4 Upcoming Marketing Conferences That Aren’t Vendor Commercials

I firmly believe that every marketer needs to take the time to step away from his or her work and participate in live experiences that will lead to growth. Sure, you can learn just about anything you want on the internet, via podcasts, or in Slack groups. I won’t argue with that. However, when my out-of-office auto-reply is activated, when my extremely competent team is handling any surprises, when I’m in a completely different physical space than usual, and when I can hear a stranger chuckle or sigh or gasp because he or she is reacting to the same content I’m experiencing—I know that in these instances I’m best-suited to process new information and discover ideas I am motivated to test and analyze.

Of course, just like anything and everything else, there are high-quality experiences to be had, and there are events that, frankly, are nothing more than vendor commercials. Sometimes it can be hard to separate the treasure from the trash, and so here are four events over the course of the next six months that a revenue-focused, growth-driven marketer should seriously consider attending (in chronological order):

B2B Marketing Exchange
February 19-21, 2018
Scottsdale, AZ

Every year I’m impressed with the B2BMX agenda’s breadth and depth. This year, in addition to ABM and sales-specific tracks, there’s also a channel marketing track. Why channel marketing? Over 70 percent of the world’s goods and services are marketed and sold through indirect channels, and yet channel marketing departments continue to be resource-starved. While every marketer can certainly learn from demand generation and content marketing sessions, it’s awesome to see a focus specifically on channel marketing.

Revenue Summit
March 1, 2018
San Francisco, CA

Marketers, you can’t do it all on your own. Revenue Summit is a one-day, strategy-packed “marketing + sales = revenue” super-event. Be prepared to learn from others who have been in your shoes, and stay curious as you hear the challenges and triumphs of your sales counterparts. To quote “High School Musical,” we’re all in this together. (OK ... I went a little too far, even for me.) (Bonus: The Revenue Summit team is offering 20% off tickets if you use code 'JSPENCER')

MarTech – West
April 23-25, 2018
San Jose, CA

If speed-dating were a conference, MarTech would be it. MarTech offers an enormous quantity of sessions, one after the other, in concurrent tracks. If you don’t plan ahead and build your agenda, it can definitely overwhelm you. If you want to hear how (mostly larger) companies are using marketing technology to transform their businesses, this is the place to take lots of notes, and then find the speakers at happy hour and connect via LinkedIn so you can continue to learn from their experiences.

AMPlify
June 12-13, 2018
Boston, MA

AMPlify is an employee advocacy and engagement conference for the marketer who seeks to leverage the power of company evangelism in his or her marketing efforts. It’s not just about getting employees to share company content (although that’s awfully nice!), but also about harvesting the valuable content opportunity that’s growing in practically every department, across every line of business in your company. (Bonus: The AMPlify team is offering 25% off tickets if you use code 'SmartBug25')

What are some of the greatest “a-ha” moments you’ve experienced at a live event? Is there a high-quality marketing-focused event coming up that I’ve missed? Share your thoughts in the comments.