Not Advertising Week

I'm not going to Advertising Week.

I am launching a new event attendance and sponsorship strategy for my day job where we go the events that matter to the brands we serve. Sounds like an obvious but also novel concept at the same time.

I've grown disenchanted with the majority of our industry events. So much of the content is pay-for-play, overloaded with vendors just talking to other vendors, and fewer and fewer actual brands attending.

Instead, you'll see the team and I showing up at events I've never been to. Events that are not necessarily marketing and advertising trade shows but serve the broader needs of our client's sectors.

For example, would you normally expect to see a media analysis company show up at an FMCG / grocery trade show? Well, you're about to.

Today, I'm at Groceryshop in Las Vegas to meet 1:1 with retailers and grocery brands...with barely any ad tech vendors in sight. I'm pretty pumped about it.

It feels a little "fish out of water" too if Im honest. It isn't my typical show, with all my typical industry buddies in attendance.

If your brand's core industry trade bodies have killer events coming up, I'd love to hear about them. Reply back to this email. That's where we plan to be from 2025, onward.

I'll still be at CES, IAB ALM, and possibly POSSIBLE next year. The rest is a blank slate, and I couldn't be more excited about it.

My Groceryshop Preview

At this week's Groceryshop conference in Las Vegas, the Retail Media track is filled with sessions about how CPG companies and retailers are pouring traditional shopper marketing dollars into digital media.

Here is a preview of the sessions I’m most interested to attend: