SF Tech Week Is Brilliant. Just Don’t Mistake It for a US Expansion Strategy

By Robynne McPadden

‍I’ve spent the last few years building teams and helping businesses expand across the US, from New York to Austin and plenty of places in between. SF Tech Week is one of the best weeks in the calendar — but it’s also a very easy place to mistake momentum for strategy. If you've never been, here's what SF Tech Week actually is.

What SF Tech Week Actually Is

For one week, the entire tech world descends on San Francisco - VCs, founders, operators, anyone that has a hand in helping companies grow and scale. Hundreds of events, most of them unofficial and happening on the fringe, scattered across offices, bars, rooftops and someone's back garden in the Mission. 

There's no single venue and no real schedule. You follow a map of parties, you talk to strangers, and you hope the right one happens to be standing next to you at the right moment.

Honestly, it's brilliant. The energy is real, the people are sharp, and you'll have more useful conversations in five days than you'd manage in five months of cold outreach. If you're going, go all in. Say yes to things. Follow the interesting person to the next event. Expect to board the flight home lacking in sleep and a voice.

The Buzz Is Real. But It’s the Easy Part

I've spent years helping companies build in the US, and I want to gently push back on something I see every single October: a week in San Francisco is not a US strategy.

It's easy to come home buzzing, convinced you've cracked America, when what you've actually done is attend a very good festival. The buzz is the easy part. The build is what counts, and the build looks nothing like the week.

San Francisco Probably Isn’t Your Market

Start with the obvious thing nobody says out loud: San Francisco probably isn't your market.

SF is where everyone points you first - and for good reason - but this is exactly why it's so crowded and so expensive. It's the default, not the answer. The more interesting growth is happening elsewhere. UK founders are falling for Miami as a gateway into Latin America. Denver has economic development corporations actively pulling companies in, with real money and support behind it. Raleigh and the Research Triangle are quietly becoming what Austin was ten years ago, just with fewer good restaurants.

I don't even live in SF. I've run US teams across three cities, and being on Central Time in Austin covers the West Coast well enough that I can bop between both coasts without basing myself on either. Where you land should come down to where your customers and your talent actually are, not where the parties were best in October.

The Companies That Crack America Keep Showing Up

Here's the thing a week can't teach you. The companies that crack America aren't the ones who had a brilliant few days. They're the ones who kept following up and showing up.

The single biggest reason US expansion fails is people. Usually decision-makers who don't spend enough time in market to understand it. You cannot feel the nuance of a market from a rooftop. You feel it by being there, again and again, long after the lanyards come off and the Slack invites go quiet.

America Isn’t One Market. It’s Fifty

Nuance is the whole game, because America isn't one market. It's fifty. What plays in New York doesn't play in Texas. Even the way you reward a team shifts from city to city. When the New York team I ran wanted to celebrate, we found the closest rooftop bar and ordered a cocktail. Charlotte wanted to go white-water rafting, which is my idea of a nightmare. Austin wanted a fat steak and a shooting range. Same company, same goal, completely different how. Miss that and you'll hire the wrong people, pitch the wrong way, and spend a year wondering why the thing that worked in London is falling flat.

The Real Work Starts When Tech Week Ends

None of which is a reason to stay home. SF Tech Week is a genuinely good use of a week. Go, have the coffees, go to the parties, enjoy the sheer density of it. Just go in knowing what it is. It's a brilliant front door. It is not the house.

So don't fly home thinking you've done America. You've done a week. The real work starts when it ends.

At In2America, the bit we care about is everything that comes after the week: landing properly, hiring the right people, making the right connections within the ecosystem, and building in the market that actually fits you. If that's the conversation you want to have, you know where I am.

Robynne McPadden

‍Robynne helps international businesses navigate US expansion at In2America. Having built teams on both sides of the Atlantic, she now lives in Austin and works with founders on where, when and how to build in the US.