CONFERENCE RECAPS

Life changing doesn’t even begin to describe my experience as a 2014 AdColor Future. Yes a fully paid trip to sunny Los Angeles, CA was great but the real highlights of the AdColor Future’s Program came from the week long experience. The opportunity to learn and bond with forty of the top emerging multicultural professionals in the communications industry was enlightening. Their stories and advice gave me inspiration to apply to my current job and my growing career. I had access and exposure to some of the most successful, senior level executives in the industry. Often inaccessible, I had the opportunity to network and set into motion the beginnings of new opportunities, partnerships, mentorships and more. Education was also integral to the AdColor Future’s experience. Through the efficacy training I learned how to navigate industry issues faced by multicultural talent and forward my career through network building. Attending the conference gave me insight into some of the be...

“Purpose is the new digital.” This is the bold statement that Max Lenderman, Founding Principal at School, used to open his Advertising Week session “On Purpose: The New Face of Cause Marketing.” 20 years ago he says, digital was about banner ads, and people did not yet understand how it would eventually revolutionize our industry and the way consumers interact with brands. While still in its infancy, Lenderman believes that “purpose” today has the same power. Through the session, he shows that responsible brands, products and even advertising campaigns are simply more successful.  Less than a third of consumers believe companies are doing enough to solve social and environmental issues they care about, and a majority would not care if 70% of brands disappeared in the future. Yet, almost all of them would be ready to switch to a brand of similar price and quality if it supported a good cause. On top of it, consumers are likely to talk about this cause, or boycott a company...

THE 3% CONFERENCE NEW YORK by Alexander Dean Thursday, May 8th @ 6pm – Ogilvy, New York Why do outdated misconceptions about the ever-changing market still prevail and put women in the 3% corner? If 96% of advertising is targeted towards women, then why the creative power only consists of this near-invisible number of female positioning in creative directors roles? These were two of the main questions that triggered THE 3% CONFERENCE at Ogilvy and provided its founder Kat Gordon with a full throttle start into this highly controversial subject matter that shouts out for social change and female inclusion in a work force designed to attract women participants. Kat brought this even to New York as part of a series of “road shows” appearing in major cities across the country and educating its audiences on how can we make change. One of the most provocative pieces presented during Kat Gordon’s introduction was the Mad Women video (YouTube link below), which centers around women in top cr...

The Connected World It was an energetic and vibrant environment at the New York Times Center Stage during one of the morning sessions of the Advertising Week conference held which took place from September 23-27. The connected world, starring Shelly Palmer, host "Shelly Palmer Digital Living" outlined how technology is quickly becoming adapted to everyday activities and lives. Participants were shown an exclusive video of a virtual connected home, shopping center, and workplace, it showcased demonstrations of how consumers are changing,  using connected devices in various facets of their lives. Participants were exposed to terms like the Internet of Things (IoT), Machine to Machine (MtoM)—terms used to describe how devices have become more connected than ever before. Finally, session participants were advised to learn how to integrating marketing and advertising in the connected space.  Mobile Matters in a Multiscreen World  This session present...

Advertising Week 2013: The Visual Revolution and The New Creative Director By Edward Arredondo Dear friends and colleagues:   Late last year I had the opportunity to attend Advertising week which ran from September 23 to the 27th for the first time.  Sitting in the Times theater, surrounded by hundreds of professionals well versed in and passionate about their craft, I felt fortunate at being able to witness in person the many intelligent observations from several distinguished thought leaders in the field of Marketing, Advertising and even Design.  Two sessions that resonated with me were the "The Visual Revolution" and "The New Creative Director". The Visual Revolution Panel:   Ari Lewine - Co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer,Triple Lift             Doug Scott - President, Ogilvy Entertainment             John Cantarella - President, Digital, News and Sports Group, T...

By Alex Suazo In a perfect world, I would have sat in my seat in front of the Evolve Media Stage, at Internet Weeks’ HQ, the entire week of May 19th. Instead, I could only attend one day but nonetheless learned so much from a variety of different marketing and digital industry professionals. The focus of conversation on the Evolve Media Stage Tuesday, hosted in tandem with social CRM enterprise Oracle Social, was retail and smart commerce. Panels and presentations included discussions around, “Harnessing Social Media for Authentic Commerce”, “Behavior of Shoppers – Truth About Shopping”, “Intelligent Packaging”, just to name a few.
 One of the key learnings that I felt echoed across all the panels was the fact that shopping is still a very emotional human behavior despite technology innovation; the reasons why we shop haven’t changed, it’s how we shop that has. Retailers are doing themselves a major disservice by trying to only focus on the “how” – the technical part of th...