Genuine in-person connection beats social media for influencer marketing, especially in B2B. Conferences are where real relationships form and turn into business. The speaker is moderating a B2B influencer marketing panel at IMCX in Los Angeles, Feb 25-26, 2020.
Hey guys, welcome to this next episode, episode 6. I can't believe we've already done 6 episodes of these things, of Influence Unpacked. Anyway, thanks for showing up. Thanks for giving me your feedback. Thanks for engaging and connecting and all those good things that we do on social media. Today I just want to touch upon an idea because I was talking to a major B2B influencer earlier in the week and she had some really interesting observations to share with me about what's going on in the space. And one of the things that we talked about was the importance of the human connection and how it's still very relevant today and it's not going away because of social media or social platforms or any of that stuff. And, you know, it really is a pretty key thing to me because every time I get to go to a conference, whether it's to be as an attendee or as a speaker, I'm always looking to meet up with as many people as possible while I'm there. I want to see if there's potential customers, obviously. I want to see— I want to meet my peers. I mean, going to a conference is probably one of the best ways you can ever hope to get in front of so many of your peers in one spot. And it doesn't matter whether my peers are doing the consumer side of things or the business-to-business side of things. I really look to engage with them, meet with them, and then start to establish real relationships with them. In many cases, these become friendships, and you guys over in London know what I'm talking about. Scott, Alicia, Tim, David, Owen, Philip, all you guys and gals know what I'm talking about. So it's the opportunity to really meet with people, break some bread, have a cup of coffee together, and share some real insights and share something about yourself. I find that conferences give me an opportunity to, if I'm speaking, not only to really share some valuable insight to an audience, But it's the after the speaking part that really, you know, really gets me engaged because that's when people come up with questions and they want to know, well, what about, you know, in my specific business, you know, how do we do it this way or what can we do with it? Can we apply influencer marketing to my business? I don't know if we can. And I just love all those conversations because I love to be able to just peel off, sit down for a little bit, and then just give them a value dump about all the things that are possible with influencer marketing. And it doesn't matter what business you're in, it's just a matter of how you're looking at it. So anyway, the relevancy of really working with people, meeting with them physically, is more important now, I think, than ever. Social media is wonderful. I mean, we can connect and interact and all these great things with people all over the world. But man, when you have the opportunity to really sit down with somebody and meet them in person, Nothing beats that. Absolutely nothing. Like, I'm kind of champing at the bit to get back to London to meet up with some of those folks I met over there last year because they're just really dynamic bunch and had so many great things to share and gave me a lot of things to think about. And, you know, I got, I got so much out of it. So I hope you think the same way. And if you have an opportunity, now that we're winding up 2019 and we're looking at 2020, Start thinking about what conferences you might want to attend next year. It doesn't matter if it's just one or two. Even if it's a local one in your city, in your town, think about going. Think about just meeting some new people, exchanging ideas, getting some valuable insight yourself, and I think you'll find it really, really rewarding. So anyway, that's my thought for today, and let me know what you think in the comments. Oh, and I want to give a shout out. I got asked to come back to the IMCX conference, the Influencer Marketing Conference in LA, which is taking place in February, February 25th and 26th, 2020. And I've been asked to moderate another panel on influencer marketing in the B2B space. So it'll be about B2B influencer marketing, and I'm already getting some ideas and feedback from some of you guys about some of the things you might want to touch upon in a session like that. So keep it coming. I want to know what you think, and we'll work to incorporate all that. But anyway, let me know how you're doing. Give me a shout out, comment, like below, connect with me, follow me, whatever you want. And I will talk to all you guys soon. Bye.
