The Art Of Marketing, Vancouver

This is No Science

Recently I had a chance to attend one of the best marketing conferences in my life, "The Art of Marketing." I learnt numerous lessons from the six awesome speakers: Seth Godin, Nancy Duarte, Mitch Joel, John Jantsch, Brian Wong, and Keith Ferrazzi. And today I would love to share the lessons with you!

A quick summery of the summery...

The event was set in The Centre downtown Vancouver. The contents from the speakers were various from abstract to application. In general, they revolved around the networking, creativity, old VS new marketing, digital marketing, relationship, etc. That's not all! There was an illusionist performed a "dangerous card trick"! Overall, this event is not only educating, but also entertaining, a true "Edutainment event"!

Summary of the Event

Although I will share the experience and knowledge I learnt from the event, however, I will not provide information or photo of the speakers.

The first speaker, Seth Godin, gave one of the most memorable presentation I have ever been. He explained about different ways we can look at the world. The revolution of marketing in contemporary world, the "mass" population is decreasing, and the "weird" (as Godin called them) is increasing. Hence, marketers need to focus on the "weird" people, not the mass. 

He further described his perspective on marketing as "making the one and only" It is not effective to create something using the existing; instead, create something that is not exist. An example was gave by Godin about the first fax machine. The key to success is to provide something that is not exist and benefit everyone.

It is all about taking risk. "If failure is not an option, then neither is success" said Godin. That is why marketing is like arts, because we need to keep trying until we get it right. We need to jump off the cliff and let the wings grow on the way down. The right time will never come, waiting will paralyze us from moving forward. 

Communications process today by Nancy Duarte

Second, the communications expert, Nancy Duarte, elaborated methods to create a successful story. Apart from the dramatic story structure (begin, middle, and end), she introduced "what is" and "what could be". Many successful speakers (Steve Job and Martin Luther King Jr.) used this strategy to give their speech.

Always remember who you are talking to, the audience. It is most convincing if you know your audience and craft the speech accordingly. If it is a presentation, utilize visuals to support your story. Visual is meant to complement your speech, not distracting the audience attention.

Additionally, digital marketing is BOOMING! Marketers are freaking out about all these technologies whether social media, mobile, or smart devices. Mitch Joel pointed out some of the funniest, memorable, and knowledgable topics: Direct relationship, Sex with Data, Create utilization values, and Once screen world.

To sum up Joel speech, we should focus on the relationship part rather than spending most of the time trying to be on the top of the technology chain. Although all those are important but down to the end of the road, only the screen that is in front of a consumer that matters. Every screen will link into one and there is no point to create many different screen for every device.

Brian Wong, to me, was another highlight of the conference. Even though he talked solely about his company and its history, I learnt that sometime you do not need to create a whole new world for consumers only if you know the missing pieces in their lives. I admire his company value, "moment" and "reward."

He made it seem so simple to see that there are gaps within consumers' daily life and that is what Kiip (his company) does, rewarding every achieving moment in your life. He believes that actions drive rewards, but not the other way around.

The last presenter, Keith Ferrazzi, provided us with a 360 degree relationship view. He said, a simple rule of relationship is that no one want to have one. And the best way to build a relationship is "generosity." According to a research he referred to, "the world is more connected than ever, but less related", which means, we know a lot more people but we are not really related to them.

Ferrazzi explained that many people jump into a pre-judgement that, "they do not like me" or "they do not care about me." Those attitudes will prevent your from building any kind of relationships.

Ferrazzi also demonstrated a different way to be efficient and effective with our time. People list, is to prioritize those who are important to us first and spend more time with them, and those who are less important to you, spend lesser time with them. Because at the end, you will have 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 52 weeks a year.

I hope you get the essence of this awesome event by reading my posting. Please note that these contents are not everything from the conference. It will take me months to cover everything I take away from it. Maybe, I will see you in the next event!

"Shaping The Future Of Business"

Special Thanks to...

• Douglas College

my new friends

• @Beatler
• @MarStano
• @carlydancing
• @AviLambert
• @MNathanson
• @KarmynAyn
• @mccabep
• @hmcgillivray
• @Fairlite

Connect with me on:

Twitter: @Rathapat_S

LinkedIn: ca.linkedin.com/in/rsuwanaratana