Tag: conferences

Let’s face it, most conferences suck.

But they don’t have to. I can help make your conference awesome! I started AdMonsters in 1999 and it grew to become a highly acclaimed and uniquely valuable conference series and professional community. With the addition of OPS in 2011, we produced more than 100 conferences in the U.S., Europe, Australia, Singapore, and Brazil, and AdMonsters continues to be a great success today as part of the Access Intelligence family of companies.

If you have the feeling that your conference could be better, I can help. I started AdMonsters as an enthusiastic practitioner. That’s a nice way to say that I had no idea what I was doing, and it took me a long time to learn how to produce not only a great conference, but to do so smoothly and repeatedly, and to keep it fresh along the way.

Read on for further thoughts about conferences, and get in touch if you’d like to talk about how to make your conference awesome!

Why do you go to conferences? A break from work? The chance to meet new people? Want to learn something? Got a project you’re working on that you need help with? A trip on the company dime? Looking for a job? Just want to have fun?

Now, think about what the conference is designed for. What is the purpose of the conference? Organizers have different reasons for putting on conferences, and those reasons may or may not line up with your own. Great conferences have a very clear reason for being, and organizers of great conferences will be transparent about the purpose of the conference and help you determine if the conference is a good fit for you.

Continue reading “Why do you go to conferences?”

Conferences, right? I know, super exciting. But I bet you’ve been to a lot of ’em, and only a few have been really great.

It’s a bit of a paradox that there is a conference for everything (I’ve been the a conference about, yes, conferences), and yet most people hear “conference” and roll their eyes. Conferences are boring, conferences kinda suck, conferences are just ok – but I just heard about this cool new conference about…

Why are some conferences great, and some not so great? One thing that makes a huge difference is who owns the conference. Most people don’t think much about it, but conferences are owned and produced in various ways, each of which has some pros and cons.

If you’ve never considered it before, ask yourself: how is the conference organizer making money? 

Continue reading “Who owns that conference?”