Latest / Retail Media Breakfast Club / How These 4 Retail Media Leaders Make Conference Season Count
Transcript
- Q2 - Audio Cleaned Conference Season === [00:00:00] Conference season is upon us, and your boss just asked that dreaded question, why should we approve this expense today on the Retail Media Breakfast Club, we're unpacking how to maximize those precious conference days and get that expense approval. My brand side, retail media, friends. Share their battle tested strategies from bringing cross-functional partners to witness solutions firsthand to creating intentional networking hit lists to spotting emerging tech, like AI powered product search before your competitors do. [00:00:39] Whether you are headed to Cannes for the first time like I am. Or navigating your first conference app, you'll hear some practical tips for turning those conference badges into genuine business value. Let's dive in. Good morning and welcome to the Retail Media Breakfast Club. I'm your host Kiri Masters, and every weekday at [00:01:00] 6:00 AM Eastern, I bring you candid and real discussions in the world of retail, media and marketplaces. [00:01:06] In just 10 minutes. So bring your own cup of coffee and we'll get smarter about retail media together. Now let's hear from Brian Dudzinski, independent Amazon consultant and ex kind snacks. Yeah, conferences are a lot of fun, especially in this industry. Um, a lot of sharing of ideas and. When you go back to a team or you're looking to your boss to get these things approved, uh, it it's very impactful when you can come back afterwards and give a download of like what you've experienced, the trends you've seen, the technology. [00:01:39] You can go into these conferences with specific problems you're looking to solve and find those solutions when you're there. Um, some other tips I've had are bringing along cross-functional partners, um, even if it's a little bit further out adjacent, maybe it's a, a finance partner, which can help getting your expense approved, um, maybe operations. [00:01:59] Bringing them along to [00:02:00] see kind of the magic of the space really helps bring energy around some of the solutions that you find at these conferences. That's a really good one. I have, that's, um, I mean, usually people just look at bringing in their, like immediate team, like more junior people so that they can get more experience, but that's a great idea. [00:02:19] Finance in particular, no, I, I literally brought my finance, uh, business partner. They're, they're intimately evolved in the business. And for them to understand what's happening around that actually like, gets them motivated and like, wow, this is really cool. Like, now I understand what you're saying about these type of things. [00:02:35] So, um, that context helps. And now let's hear from Bree Keating, director of e-Commerce at Wilton. So. To make the most outta conferences, I, uh, make a list of who I wanna meet and why, uh, before I even go. And I promise you that the universe will make it happen. I don't know how it happens, but I always make a list of who I'm looking to meet at the shows and what types of people, what types of skills I might [00:03:00] wanna learn from, or experiences that I might wanna learn from. [00:03:03] And it always happens. Um, you and I both know Carter Jensen. Um, four years ago I put his name on a list of people I wanted to meet at the conference. It didn't happen. And it was so funny. The day after the conference, he wrote me on LinkedIn and said, you were one of the people I wanted to meet at the conference. [00:03:19] I was like, you were one of the people I wanted to meet at the conference. And so we never, we didn't meet for a full year, but we had, um, maybe three to five conference calls where we just, you know, shared experiences and talked about the industry and it was great. So I encourage anyone going to a conference to remember why you're going and it's not, it's not the free parties. [00:03:39] Now let's hear from Louis Antunes National Account Manager, e-Commerce at Organica Health Products. Oh, that's a must for us. I just came from the Prosper Show, Vegas last month. It was excellent because you can see, uh, different examples from, uh, other [00:04:00] companies, even from other categories of industries. [00:04:05] It's cool to see that. Also, we discuss what's coming, what's going on. Example, we talked about ai, how it's going to be the search of products with the ai. One thing that I, I've been reading, uh, from you ki well this really important, so we watch the good presentations about that, rules, et cetera. It's cool. [00:04:30] We always go to the unboxed event as well. This year is going to be the fourth year, and not only me, but I try to bring my team last year, uh, marketing department to join the, um, um, unbox, uh, as well. And our fiscal year goes from uh, September to August. So in June you're going to start. Uh, preparing the budget e exercise, and definitely I'm going to include those EE [00:05:00] events in the budget. [00:05:01] It, I, I take it as so important. Now let's hear from Danny Silverman, growth consultant at Silver Stream Strategic Consulting. So there's probably three things I would recommend for attending trade shows. Um, number one, make use of the app that they provide to make your schedule as well as networking. [00:05:23] It's really important to have a plan and not just to go and figure out what you're gonna do on the fly, 'cause you won't get the most out of the show. Number two, if you're. Saying, Hey, let's meet up there. I'll find you. You probably won't, especially at the bigger shows like Shop Talk. So if you wanna meet with someone, schedule a very specific time and place where you're gonna meet. [00:05:42] And the third suggestion is walk the floor. Like it's yes, like it's a gauntlet and there's salespeople and there's all that stuff, but it's the only way to really know what's happening in the industry and what's emerging. It will give you a really good insight into, uh, what's the next thing that's coming, as well as, you know, meet and greet some of your old friends [00:06:00] and see some of the old, uh, familiar faces. [00:06:02] Well, that is it for today. I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Retail Media Breakfast Club. We meet here every day at 6:00 AM Eastern, so be sure to subscribe and get your daily dose of insights, trends, and hot takes in the world of retail, media and marketplaces.