Leigh Simpson
Here is a quick rundown of my highlights of the week at my very first Inbound 2017. If this is anything to go by, it will be the first of many trips to Boston.
# 5 - The Food Trucks in the Sunshine
Who turned up the temperature - balmy days in September were the icing on the cake in Boston. But a guy has to eat right! Boy, Inbound 2017 did not disappoint. Fish & Chips, toasted cheese sandwiches, teriyaki chicken, pizza, curry, you name it, they had it.
What an excellent way to recharge and refuel all ready for the afternoon sessions.
#4 - Ed Catmull -
The Pixar founder who brought us Buzz Lightyear, Sully, Lightning McQueen provided a masterclass in developing creativity in your organisation. Ed defined creativity as the process of how we solve problems and explained it as a response to when things go wrong.
In Ed's examples from Pixar and Disney, he built trust in peer to peer networks where he removed protocol and barriers to allow creativity to flow between teams to address challenges in the filmmaking process. You can find more on his techniques can in his acclaimed book, Creativity, Inc.
#3 - The hilarious Brian & Dharmesh Puppets
Dude, you're a puppet.
What a way to open it; inbound legends and Hubspot founders Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah were transformed into cool puppets to stop them from getting to Inbound. So clever - catch the video here on youtube
What followed were two compelling keynotes about scale-up culture, delighting customers and growing to be better as individuals and companies.
Supporting their message were the new product announcements for Hubspot, including Sales Professional, Conversations, Customer Hub and the intriguing integration of Motion.ai. You can find more info on these features here.
#2 - Inbound Rocks
After two full-on days of intense learning, it was a welcome change to see these two funny and controversial comedians. Tiffany Haddish opened, and there were tears literally running down my face, although I'm not 100% sure if they were from laughter or fear - boy, this girl has some crazy shit going on inside her head - and she just lets it all come out with no filters.
Judd Apatow followed with an array of self-deprecating tales interwoven with vast amounts of political satire and irony. A hugely popular stand-up performance from Judd capped off a fantastic day.
#1 - Michelle Obama
You could run out of superlatives writing about this remarkable woman. She is such a natural and engaging orator that she captivated the 21,000 person audience with her stories and tales of living in the White House and her life before and since.
Without mentioning Donald Trump's name once, she was gracious in her support for the office, but clearly, she is not happy with how the POTUS is conducting himself, especially in his attempts to unpick the work of the previous administration.
On this performance at Inbound 2017, you cannot rule out a severe tilt for the Presidency sometime in the future from her.
Special Mention - Mark Jeffries
The host with the most - the Inbound MC Mark gave us a better "pick me up" every morning than a double espresso. His anecdotes about presenting, coupled with a few hints and tips, were a great start to each day and the only complaint is that we didn't see more of him during the week.
So there you go; these were my highlights of Inbound 2017. Leave me a comment on your highlights below, or to find out more about what I learnt and how you can use this knowledge in your business, contact me or follow me on Twitter or LinkedIn. You can find more information on how Insynth Marketing can help you on your Inbound journey on our website.
About Insynth
At Insynth we deliver a predictable flow of leads, customers, and specifications for building product brands through our inbound marketing approach, proven to reach a technically demanding audience.
We use the latest marketing techniques such as construction inbound marketing, to equip building product companies to grow sustainability in this era of digital transformation.
As the only HubSpot certified agency to major in construction marketing. We have a proven formula of bringing a variety of functionalities together including CRM Implementation, Web Design, Sales Automation, SEO, and Email Marketing to achieve your ultimate aim: Growing your business and gaining new specifiers and customers.