April was hectic as one can tell when not much is posted. One highlight was the annual visit of the Ad: Tech show to San Francisco. This is by far the best non-industry specific show that I attend. I discovered this gem three years ago and set my calendar around its arrival. This show is about the merging of advertising with the web. Most understand this, but haven’t completely embraced what that means –including me.
Even at the show more traditional ad-related companies bring some dimension of the Internet to what they offer, but I suspect that too many are still stuck in an old paradigm. Ferreting out those that really get it and are relevant to your need is the challenge, but absolutely worth it. We knew during the bubble that the Internet was changing everything, but got confused that shipping dog food and dry cleaning your clothes were not exactly ideal target markets. This continues to be the challenge of the Internet, but I wholly endorse this show as a place to see what is possible and a place to open your eyes to new approaches to driving revenue. I am sure looking forward to that.
One of the most remarkable characteristics of this show are the keynotes, which are free with show floor admission. Keynotes tend to be one of the most formulaic and too often boring aspects of trade shows. Usually some industry leader –that we want to hear from, serves up some pablum and “new” product or dimension introduction. Some Ad:Tech keynotes could be criticized as getting close to that, but I have not heard a bad one. I can’t name another show where you cannot go to hear a bad one–at least one.
So I told you. If you have anything to do with selling, aside from that hot date you are after, you cannot go wrong at this show. If you attend and don’t get it and don’t learn something, look into another career. I will be very disappointed if you don’t see lessons from our show visit as we redesign our website.