When summer rolls around again it always means two things, one bad and one good. The "bad" is that most software vendors experience a dip in sales over summer as our potential customers, at least those in the northern hemisphere, get out of the office and work on their suntans. The "good" is that it's convention time, a chance to catch up with people you only know from exchanging emails and forum posts.

Last month was the Software Industry Conference (SIC) in Boston, which is the must-go conference for independent software vendors. Mark your calendars now for SIC 2010 in Texas and you might just catch a presentation on software promotions by yours truly!

If you didn't make it and want to get a feel for what it was like then check out these presentations that our friends from Avangate have shared:

• Online Reputation Management for Software Authors by Adriana Iordan
• Social Media Marketing For Software Authors by Adriana Iordan
• Best Cure For 2009 New Revenue Streams by Casey Potenzone

This month we were in our home town of New York for the Affiliate Summit. If you haven't been before the Summit, held twice yearly, is a large conference with a low entry price, and draws from all sectors of retail who sell online. Sunday kicks off the conference with the Affiliate Meet Market, which is a hectic free-for-all networking event, exhausting, but worth it. Many e-commerce vendors and affiliate network programs made a showing this year, but special thanks go to Denise and Rick from Digital River for throwing their exclusive cocktail party just for us software people to get together. The rest of the conference was the traditional booths and seminars.

The Affiliate Summit publishes their own survey of over four-hundred and fifty affiliates after the event. The report features dozens of charts of data, based on the responses from the participating affiliates. Also included, an uncensored view into the opinions of affiliates on a variety of other subjects. Affiliates were asked to share any complaints, ideas, suggestions or opinions they have regarding affiliate marketing. Plus there are some great resources for affiliate marketers: a glossary to explain industry terms, as well as lists of suggested message boards, blogs, and Twitter accounts that you should know about.

You can download the report or visit the affiliate survey website.

If you're just starting out as a software developer and wondering if you can justify the costs of travelling and going to a conference, then I'd say that almost all of them have been worth it for me. Putting a face to a name really cements a relationship and I always take away something unexpected and new.