When Christian Thomson organized the first Canadian Internet Marketing Conference in Squamish two years ago, he says people were a bit confused as to why the event was so removed from Vancouver’s urban centre.
Now called Change in the Making Conference, the event brings together marketing and PR experts to share ideas on how the industry is evolving, and Thomson says returning attendees have clued in to why they chose their picturesque location.
“You had to be more committed to come. So if you were coming you weren’t nipping back to the office at lunchtime to check your emails. You were here for the full two days,” he says, mentioning that about 95 per cent of people attending last year were from outside the Sea to Sky Corridor.
Held at the CN Roundhouse and Conference Centre on April 5 and 6, Thomson says that the two-day event takes on the atmosphere of a business retreat rather than a conference.
“It’s got a different vibe to it. Rather than being a conference in an airport hotel in a kind of stuffy room, it’s got this cool freshness about it.”
Big brands featured this year include Facebook, Instagram, Starbucks, Twitter, YouTube, BuzzFeed, Google, Pixar, Visa, Bitly and L’Oreal.
The CIMC was born from the simple desire to learn more about the industry from experts in their field, says Thomson, who founded his company, Marwick Marketing, in 2011. The idea was to collect all of the people he wanted to learn from in one space and share that opportunity with other interested industry professionals.
“We sat down and we were talking about how we’re in the knowledge industry so the more we can learn and understand the better we can pass it on to the clients.”
But instead of inviting people who spoke at conferences consistently, Thomson wanted to invite some new perspectives from brands and companies he thought were innovating or navigating the digital marketing world especially well.
Thomson has also sourced several agencies to promote the event rather than having a core team doing it all.
“We think of the conferences as an open platform, so this year we have an agency managing all the social media, a different agency running all the email campaigns, same for the PR and the website... We’ve brought in partners to take ownership of different elements of that,” he says.
A few of those agencies will also have the opportunity to share their experience promoting the event with the people attending, a unique perspective to analyze what worked and the strategies that fell flat.
The conference itself has evolved over the past two years, says Thomson, who noticed that they were limiting the potential of the event by focusing solely on Internet marketing.
“The general trend is it’s more of a complete marketing conference and that’s what we’ve seen as a progression through what the different topics and presenters and speakers have taught the audience over the last two years. Yes, you can focus on one area but it needs to be cohesive across all the channels.
“I think the conference has adapted in terms of the way that even the past speakers and presenters have kind of influenced it, an evolution is what we’ve seen.”
CIMC also has its own curriculum now and a syllabus that attendees can access online before they show up to hear the speakers on April 5 and 6. This new development around the event has allowed the team to offer partial ticket funding for business owners in the province through the B.C. jobs grant.
Business in Vancouver magazine will also be hosting the Western Canadian Marketing and PR awards at the event.
