Chris Butler/The Idaho Statesman, via Associated Press

Sarah Palin may be inching toward a presidential run in 2012 as she heads next week to Nevada for two speeches and her advisers quietly begin talking to Republican activists in Iowa.

Both states will be key to winning the Republican nomination, and Ms. Palin’s advisers are determined to do the groundwork necessary should she decide to jump into the campaign.

The informal conversations in Iowa, reported by the Web site Real Clear Politics, are the first baby steps in what would have to become a much more elaborate turnout effort if Ms. Palin, the former Alaska governor, decides to run.

And her speeches in Nevada to two outdoors groups — including one on the same night that President Obama delivers his State of the Union speech in Washington — give her a platform to talk about hunting and guns in the wake of the shootings in Arizona this month.

“There are a lot of Republican activists who want the governor to run and want to get involved and want to help,” said Tim Crawford, the treasurer of Ms. Palin’s political action committee, SarahPAC.

Mr. Crawford said the conversations were “part of a process of gathering input, guidance and advice” in Iowa and were not unlike the kinds of conversations that any potential candidate might have at this stage in the process.

“There are people that want to support her and want to work for her,” he said. “There are a lot of them in Iowa.”

Other potential Republican candidates are moving slowly in Iowa as well. Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts, has spent relatively little time in the state during the last two years — a dramatic shift from his 2007 strategy of trying to win Iowa with an early barrage of money and time.

But others are being more open about their ambitions in the state. Tim Pawlenty, the former governor of Minnesota, is scheduled to spend two days in Iowa at the end of this month as part of a tour promoting his book.

Representative Michele Bachman of Minnesota is scheduled to arrive in Des Moines this weekend to headline the annual reception for Iowans for Tax Relief. And Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, is set to give a talk to the Iowa Renewable Fuel Association’s annual meeting in Des Moines a week later.

Taken together, the steps by Ms. Palin and the others suggest that the 2012 campaign for president is beginning to pick up some steam.

But advisers to several of the politicians have said they would like to push back any official announcements as far as they can. Forming an exploratory committee and becoming an official candidate trigger costly legal requirements that require sophisticated fund-raising efforts to support.

And many of them don’t have that — yet.