We’re a few weeks into 2017 now, but you may still be wondering how you can really jumpstart your business’ growth this year. But there’s only so much brainstorming you can do with your colleagues; to really do something new, you’ll have to step outside.
Thankfully, there’s a bevy of great conferences where you can learn some tricks, network with your peers and discuss upcoming trends and ideas. There are a lot of conferences out there, but you won’t be able to check out all of them. That’s why it’s important to make sure the ones you attend are worth your time and money—so we vetted a handful that we’re sure you’ll love.
No matter where in the world you are, you’ll likely be able to attend one of these conferences without travelling too far. And if you can’t make any, a few release their talks digitally—so there’s something everyone can enjoy. Check out our top five recommended social media conferences of 2017, offering tips on reputation management, community monitoring, artificial intelligence and more!
SOCIAL MEDIA WEEK
Where & When
New York, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Milan, London, Jakarta and more throughout the year—check site for full list of cities and dates.
What to Look For
One of the biggest social media conferences of 2017, this conference spans (you guessed it) an entire week in twelve cities across the globe throughout the year. The conference features some of the most innovative thinking on how the internet is changing business and culture, with past speakers like Ben Boskovich of Esquire, Bob Cohn of the Atlantic, Chris Cox of Facebook and more.
This year’s conference has quite a collection of timeless as well as forward-thinking talks. Contently’s How to Build an Online Community That Doesn’t Suck promises to show brands the ins-and-outs of community building, while The Future of Human-Computer Interaction might inspire you to invest in machine learning and artificial intelligence to influence behavior.
AD:TECH
Where & When
New Delhi, Sydney, Shanghai, San Diego and more—check the site for full list of cities and dates.
What to Look For
With conferences spread across four continents, you can bet ad:tech offers a unique networking experience and cross-pollination of interesting ideas. In fact, while events are hosted across the globe, ad:tech is Asia’s biggest marketing conference.
Details are scant on specific talks in most locations for this year, but one particularly hot topic for the New Delhi event is Brands as Chatty Friends, hosted by Nestle, which is focused on how brands can make use of bots and AI in advertising.
SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING WORLD
Where & When
March 22-24 in San Diego
What to Look For
Based in San Diego this spring, this conference expects over 3,000 in attendance to network and learn from industry greats. In addition to enjoying the many scheduled talks, you can take part in free workshops throughout the conference for some hands-on learning. And if you can’t make it, that’s okay; get digital access to talks with the virtual ticket.
There are a few awesome-sounding talks to look out for this year. How to Manage Your Next Social Media Crisis is a panel discussion about reputation management (always a good topic to brush up on). We’re also interested in How to Use Bots and Messaging Apps to Improve Your Customer Service, which has a truly forward-thinking approach on using artificial intelligence for community monitoring with the latest tech.
DIGITAL MARKETING & STRATEGY INNOVATION SUMMIT
Where & When
April 26 & 27 in Hong Kong.
What to Look For
This digital marketing-focused conference features over 20 industry leading speakers, including Alibaba, Facebook, HSBC, eBay and more. The value here lies in reaping the rewards of heavyweight Fortune 500 companies and their case studies across different industries. Can’t make it to the conference? No problem—Innovation Enterprise has an on-demand service rich with resources, talks and content from the conference that you can enjoy from home.
We’re looking forward to When Customers Become Campaigners, a talk from Target’s General Manager of China on cultivating brand advocates. Another talk to watch out for is Social Media and Your Customer, which promises to teach you everything you need to know about managing your social channels to their highest potential for better community monitoring.
SOCIAL MEDIA SHAKEUP
Where & When
May 22-24 in Atlanta, GA
What to Look For
This is the conference to check out if your primary concern is community monitoring and reputation management. Of course, you’ll learn plenty of other strategies there as well, from huge brands like IBM, Samsung, Gartner and more.
What are we excited for? First, there’s a lot to learn from a panel featuring reps from the American Cancer Society, Nissan and more on beefing up community monitoring efforts. If you need an extra push on developing awesome brand communities, don’t forget to check out Brands as Customer Communities to see how cultivating a community can impact your business for the better. Finally, anticipate any disaster with When the S**t Hits the Fan, which will teach you how to deal with any crisis online.