Hot topics at the Festival of Enterprise

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This week we are exhibiting at the Festival of Enterprise at the NEC in Birmingham, 23-24th Oct. We’ve not done this show before and it made a nice change to be heading up north to Birmingham instead of London where most of the industry shows tend to take place.

We took our new stand which we are really pleased with – certainly gives the boys a good work out putting it up!

The Vertical Leap stand at the Festival of Enterprise
Our new stand at the Festival of Enterprise

Our show team, pictured below, consists of Chris Pitt, Operations Director (front), James Cooper, Business Development Manager (back) and Nathan Tetley, Sales Support (left).

Chris, James and Nathan at the Festival of Enterprise

We asked them what they thought of the show so far, what questions people have been asking and what the hot topics are in the industry at the moment.

Chris Pitt – Operations Director

“It’s a really nice event! It’s a smaller footprint in comparison to what we normally do in London, but great to see LinkedIn and Google both having a presence. I suspect the show may grow. Quite surprising though to be having conversations with people that aren’t doing (and have never done) any SEO or PPC for their business!

“However, we also had lots of good conversations with companies that are doing PPC. Some of the smaller companies are realising that they need to get clever with their targeting if they want to compete with bigger players in the market. We chatted to them about how to really drill down into the targeting options on the Google Display Network, and how to use things like audience layering and data science in their search campaigns so that you pay more for the people who are more likely to buy from you, and less for the ones less likely to buy. This means they can reduce wasted spend and increase their ROI,

“It’s been really great to talk to these companies and see them get inspired about getting the edge over their competitors.”

James Cooper – Business Development Manager

“I’ve had some great conversations so far with a lot of interest in AI and machine learning. People want to know how they can apply it to their digital marketing and how it will deliver a competitive advantage. It’s a really hot topic at the moment but there is also a lot of confusion about how to incorporate it into their businesses.

“People are also really keen to understand how they can make more of the data available to them, and understand their target market better so that they can make their marketing more relevant and cut through the noise.”

Related content: AI in marketing – how to find the right data sources

Chris’s presentation

As usual at these events, Chris was presenting. His talk was called ‘Why data science will help you suck less at marketing‘.

He spoke about the phenomenal amount of data that marketers need to collate and analyse, and the endless amount of marketing tools on offer that claim to make sense of it. He went on to explain how data science can help you overcome these problems by unearthing key threats and opportunities and revealing really powerful insights that will give you the edge over your competitors.

Chris on stage at the Festival of Enterprise
Chris hopefully not insulting the audience by telling them they suck at marketing!

Hopefully day two will be just as good! If you’re thinking of popping along to the Festival of Enterprise, come and see us on stand F20 – you’re welcome to pick our brains and eat as many sweets as you like!

Or if you’d like to chat to one of our search marketing specialists, call 02392 830281 or submit your details here.

Michelle Hill profile picture
Michelle Hill

Michelle joined Vertical Leap in 2011 as Marketing Manager, having spent the previous 15 years of her marketing career in the recruitment, leisure and printing industries. Her passions include dogs, yoga, walking, cycling, the beach, mountains and tapas.

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