The Event Content Lifecycle Nobody Teaches You

[00:00:07] Hey everybody, welcome back to Event About It, the Dynamic Dialogue After Show. I'm your host, Megan Martin, and I am here today with Stephanie Wells. For anyone just joining us in the after show, we owe you a quick introduction. Stephanie is an event content and go-to-market strategy leader with over 20 years of experience helping global organizations turn events into engines for customer engagement, revenue growth, and brand leadership. She's led content strategy and large-scale event initiatives for some of the largest

[00:00:37] tech companies in the Bay Area and even did work with the United Nations. Her founding story is amazing, so head to the main episode to check all that out. She's also a founding member of the Event Content Council and has spent two years embedded inside the world of hands-on training at Skillable. This fall, she's launching her own firm, Gold Heart Events. She is the person you're going to want to call if your event has sessions but no strategy. And if you caught the main episode, you already know why that's important.

[00:01:07] So, let's get right into it. I kind of want to know and kind of expand a little bit on what we talked about in the after show or in the main episode. So, walk me through what a full event content cycle looks like when you're an in-house planner. So, for someone maybe that's working for an agency wanting to go in-house, what does that look like? Because both of us agree that content should come first before operations and logistics. That's not always the

[00:01:37] reality. So, if content goes first. So, what does that life cycle look like? So, ideally, even if you have a really big event team, you might not be able to pull this off, but ideally it should start, if you're doing say like an annual flagship event, your next year's planning for that event should start while the first one is still in motion. So, I would think it in your like ultimately

[00:02:06] when that flagship wraps, you're going to be getting survey feedback. You're going to know what landed, what didn't, what drove pipe, what was less successful in that. And that is a great data point. So, we're the like first and last out the gate in a way. We wrap everything up and then we start everything like immediately after the flagship wraps.

[00:02:32] So, you want to ideally have a database. Like please have a good data foundation. Like if we need to have discussions about what does that mean? Because data can, using different lenses with the same data can produce very different results.

[00:02:52] So, I would say that content and operations really do work hand in hand. One of the critical things that you're, of course, as any event content person needs to know is your venue is going to dictate a lot of your strategy. So, it's how many rooms can we have? What is the budget for getting those rooms? How do we split them? How big are they? How much capacity? How many butts and seats do we have to work with per room?

[00:03:19] How many time blocks are there? How many, how long is everything? What kinds of content? So, do we want long form? Do we want breakouts? Do we want short form like theaters? Do we want training? Like what do we want? What is important? And I think there's two ways to, there's a couple ways to look at it. So, you can also like really important to ask the questions about who is this event for?

[00:03:42] Is this event going to be a prospecting event where maybe you're not going to have like deep training? Is it a marketing event where you're going to have like more breakout sessions, more sort of small bites for people to consume? Is it like, for example, is it like, for example, a dev con where your audience is that developer, that very, very technical attendee that needs in-depth training?

[00:04:09] Like they need labs, they need training, they need, you know, as deep as you can get to the bottom of the ocean if you want. So, what is this going to look like? Is it going to change from last year? And I do think that there is goodness in looking at like really honest, just be super honest about what work with them and then go from there. So, those are important things. There's also like anybody, again, who's worked in event content knows the push pull.

[00:04:38] Like you can say that I'm building, we can all say I'm building this event for the attendees. I'm building this event for the customers. We know that there's going to be business drivers. We know that there's going to be, we're not here in the room just to like, you know, glad hands and like kiss babies and stuff like that. We're not, that's really not why we're here. We're here to move product, right? We're here to like, for the pipeline. We're here to, you know, basically like help sales, help us keep our jobs.

[00:05:04] So, you have to understand how those business drivers are woven into the content that you're going to be planning. I think it's also really important to understand what is going to be foundational, what is probably not going to change and what is going to be fluid. So, are we talking about like, depending on your company, depending on the event, what elements are going to be fluid that you kind of need to keep an eye on as you're moving through this and always have in your back pocket.

[00:05:33] We all call it like the back pocket allocations. Like you don't give away 100% of your allocations. You save a percentage of that for those executive needs, for those like, I can't tell you how many conferences I've worked on where like the week before we've acquired a company. And so, all of a sudden we have to get, we have to have three sessions about this company, like in like a week before, two weeks before an event. And so, we had to use that back pocket allocation for things of that nature.

[00:06:00] So, again, like what's foundational, what's fluid, what are known, like known elements, what are unknowns, who is this for, and then who can deliver this. There's so much nuance in it. And there's just so much, like, do we want the people who are the audience draws? Do we want to give new people a chance? Do we want them to be mostly customers? Do we want them to be mostly partners? Do we want them to be salespeople? Do we want them to be sneeze? Like, what do we want?

[00:06:30] And I think like at the end of the day, one of the things that I have learned is the reporting, especially if you're a high growth company, especially your reporting is going to be your gold. Like, it is going to be something that if you don't mail it and be thoughtful about it before, like way before the event launches,

[00:06:58] then it's going to be kind of meaningless. So take the time in your event, in your strategizing, in your like overall event planning. What do you want to ask? How do you want to measure this? Do you want to measure it the same way you did last year for continuity? Are there other elements that we should be measuring this year? How are we going to do that? And make sure that like everybody who needs to measure that knows what they're supposed to be measuring.

[00:07:27] I've gone through major conferences where we were not thoughtful enough and communicated enough of what we needed. And just our data analysts, like they didn't know because they're not event content people. Correct. They pulled out data. Like it was really good work, but it wasn't data that was meaningful to us and didn't push us forward. So yeah, I'm also kind of a data nerd. No, I think all of that ties in.

[00:07:55] It's so important because if you understand the event you're building, why you're building it, who you're building it for, and you have, as you said, that foundational layer before you even actually start picking a session or a speaker or anything, it's a lot easier to measure on the back end. Because all of your data should support answering your why. And if you can do that, then it tells the story in an impactful way.

[00:08:25] Like, did this actually do what we intended it for do? I mean, if you break it down to a scientific level, that's how scientists work. They have a hypothesis. They know why they're doing the study. And then they do the study. And then they measure against their why. And events as a science are the same way. But without understanding, if you're just doing events to do an event and no one can answer who it's for, what it's supposed to do, then why are you doing it in the first place? Why are we allocating budget?

[00:08:53] Like, it's a lot of budget to pull this thing off. Yeah, I'll take that I'm a scientist. We're event scientists. Yeah, totally. Event content scientists over here. I love it. So I'm curious, too, when you start putting these agendas together, a lot of events have a theme for the year or what the purpose of the event is. It ties in with the theme.

[00:09:16] I have found that majority of the time, attendees cannot necessarily regurgitate what that theme was. So I think a lot of times we create these themes and try to connect it all together with, you know, a red thread. And the participants generally don't know what that theme is at all.

[00:09:36] So how do you then start tying this content together to really tell a story arc over the one-day, multi-day event, maybe hour-long event? How do you structure that content to tell that story and have that story arc when majority of them don't even understand the theme? Or your participants don't know the underlying foundation of the why and who and all that. Like, they have different perspective.

[00:10:06] Yeah, I found... I'm going to swing big here. To be really honest, I feel like a lot of event sort of themes or subheadings are... It's word soup. Like, it really doesn't... Like, again, my opinions on AI are quite strong, too.

[00:10:23] But, like, if I see another event, like the company, ex-company here, colon, your AI leader, like, or your AI conference, the AI conference, the realist AI, like, come on. Like, it doesn't... It doesn't... Do you really think that drives attendance? Like, it's... No. So why have it? I think that also if you do...

[00:10:46] So let's just say, again, swinging big, let's just get rid of, like, overall event themes, like, on paper. I don't think it's a very good marketing tool. It doesn't really sell a lot. Your company should be your biggest branding. And there are ways, though, of course, of, like, having an internal red thread. Like, I think it's a smart thing to do. I don't think it's necessary, but I think that it's smart.

[00:11:15] So it always should be, you know, keynote lands the big messaging. And then usually what happens is there is, like, a technical drill down. So what I've seen work the best is sort of breakout session format of you have one subject matter expert. I said student matter, not student matter.

[00:11:36] So subject matter expert on stage with usually somebody who's more on the business side of, like, why this should be important to your business and how do you make it impactful to your business? So you kind of have, like, the subject matter expert and then the application layer. So the person who's applying all of that to their real-world scenario of, like, here's how you would use this in your everyday. Yeah. This is the why. This is what the results are, how they're going to change your business.

[00:12:02] This is the how of how we're actually going to implement that. Those are what I've seen the most successful because there's people in your audience, especially if you're doing, like, a big flagship conference who are both. Usually people show up who are not, like, everybody's wearing a little bit too hats or they're taking information back to their team who are maybe in a different, maybe they're more sales or maybe they're more technical. And you want to make sure that you address both sides of this.

[00:12:32] So there's that red thread. Usually there's a few of those coming from keynote or whatever keynote, if you're doing multiple keynotes over multiple days. Then you kind of, like, supplement that with maybe short-form content. So, say, theater sessions or even, like, demos on the expo floor, interactive demos, things like that. And for the real hands-on part of it, of course, labs. Sometimes that can be more challenging just to be totally honest.

[00:13:01] That's debuting net new stuff. Like, if you're at a DEVCON and something goes wonky, that's because it's brand, brand new out of the box. Like, that day it was under embargo. And so it might be a little, like, you're kicking the tires on it. But I think that's the general gist of how the red thread goes. Again, I feel like we're over-indexing on the red thread. I think that, like, of course we should have a content North Star. Of course.

[00:13:31] Like, absolutely. But I do feel like event teams spend a lot of time gilding the lily and really trying to refine what that looks like. And I think that time can be spent in other ways. Our attendees are intelligent. Yeah, I agree with that 100%. So with all that, I think that's a great framework to follow. Where does then sponsored content come into that? Because a lot of times I think we build these great agendas.

[00:13:58] And then we do it, you know, as the very first thing. We're like, this is what we're trying to accomplish. These are the keynotes. This is how we're going to build breakout sessions and labs after the keynotes to build that story arc. And then sales goes out. And now all of a sudden you have 15 sponsored breakout sessions. And that have to fit into this narrative that you've built. So where's the balance of sponsored and owned content? That's a great question.

[00:14:31] Lovingly, anybody who's worked with sponsored content knows that it is a different beast. It is its own animal. It operates. Like, there's a way that you want it to operate. And then there's a realistic way that it's going to operate. And that means it's usually going to be last minute. It might be completely off topic. Like, you have no idea. You really hope that it's not a sales pitch. Like, you really hope.

[00:14:54] And I think over the years I've seen event teams get a lot more helpful in communicating to their sponsors about like, hey, this is the theme that we're doing. This is the red thread or what we're trying to drive home with this. Because you're here because your product actually is one of those solutions. You're partnering with us or, you know, you are in part of the solution.

[00:15:22] But I think that like, yeah, it's treated like completely separately. It does get difficult when you are creating your event strategy. And like I said, you're looking at your real estate. You're looking at the number of rooms you have, amount of time slots that you have. And you have to say you have 100 sessions and you have to factor in 25 sponsored sessions. That can be tough. That can be tough.

[00:15:48] And it's also like when you're scheduling them, for example, you're not going to like book in the entire event with all your sponsors. Sponsors aren't going to like that. So how do you find a balance between your really important sessions, like breakout sessions that are supposed to drive business goals and supposed to, you know, answer attendee pain points and also make your sponsors happy? Because frankly, event budgets are getting smaller and smaller and we love and need our sponsors.

[00:16:18] Yes. And I think there is a good way to weave them together. But as you said, it is a balance and a fine line. And this is where being collaborative with any sponsored content or sponsored session really sponsors in general and making them part of the bigger story. I think it enables them to not feel like they're doing a sales pitch and that they can participate and get what they need out of the event.

[00:16:42] But it takes a lot of conversation and trainings and you have to bring them into the conversation as early as possible. Yeah. And it really depends on who's in the room. So it and that is tough because they're a sponsor and they are not as sort of beholden as like employees are, employee speakers or even customer speakers for that matter.

[00:17:06] You are so lucky if you get somebody who a sponsored speaker who is truly a speaker and does want to be, like you said, a collaborative part of this event. And oftentimes you get kind of mixed with that with like somebody who really like just came in at the last minute, flew into network and is like delivering a sales pitch, which, you know, then they wonder why there were people were leaving and there's only like five seats left in the audience. Exactly. Exactly right.

[00:17:34] OK, so this kind of I'm going to take us a little bit of a different direction, but it kind of goes in the same. And it's on who owns the content piece, because right now we're seeing a lot in the space where marketing is getting involved because they want creators, influencers. They want a lot more user generated content to use in the marketing side of things. And that's very much trickling into programming and the content that goes on during the event.

[00:18:02] So two kind of part question here. One, who should own event content? Let's say they don't have a content strategist on their team. Should they have one? And if they don't, who owns that? And then where do creators and influencers start playing into the space? Are they speakers? Do they have their own track? Are they brought into the content conversation in a different way? I'm going to give like the lamest answer is it depends.

[00:18:31] OK, which I think like if you look, it depends on what is your event? Like we're going back to this question. Is this a DevCon, right? Is this a very it's a it's a. DevCon's anything that's technical requires time. And how are you going to use that precious time with your attendees? Are your attendees like really going to be interested in like a track of all influencers when they could be getting their hands on?

[00:19:00] Like I was talking about DevCon to the latest and greatest when they could be learning more about the latest and greatest when they could be getting their hands on it. Probably not the most appropriate setting for like heavy on the influencers and heavy on the creators. Marketing event, like a big marketing event. So I could imagine something like this happening at like a Dreamforce or something where they do have like they would have an influencer track. They would really lean into the influencers and creators.

[00:19:29] I could see that being a more appropriate fit. I think, though, like who go back to fundamentally, like who's there? What do they want to learn? What are these influencers talking about? What are the creators? What is the substance of what they're doing? Is it like I mean, I've seen great like influencers, but they're like comedians and they're doing comedy bits about like the corporate world and conferences. I think it's hilarious. But like there's a time for that and a place for that.

[00:19:58] But there was one last year that like there was a huge stink because they had a tech show in the Bay Area, had a comedian come and he poked fun at everything about the corporate world. And not a lot of people liked it. I thought his jokes were hilarious, but it definitely ruffled a lot of feathers. Like, oh, I didn't love it. I'm sure. Yeah. Like, no, they say know your audience. But like, who is that? Know your crowd.

[00:20:26] Like, like local jokes get local, local laughs or whatever. Like you got to know it. Don't just plonk it in there. Be intentional about it. I would also say, like, to your question of who owns content. Honestly, the event lead, like the event lead is the tip of the spear for everything else. Why shouldn't they be the tip of the spear for event content? However, they want to drive that. I a lot of the orgs that I've worked in on the in-house marketing teams, they are under marketing.

[00:20:55] I mean, on house event team, excuse me. They are in the marketing org. So, I mean, I think that there is a way and we might talk about this and like content repurposing, but like there is a way to think about longer term content in a way that doesn't like sacrifice quality, if that makes sense. Yeah. Well, let's get into that because that's kind of where I wanted to go next was on the repurposing side.

[00:21:23] I think people haven't quite figured out this like always on content engine and I think events and the content specifically at events are when done correctly. So, you and I have agreed on this, like either do it properly or don't do it at all really. And when done properly, your events and the content that comes out of your events is a gold mine for first party data on exactly what your customers and prospects are looking for.

[00:21:52] And it gives you an opportunity to keep feeding that engine because you know what they're looking for. So, you can send them white papers, webinars, other events, invite them to intimate community events. Like there's so much there. So, how do you approach and think about that content repurposing and extending that, you know, three days of content into a year round? Like what does that actually look like? I think that there's like there's a few ways you can approach it.

[00:22:20] Um, I have a background also in content marketing. So, I get it and in social media. So, I get it. Like I really do understand how powerful it can be and what you can do with it. Um, I think that oftentimes it's not the reason why it doesn't get used like do it right or don't do it. The reason why like I don't think it gets done right is because frankly we don't have enough time. Yeah.

[00:22:46] We're not thinking, we're thinking about how to get, you know, how to get butts in seats, how to have those like audience acquisition plays. We're thinking about how to like address budget, nail down all the content we have to. Teams are leaner than ever. Ideas and visions are bigger than ever. Like how do we accomplish that? And then we rarely think about like really intentionally and thoughtfully and take the time to look at what are we going to do with this event, post-event content?

[00:23:13] How are we going to make it impactful across content marketing? So, are we looking at like blogs? Are we looking at like, hey, these are my top five, my top whatever takeaways from this conference. Are we looking at social media? Are we looking at activating sales? Like what does that look like? And does that mean we're doing it for every piece of content delivered at the event? If you're, that's expensive. Like it just is. It's very expensive.

[00:23:44] And so I think to have those, like have those conversations with not only your marketing team, not only your content marketing folks and your like your communications team. Also with sales beforehand. I know that marketing and sales are sometimes like frenemies. Like we're sometimes like oil and water, but really we're like, we're arm and arm through a lot of this. So try to understand for sales, what is most impactful to them rather than the other way around.

[00:24:13] We just from events dump a ton of content on them. And then they have to spend time sifting through it and finding exactly what they need or coming back to the event team and saying, hey, I'm looking for this tiny clip of this tiny thing. Let's be strategic together and say, this is what you guys are going to get at the end of this. Yeah. Like this is as much as we can tell you about what's happening. And this is what, you know, we can't do everything. We do have limits. If you had the biggest budget in the world, you could do all of it.

[00:24:38] But like partnering together, especially these days and getting ahead of it is so crucial to success. Yeah, I agree. Things all repurposing conversations happen before the event even starts of like, this is what we want to do with it. And then backing into, well, this is what's going to be available. Where do we, you know, bridge the gap between those two? Yeah. I think that's great.

[00:25:04] Well, one thing also we've talked a little bit about, and I think sometimes people forget this, is that when we talk about first party data coming out of these events, and we talk a lot about marketing and sales, but there's so much more in there too. And we're going to get into some of the hands-on learning and how you structure that at an event and not just talking heads. But some of the information that comes out of there and the data that comes out is great for sales enablement.

[00:25:32] It's great for product development. Because if, let's say you record all of your sessions and then you run a trend on all of those transcripts and the same five questions keep coming up at every training, in every session, maybe your product team needs to know that like there's still a gap in our product and we should address that because everyone's asking this question. Or marketing needs to know it from a brand perspective of like, people keep saying we're this company,

[00:26:01] but really we're trying to be this. So like maybe there's some messaging that needs to go in there. Or customer success, like we need more training because everyone came and signed up for this one hands-on training piece and we're not addressing it. Like we have no collateral outside of the event on this. Have you, when you were in-house, have you guys looked at some of the data in that way? I mean, I hope the answer is yes, but I think the reality is most people aren't connecting those dots.

[00:26:30] Like it goes straight to marketing and sales. I mean, I think, yeah, I think it's like, who cares? Like who is caring? So I think what I've seen at enterprise is that it's just so big and it's really about like an event to most of the companies a moment in time. Right. Like, and I can't tell you how many times, like, for example,

[00:26:56] I, when I was at Skillable, our largest, our largest customer is Microsoft, by and large. Microsoft, huge, huge, of course, global mammoth in the tech industry. And they have what they call update Tuesdays. So everything updates on a Tuesday. Well, guess what also happens on a Tuesdays? Events go off on a Tuesday. So what would happen is the, everything would update.

[00:27:25] It would, like, if there's an update, it's likely it's going to kind of mess up what you're trying to deliver. And so we'd say, oh gosh, like even the event people, like, oh my gosh, like, can't we just sort of like pause the update? And I'm thinking, absolutely not. Like, there's no way that Microsoft leadership and product is going to be like, oh yeah, there's a 20,000, you know, person event going off. That does drive X amount of pipe. But globally, we're looking at orders of magnitude beyond that.

[00:27:54] So it's what they care about. Like, they care about, like, the orders of magnitude versus, like, what might be perceived as, like, a blip in a moment in time in an event. So I think it's who it is. I will say that, like, it, I do think it helps, again, if you, if the leadership is on site and does see it. So if your chief product officer is on site and is, does sort of, like, bop into sessions and see, like, okay, well, I'm going to go into this one.

[00:28:24] I'm going to go into that one. And I'm going to listen meaningfully and hear what people are talking about and listen to, like, the Q&A portion. That can really help. I'll also say that, like, my latest company was a much smaller company. So it was, like, 300 people. And the crux of it was a platform. So, and it was, it's an incredible platform.

[00:28:46] And what we, our leadership, like, our senior, senior leadership, our executive leadership would go on site and watch it in attendees' hands and take notes live. And then come bring it back to our product and platform and infrateams and say, like, okay, these were pain points that the attendees were having. We want to make sure that this is improved upon or gets queued up for our clients to have greater success. So it's, like, not who cares, but who cares?

[00:29:17] Who is human in your company? I think that's a great lens to put it through. And I kind of want to go into that hands-on training. And I think that what you just described is the exact use case for executives at events. I think they should be very detailed observers and seeing and listening and intentionally listening, not just, like, the room is cold or the food sucks, right?

[00:29:45] Like, that's not what they should be listening for at all. But, like, how is our brand resonating? How is our product being used? And I kind of want to go into the hands-on training because I think events are becoming more and more technical. Not in a how do we use your product, but people want the how. I think for a long time, events said the why in thought leadership and we talked very 40,000 foot in the clouds. And now people can get that on YouTube.

[00:30:15] There's all kinds of creators talking about the why you should do something, but people want the how. So talk to me about how you guys have done these hands-on trainings at scale without losing some of the things that make it, like, super valuable. So, like, how do you do it at scale without losing the vision?

[00:30:35] So one of the things that we do, it is interesting because having been in-house managing hands-on training and then being on the vendor side managing hands-on training are very, it's a very interesting place to be in. And also when I was third party, I could see the scope of different customers and how they're approaching it.

[00:30:59] I will say that in this sort of ecosystem event content that hands-on training is expensive. It just is. It's more expensive than breakouts. It's more expensive than theater sessions. Like, it just is. However, it is a major audience acquisition driver. And I think that one of the things that it, you have, the most successful events I've seen, your platform.

[00:31:27] So say like the event platform that I was working for is really close partnership with the event leads. So they are understanding ahead of time and they're understanding what those, not just pain points are in terms of content, but technical pain points. So meaning like, how are we going to, you know, overcome this hurdle? Like we're talking about sometimes it is fundamental foundational content or sometimes it is net new content.

[00:31:57] How are we going to partner together, get ahead, get in front of this to deliver like an alignment with their vision and make sure that the attendees are happy. I think it's also super helpful when we say like, hey, by the way, we've seen this happen with a certain company in hands-on training and that wasn't successful or vice versa. We've seen it with another company and this approach was successful just to let you guys know.

[00:32:23] Um, but yeah, I think that it is, despite being a big budget line, it is, I've seen conference over conference and company over company. It is well spent. Attendees are usually really happy to have it there and it does get people to, to attend the conference. Yeah, I completely agree. And I think that's going to become more important and more of a driver in the future. I mean, it already is.

[00:32:51] Um, I think it's just going to compound itself. So that lends me to now a question. This is a hot debate in the events world. So I want your take on it. And that is celebrity keynotes. I think keynotes are important. Thought leadership at events is important. We still want to have sort of the bigger picture, 40,000 foot view of topics. But how, what's your stance on celebrity keynotes?

[00:33:20] Uh, I think they're a really big budget line. Um, I think it, again, it goes back to the, this was a topic before COVID, right? This is not, this is not new. Um, and again, after COVID, everybody knows attendee, attendee attention spans are so short. Like, I'm super guilty of it. Like, super guilty. Like, you've got to hold my attention for like 90 seconds for me to buy in. And that's tough. Yeah.

[00:33:48] Um, it's the, what it's the substance of what they're talking about. It's how deep these celebrities are willing to go. And I'm not talking about like the Adam grants of the world and the folks who like, they make their, or like even, um, oh goodness. Well, their business is thought leadership. Like that's what they're doing. I'm talking about like the actors. Yes. Cause like Adam Grant, Malcolm Gladwell to me are practitioners. They're just well-known practitioners. Right. Yeah, exactly.

[00:34:17] Like they're in a different category. I'm talking about like pure straight up actors. Like, um, there is, there are ways to do it though. And I'll share one way that, that I found it to be successful. Okay. I think we can all think of plenty of ways where it's unsuccessful. Um, but one year, um, I was working for Tableau and Tableau. If you don't know Tableau, it's a template. It's all about data. It's an, it Salesforce acquired it, um, before the pandemic. Um, and it's meat and potatoes is all about big data.

[00:34:46] So the year of, I think it was the Olympics. So I can't remember which year it is, but, um, the leadership really wanted to have like an Olympic tie-in. And so we're thinking like, I'm thinking, oh my gosh, I'm the content lead for this whole, this whole big shebang. I think it was either my first or second year doing that. And I'm thinking, and I'm like, how do we get Olympics and data, Olympics and data. These days I feel like that is like, it's a layup,

[00:35:13] but I literally was in the pool and I was swimming and I had my Garmin watch on. Um, and I thought, oh my gosh, biometrics, like those kinds of stats. What are you looking for in terms of data as an Olympian? And then I started thinking deeper about it and it's all about data. So we're not, they did these athletes, these Olympic athletes, they were amazing. Alison Felix, Tom Daly, um, showed up and they didn't just talk about like, what it's like to be an Olympian. Like what's your day to day.

[00:35:43] It was, how does that, how do you use data to inform your training schedule, your recovery schedule, your nutrition, all these kinds of things. And these are things that they have been working with, um, for statistics and data for the entirety of their careers. It's all about data when you think about it. So to me, not saying that like, yay me, I nailed it, but like I did. Tap, tap girl, brush it off. You nailed it. That's a genius connection.

[00:36:11] And they were, and they were super, now I feel like we know a lot more of that kind of stuff. You know, um, think about the world cup right now, tons of data out about that. Um, but they were also able to speak to it as a very concrete concept. Like this is something that they work in and they are hands on in every day and have been for their entire careers. So I think it's one thing if you can find that tie in and get those influencer or influencers, excuse me, celebrities to find something that they really do care about.

[00:36:41] And they're also not just care about in sort of a conceptual way, but they have their hands dirty with. I think that leads to successful celebrity keynotes. Um, I think when it's too high level and it's just a chit chat between like a celebrity and like, you know, one of your C-suite, like it's not going to be impactful. People, I, I really think it's important to make the best use of folks' time. Um, especially attendees when they're opting to,

[00:37:10] they're opting to spend like an hour of their very busy schedule with you. So sometimes keynotes, we know it's an hour and a half, which it shouldn't be, but. We'll have to do a whole nother episode, just a timing of sessions and things. Um, okay. So last topic, and then we're going to start wrapping up here, but we've talked a lot about data and reporting and how you should use that to inform future decisions, future events.

[00:37:35] What are some of the things you're looking for in your data, um, that you're putting in a post event report to take to your C-suite to say that our content did what it was supposed to. What are some of those things you're looking at? Um, I think what's interesting is that this is an area that is in constant development. So what I would have measured a couple of years ago is so different from what I would measure today.

[00:38:02] What we're looking for, especially is like quality of delivery and how do we measure that? Um, it's always about successful. Like, for example, I'll use a really, this is a really easy way to measure that. But, um, I was at a high growth company right before this or right before now, um, skillable, which was great. And they were going through sort of their maturity cycle. And we, having been at other companies that are like that, they're really going through periods of, um,

[00:38:32] like tipping points almost in their growth. That fortunately, having gone through that myself saying, okay, our leadership is going to really want stats. They're really going to want data to see where we're going. And I'm thinking it's going to be like this. So for us, what we would do reporting to our leadership, and again, this is net new. They haven't asked us for this in the past is we need data on, um, how many labs were successful, meaning successful. Like they launched, they went smoothly. Um, we filled up the time properly.

[00:39:02] Um, also every repeat of that session, like was how seamless was that? Um, and also like, again, the age old, like request for year over year, year over year. Um, how do we do that year over year? Do we measure it year over year? What is it like? What does the event look like year over year?

[00:39:24] Um, and I think that like, this isn't really addressing, like answering your question, like specifically, but I would say for my advice for folks who have not like been reporting, um, is to be as anticipatory as you possibly can. Um, and try to like find your seat, your C-suite whisperer and understand from them, like, what does this person care about? Like, and then we'll try to back all of that up with data.

[00:39:53] I think this is why ROI is always going to be this, you know, black hole conversation because one size does not fit all. And every event is measured differently and every content strategy is measured differently. And every C-suite wants a different data point and a different message. So what your CFO or CRO is looking at versus your market CMO or your CEO, like all of those are different stakeholders.

[00:40:23] A head of account management is going to look at something very differently from an ABM campaign. And all of those are important and they're all going to require different analysis of the event and the content specifically. So it, I think finding that C-suite whisperer, as you said, is like the most critical piece to actually measuring ROI effectively.

[00:40:46] Knowing your why, knowing the, how you got there, and then knowing what they actually want out of a report is what you need to know to measure ROI impactfully. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Well, let's wrap up because I have loved all of this conversation and your background is so diverse, which is such a superpower for you.

[00:41:08] And now you're putting 20 plus years of all of this amazing background in history and events into your own firm, Goldheart Events. So tell me a little bit about why now, why are you betting on yourself now and how are you going to bring this diverse resume all together into one place under Goldhearts? Sure. Why am I betting on myself now? Like it just feels like the right thing to do at this time.

[00:41:36] It's something that I've explored, like you said, a lot of areas, and this is one area I haven't explored yet. And I also really looking forward to connecting with this beautiful event ecosystem that I've built over the last number of years. One of the things that's really important to me, too, is that has really informed a lot of my career is, like I mentioned earlier, is going to different kinds of events.

[00:42:05] So I'm looking forward to working on different kinds of events. In the past few years, I was really focused on enterprise tech events, you know, really the grind of all of that, making sure that they are executed well and really devoting myself to that.

[00:42:23] And then I started zooming out a little bit and I started working at other much smaller events, festivals, things like that, that really reminded me of how they can be fun, how our work can be fun and got me thinking about how can we really get people who anticipate going to this?

[00:42:45] It's not just because of like, you know, I'm going to learn this or whatever, but like, how do we like creatively re-inject that sense of enjoyment into an event, not just the grind. And so I am launching Gold Heart Events to have a bit more diversity in the portfolio of events that I'm working on. And also just to sort of understand better, like, what does the future look like for events?

[00:43:15] How can we take different kinds of events that are kind of in their own silos and start to interweave them a little bit? So, yeah, so that's something that's coming this fall. And I'm starting to, as they say, activate my network this summer. And then I'd love to have conversations with folks coming this fall. That's amazing. If you had to give a piece of advice to early career, Stephanie, what would that be? Keep swinging big, keep going for it.

[00:43:45] You know, I'll just disclose, like, I had, like, severe learning difficulties. And I felt like I couldn't, you know, achieve what, like, it was not easy for me to achieve things. But I swung big. And I think, like you said, I've bet on myself many times. It's like, well, this is one life. Let's just go for it. Maybe I do have difficulty learning.

[00:44:13] Maybe I do have, you know, ADHD and things that are against me. But you know what? I'm so hungry to, say, work in the music industry. Or I'm so hungry to work, try to, you know, improve the human condition at UNESCO. I'm just going to try. And if I fail, I fail. But I swung as big as I possibly could. Or, you know, I want to work at Salesforce, the NFL of event teams. Like, I just want to try. Like, the worst thing that could happen is no.

[00:44:43] So, like, keep betting on yourself. And, like, yeah, you're going to learn a lot of stuff. Everything's going to go swimmingly. But, like, it's all so worth it. I absolutely love that. Okay. Well, before we let you go, I like to close every after show with a curiosity card. Okay? So you get to pick one, two, or three. Um, I'm going to say the rainbow one is number, the rainbow one. Is that number three? This one?

[00:45:12] Or no, sorry, two. This one. Because we're recording on July 1st and Pride Month just wrapped. Okay. All right. So we're going with number two. So this says, what's one unforgettable act of kindness you've received? Oh, goodness. Gosh. Um, that I've received. You know, we've talked a lot today about, um, humanity and about the nature of events

[00:45:39] and how it means to be human, um, or bring your humanity to events, I should say. And I think the one thing that I really learned is that this is from my, my most recent company is reminding myself that I am a human. The people treating me like I'm a human being. And that is, they don't even like people who I thanked, who I was, you know, expressed gratitude towards about this didn't even register that it was like, they're like, yeah, well, this is normal.

[00:46:08] I'm like, oh no, no, it's not. It can be really easy to feel like your number or your cog in the wheel. And I'm really, it's been such a kindness to work in an environment where I do feel like I can show up as myself authentically and be treated with just human kindness. Like it's, I'm very grateful for that. Yeah, I agree. I think a lot of times we get so busy in the hustle and bustle that we forget there's a

[00:46:35] human on the other end of the phone, the email, you know, whatever it might be. So I think that's a great reminder and a great place to wrap up the show, but thank you so much for being here. I think I could have recorded and continued this conversation for probably another hour, two hours at minimum. I just, I love the way your brain thinks. I love your background and really appreciate you being here and sharing everything with us today. Thank you so much, Megan. This was really fun. Thanks for having us.

[00:47:04] And until next time, stay curious.