Agenda

Welcome, an overview of the Summit goals and content, a preview of today’s speakers and panels, introductions.

Long before the pandemic thrust virtual events to the forefront, savvy marketers found great return on their investment in online gatherings. This session will be an intro and welcome with an overview of what to expect at the Summit. 

The new hybrid work reality, informed by the heavy use of the all-digital conference format during that time, requires digital marketing executives to think about new ways of engaging with their audiences and avoiding burnout–and boredom! 

The tired old “webinar” format won’t suffice; however, online gatherings have become a permanent part of the way in which organizations engage their audiences.  The Digital Engagement Summit will bring together experts from multiple disciplines who share their experiences and best practices for connecting people online for community, networking, and business development. 

In this welcome session, we’ll set the agenda for the day. The Summit will be a discussion between some of the brightest minds in B2B Marketing - both those on stage and in the audience; debating what the “next generation” of online content will look like, and how it will engage audiences better than ever before.

University professor on what’s been working for years, the psychology behind engagement, and where to go next

In this session, Dr. Daniel Rubin, Assistant Professor of Marketing at St. John’s University, Tobin School of Business in New York City, will share insights from his upcoming research paper, “A conceptual framework for the drivers of audience engagement” (Journal of Business Research, November 2022) alongside emerging best practices for remote learning that are in practice for undergraduate and graduate university students. 

Research tells us that engagement is a psychological state that comes from the fulfillment of goals. 

Engagement has been studied in numerous contexts, without “reinventing the wheel,” B2B Marketers can apply this knowledge for webinars and virtual events.  Instead of trying to re-emulate an in-person conference experience—which is often non-optimal, to begin with—colleges switched to the “flip classroom.” Less about lectures and more about collaboration and interaction, this method uses classroom time and space for active learning. 

Until now, academic study of engagement in areas like education, consumer marketing, management, and other areas has met with little cross-pollination. This session will dig into how presenters can be more effective at connecting with the cognitive aspects of their audience to facilitate engaged behaviors. 

Importantly, interaction is independent of the platform of engagement.  As we look to the future and advancing technologies like virtual reality, the requirements for deeply understanding an audience to engage them psychologically remain constant. And in the end, what keeps students engaged will keep any audience engaged.

Take a look at the video we showed during the break!

From the world of (re-)training, what twists need to be made in order to better adapt people to the digital engagement medium? 

People are naturally wired to connect in–person. We thrive on the social-emotional energy that comes from sitting around a campfire, speaking to a group, or just hanging out together. Online, information needs to be presented in a materially different fashion-stimulating other parts of the brain to get engagement. To do this well: rethink the design process, big up creativity, and break down finite patterns of learning. 

That said, simply presenting the same material in the same manner in a virtual event as one would at a physical one is NOT the ideal way to engage an audience, and as we have seen, rarely leads to the ideal user experience. 

In this session, Katheryn Brett Goldman, CEO of The Cybermaniacs, will talk about the research they have done to entertain, engage and enlighten their audiences by first deeply understanding them, ascertaining how they cognitively intuit new ideas, and then carefully measuring results. She’ll talk about how to reinterpret content (marketing, training, etc.) to optimize it for digital consumption - understanding how learning styles differ, how people process information, and bringing it back to the best way to get a marketing message to a prospective client, or a teach a new concept to any employee. 

All of this requires and makes use of an unprecedented amount of data.  And with great data, comes great responsibility. Digital marketers must become stewards of their audience’s data, as increasing personalization brings with it a need to protect that information, be data literate, and understand digital ethics.

Every marketer has social chops; creating the right engagement for B2B professionals takes a different approach

B2B organizations see their social media presence as an effective way to connect with current customers, prospective clients, media, and potential employees. Many of them dedicate a full-time staff (or entire departments within marketing/comms or public relations) to build up engagement on these “free” mediums.  So why is it that so few of them truly find their authentic voice there? 

In this talk, Zen Yinger talks about how you can optimize your brand’s social media presence and establish your social authority, by being authentic, humanizing your brand, and staying relevant, in our “always-on” digital world. In this talk, she shares what she has learned by working with brands of all sizes over the past 12 years.

Brands can define themselves on social media, distinguish themselves from their competition and actively drive the conversations surrounding their industry and brand. With authenticity, consistency, and offering value over a period of time, brands are able to build relationships, establish trust and ascertain brand authority.

Join this session to learn more about how your team can engage more effectively to build a trustworthy digital brand using tried and tested strategies and best practices to keep your digital brand relevant on social media.

Welcome, an overview of the Summit goals and content, a preview of today’s speakers and panels, introductions.

Long before the pandemic thrust virtual events to the forefront, savvy marketers found great return on their investment in online gatherings. This session will be an intro and welcome with an overview of what to expect at the Summit. 

The new hybrid work reality, informed by the heavy use of the all-digital conference format during that time, requires digital marketing executives to think about new ways of engaging with their audiences and avoiding burnout–and boredom! 

The tired old “webinar” format won’t suffice; however, online gatherings have become a permanent part of the way in which organizations engage their audiences.  The Digital Engagement Summit will bring together experts from multiple disciplines who share their experiences and best practices for connecting people online for community, networking, and business development. 

In this welcome session, we’ll set the agenda for the day. The Summit will be a discussion between some of the brightest minds in B2B Marketing - both those on stage and in the audience; debating what the “next generation” of online content will look like, and how it will engage audiences better than ever before.