Pitch Session at a conference

To the poster who asked how "important" it is to go to conferences -- I sold my first two books before attending my first conference. And only once have I had a sale take place directly from interaction at a conference. We'd already decided that this house would be publishing that book -- we simply met briefly to hammer out certain details and make a handshake contract. I didn't find my agent at a conference and I've never met my other publisher (five books, working on three more). That'll change this week at RT.

To everyone who took the time to answer my question, thanks. For once my intuition was right.