On the sixth day of Christmas, Spin Sucks gave to you six PR conferences, five business books, four online courses, three productivity tools, two lies told about the PR industry, and a phrase to banish forever.
Are you singing the song as you read the line above?
It almost works. There might be an extra syllable or two, but it’s pretty darn close!
Go ahead and try it. I’ll wait.
Fun, right?
To continue the trend, today we’re going to discuss the six PR conferences you must attend in 2017.
Must-attend PR Conferences
What you are about to discover is that, with the exception of one, these aren’t really PR conferences, per se.
They are marketing, content marketing, social media, and PR.
This is because communicators must be fully integrating a PESO model program, which includes all of those other disciplines (and paid media, too).
Content Jam
Content Jam is put on by the Orbit Media team and it’s held here in Chicago.
Not only do I not need to get on a plane to go learn a few new things, it’s pretty powerful when it comes to content marketing.
It’s only a day, but it’s the best day you’ll spend on your professional development all year.
And you may or may not know one of the keynote speakers in 2017 (cough, cough).
Content Marketing World
Content Marketing World is, of course, hosted by the Content Marketing Institute in Cleveland.
I have always said this is the smallest, largest conference in world.
The convention center lends itself really nicely to be able to have serendipitous meetings. I love to just sit outside of the meeting rooms and see who I happen upon.
This past year, it was someone I worked with nearly 15 years ago and seeing her was like no time had passed.
To boot, the content is top-notch as it is carefully hand-curated by the CMI team.
You also may know someone who speaks several times throughout the conference (cough, cough).
B2B Marketing Forum
As you well know, most conferences have content and speakers focused on consumer organizations.
It’s certainly easier to curate that—and lots more fun.
But the MarketingProfs team takes a different approach by curating content only for business-to-business.
And it’s amazing.
Not only is the content great, but you will almost definitely get to at least meet Ann Handley in person and, when I say that’s worth the trip to Boston, trust me…it’s worth the trip to Boston.
Oh, and you may know one of the 2017 speakers (cough, cough).
Public Relations Society of America
I’m not going to lie.
The PRSA International Conference isn’t my most favorite.
But it is the only true PR conference out there, it does have all of the top PR leaders speaking (cough, cough), and it does bring in some interesting keynote speakers.
What I’ve found that is different with them is they tend to focus more on the junior-level PR pro trying to learn it all.
Even if you’re not junior-level, if you need to learn a little bit about a lot of things, this is the PR conference to attend.
It’s very good for that.
Social Brand Forum
Social Brand Forum is the conference I was to keynote this fall, when I was hospitalized for a septic infection.
Needless to say, not even I will do a keynote from a hospital bed (Andy Crestodina stepped in for me).
Hopefully, they will have me back next year and I will see you all there.
It’s a two-day event held in Iowa City in a theater, which is a really cool space and it makes it ridiculously easy to meet almost everyone who attends.
It’s intimate enough that the networking is top-notch, but the speakers (Andy, Jay Baer, Joe Pulizzi) are among the very best.
Social Media Marketing World
And last, but certainly not least (I did these in alphabetical order), is Social Media Marketing World.
This one is held in March in San Diego and I’m willing to bet most of you would love to be in San Diego in March.
It’s gigantic so you have to be really diligent about scheduling meetings and carefully curating your schedule ahead of time.
But the Social Media Examiner team does a fantastic job of making sure you not only learn a TON, but that you get to experience some of San Diego, too.
They also do a nice job of creating networking, ice-breaker events, which are a nightmare for this introvert, but they are especially effective.
You also may know a speaker at the 2017 event (cough, cough).
So there you have it. These are the six must-attend PR conferences on our list (and strange that I am speaking at all of them, isn’t it?).
Now it’s your turn, what are your must-attends we should add to our list?
I want to go to all of them!
Your being in Spain makes that difficult.
Is the AD Party Yacht sea worthy to get to Spain on?
But not impossible!
I would much rather go to Ibiza in Summer for a weekend or Miami WMC (during SXSW) for the same price SMMW costs. Way funner. Smarter people. Better music, better parties, and better drinks and so many girls! I mean hmmmm watch Mitch Joel Speak or get sweaty dancing with scantily clad ladies. Its just better! 8) BTW if you want to learn social media marketing the music industry is one of the few success stories in social media as an industry!
These all sound so good (but none in FL? how how how how?). And to promote a little cross pollination — my suggestion for number 7 is on the Spin Sucks Slack channel. 😉
I guess no one wants to go sweat their butts off?
FL doesn’t always involve sweat! 🙂
NASA holds their Jet Propulsion Conference every year in the summer (rocket engine trade show). So that meant Ft Lauderdale for me one year in July. I was like really? Can’t we move it to winter?
Hi Paula, PR Daily hosts a conference at Disney in March in Florida: http://conferences.ragan.com/disney/
Thx!
Social Media Marketing World is quite pricey though, for those of us who are solo. Would love to go but …
You can volunteer and get reduced price tickets!
I did Social Media Marketing World this year, and it was great! You definitely need to plan out your schedule in advance, especially if you want to learn a little about a lot of different topics. Great conference though for meeting people. I found the most value in just chatting with other professionals over lunch and hearing what they were trying out with social, video, ads, etc.
They do a really nice job of sort of forcing networking with lunches and other outside-of-conference events.
Did you see clients there or only people in the social media bubble which is my 3000Ft observation.
I work in-house, so I was focused on meeting others in the industry and talking to some vendors. However, I did have a couple marketing friends who run digital firms meeting with clients throughout the event.
Trying to sneak in that last one without me seeing it! I LOVE SMMW! Just ask that Steltzner guy. 8)
I learned something very interesting in going to Industrial Trade Shows. I used to go to the trade show for people who make medical devices, analytical devices. Ones that you send blood work through for analysis. The only people there were sales reps and often a high up engineer and they were always too busy for me to meet the engineer guy. Why talk to a sales rep when customers pay $1m for a machine.
Then I went to this show in Anaheim that was for components that went into medical devices….and bam there was all the people I called on walking the show!
My advice to the readers is think of what you do, who your clients/customers are, and go to shows that align. So when I see SMMW most of the speakers are personal branding experts and few have actual experience on the b2b or consumer brand side. So if your goal is to be a writer and speaker…GO. If you want to know how to do social media running branded accounts…not sure that is the right fit. Just look at bios and most work at agencies or for themselves. Will be interesting as the snapchat fad is going away that they all jumped on last time and with brands like Coke automating social media marketing what the conference will look like this year.
Having Guy Kawasaki and Brian Fanzo just oozes BS. I count only 8 speakers with brand side experience!
Always appreciate your mentions my friend..
You block me on Twitter like a noob and your 3 big pushes for Snapchat , influencer marketinv and Live streaming have been a bust and you are stuck with Twitter and your dead network for any vanity success. So you get brought up plenty when I showcase conferences with just hot air speakers.. Step your game up Brian. Post here a case study showing real success for a big brand here from any of the three to shut me up. Double dare. You failed to do so on my LinkedIn xmas post. Maybe you will finally show some real cojones and follow through now?
Hey Howie,
We have not finalized the brand side of the line up for Social Media Marketing World. But I can tell you this, there are a ton of folks working in well established brands in attendance. However if you are exclusively looking for big brands then for sure this event is not for you.
@ginidietrich:disqus how does it feel being the best speaker at every conference you speak at?
Ha, ha. There are LOTS of great speakers. As well as some really awful ones.
Thanks for mentioning Social Media Marketing World Gini!
My pleasure, sir! See you in March!
Surprisingly, PR Daily World in NYC or our conference for PR pros at Disney wasn’t mentioned: http://conferences.ragan.com/disney/
No, I didn’t mention either because I’ve never been or spoken at either! I only did conferences I can personally vouch for. But hey, a conference at Disney surely can’t be bad.
Got it! We need to fix this for 2017!
Yes, please!