppitybiz.com to find the show and then for Reignite Media, we are a full scale B2B consulting and production management company. We make your podcast content dreams come true.

Rita Richa [00:34:12]:
From idea all the way to conceptualization. Our goal is to create positive experience that drive ROI and great brand for brand awareness for your business. So that's it for right now. Awesome.

Brandi Starr [00:34:28]:
Well, we will link to all of those links. So wherever you are listening or watching this podcast, check the show notes so that you can connect with Rita. Well, Rita, thank you so, so much for joining me. This has been an awesome conversation. You have given me so many ideas and I do appreciate it. Thank you so much and thanks everyone for joining me. I hope you have enjoyed my discussion for Rita. I can't believe we're at the end.

Brandi Starr [00:34:57]:
Until next time, bye Bye.

Rita Richa Profile Photo

Rita Richa

Executive Producer at Reignite Media

Rita Richa is the host of Bippity Boppity Business, a podcast where she interviews former Disney cast members and enthusiasts to explore how Disney weaves magic into leadership, storytelling, customer experience, and project management. She began her career at Tesla and BMW, assisting over 3,000 customers and gaining firsthand insight into world-class brand experiences. Today, Rita is the Executive Producer at Reignite Media, where she helps B2B brands bring their content visions to life through podcast production, launch strategy, and coaching. She also serves as a Podcast Host and Event Content Strategist for Lenovo, co-leading a live pop-up podcast series tied to Lenovo’s “Work Reborn” research, transforming insights into high-impact, conversation-driven content that supports enterprise sales and thought leadership. Formerly a producer at a top B2B Inc. 5000 agency, she managed 13 B2B shows and 300+ episodes across SaaS, Fintech, and tech industries. With a background in vocal coaching, a talent for relationship building, and an eye for strategy, Rita helps podcast creators refine their voice, align their vision, and craft content that connects and converts.