Here’s a lesson for us all. When trying to ensure that only qualified buyers attend your event, be careful not to set the bar so high that legitimate buyers are kept out. And for goodness sake, tell them they’ve been disqualified before they show up.

Yes, the banned attendee was me. And luckily the event was virtual, so I was more annoyed than angry. I had registered for the event, answered the questions and received a “thank you” reply with login instructions. Trying to log in the morning of the show, I kept getting an “invalid password” message. I e-mailed the help desk and was told I wasn’t qualified to attend. Seriously? A few more e-mails back and forth made it clear that something I had answered on that registration page — a month earlier! — had kicked me out of contention.Why I hadn’t been notified immediately, I’ll never know. And I have no clue what I might have answered wrong — I clearly listed myself as someone planning a purchase.Was the size of my purchase too small? Was the fact that I spent zero on this technology last year the deciding factor? Whatever it was, they didn’t want me.

But I needed to get into this show, so with a new e-mail address, I re-registered for the event and supplied bogus answers to every question. I’m now the president of a multimillion- dollar business, spending oodles of money on this technology. I’ve got thousands of employees around the world. Guess what? I got in. And not one exhibitor will be able to follow up with me because I won’t go check that e-mail address I set up. And I’ve skewed their registration data, as well. But what could I do?

I did visit the exhibitors I needed and gave them my correct contact information. And you’ll love this — virtual exhibitors don’t do any better job of following up on leads than their physical counterparts. I talked to this exhibitor and asked him to call me the following day for more conversation. Did he do it? Nope. But I did get a standard “thanks-for-visiting-our-booth-is-there-anything-I can-do-for-you” e-mail from someone else in the firm the next day.

So I responded that I’d like a demo and more information, and gave him my phone number. Not a peep. And it’s been more than a week now. So, now I’m going to the Web site, where I’ll reach a sales guy and possibly buy their software. And that poor show won’t get a bit of credit for making the sale. Serves them right for trying to keep me out. (OK, I’m kidding. If I buy their product, you better believe they’ll know where that sale came from!)

Donna Sanford, Publisher