Sometimes you get a little idea that is hard to shake. For me, that was the idea to host our first virtual summit last year. Sometimes ideas come and then slowly fizzle when the excitement factor is gone (or the wow-that’s-a-lot-of-work factor kicks in) but for me, the idea was stubborn.
As with most ideas I can’t shake, I had to take action. Luckily, I have a supportive business partner who was game, so a year ago we sent invites out to our preferred partners. Anyone who wanted to speak was invited to take part.
Why a virtual summit made sense for us
Including ourselves, we had nine speakers covering different areas of marketing over two days.
But what does this have to do with our why for hosting a marketing summit? Part of the appeal was knowing we could supplement the areas of marketing where we thrive (branding, websites, user experience, graphic design support) with the areas of expertise of some of our amazing preferred partners. They covered topics like optimizing LinkedIn, email marketing, paid ads, heart-centered marketing, relationship marketing, and more. As a heart-centered, service-based business, bringing our favourite people in front of our community (and beyond) is one of our favourite things to do.
Lessons learned from round one
Our first summit went well! For a scrappy first try, we saw great engagement in the chat during presentations and had attendees upgrade to VIP passes and access some of the premium offers our speakers had prepared (they were generous!). We learned many lessons along the way: what worked well, what to drop next time, which tech was worth the investment, and where we spent a lot of hours in the preparations. (Side note: If you’re thinking of hosting a virtual summit, I’m happy to answer any questions about what we learned!)
Leaning into the Human Side of Marketing
Our biggest takeaway was that we needed a longer runway to get every piece into place ahead of time. So this year, planning started much earlier. Back in the summer, we put out the call for speakers for our second (and possibly annual!) virtual summit.
This time, we narrowed our focus around a theme that came to me quickly: The Human Side of Marketing.
I was curious if enough other people would resonate with the theme, especially when all we hear about these days is doing things faster and cheaper (mostly with AI) when it comes to marketing. But we have always been passionate about the human behind the business, and the real connections business owners make when they market intentionally.
It turns out our theme did resonate with people during our call for speakers, and we had so many speakers apply that we extended our summit to three days and still had to turn away many speakers who would have been a perfect fit for the summit.
What to expect this year
This year we have 17 top-notch experts lined up (including Kelley and me). Spoiler alert: I have already watched all the presentations (for quality control) and they are incredible!
When designing this event for maximum value, we included the usual free bonuses and VIP perks, but we also made sure all 17 speakers will be live in the chat during their presentations to engage with attendees directly.
We are pretty excited that our speakers will be able to answer questions in real time during their pre-recorded presentation, because some of these speakers would be harder to ask your important questions to if you heard them speak at a live event, or ran into them out in the world.
Pro tip: If you’re joining us, look up the speaker schedule ahead of time and jot down your questions. The live chat alone might be the most valuable part of the entire summit (and it’s included with your free ticket)!
The real why behind it all
I could go on (and on!) about how excited I am, but our main goal is simple: we want to bring practical, effective marketing savvy to fellow business owners. There is a lot of noise out there telling you to bypass the human side of your marketing. But we’re here to tell you that focusing on the human side isn’t just nice, it’s good marketing. It builds the authentic relationships that ultimately help your business grow.
If you haven’t grabbed your free ticket yet, reserve your spot here:
https://magnetic-marketing-summit.inklingdesign.ca/
We would love to see you live in the chats! And if you choose to upgrade to VIP you will get instant access to the sweet bonuses (worth over $3,300 CAD) offered by our speakers.
