Affiliate Summit Recap - Day 3
August 12th, 2008
The final day of Affiliate Summit was pretty light in the morning since most people partied a little too hard the night before. I am proud to say that our team was at the booth bright and early and ready for action. What better way to kickoff the day than to attend a panel session on “The Future of Affiliate Marketing.”
The panelists were:
- Stephanie Gay, Director, External Channels, American Express
- Chris Kramer, Co-Founder & Media Director, NETexponent
- Kim Riedell, Vice President, Client Development-East, Commission Junction
- Steve Schaffer, Founder & CEO, Vertive, Inc.
The panelists tackled several big issues such as where growth will come from in the future, the importance of holistic strategies to affiliate and other online media, the opportunity for affiliate marketing to capture more of online marketing budgets, the value of relationships, and much more. The audience was extremely engaged in the discussion and questions were fielded throughout the session. Overall I heard this was the best panel of the entire conference and I would tend to agree. (although I am a bit biased)
After this great session we had lunch with our friends from Advanta. It was great to sit down to a nice meal and share our conference stories.
Random Thought: Personally I love that NETexponent has awesome clients. We are truly lucky to work with clients who are smart, fun, honest, and thoughtful. Whether it be clients introducing us to other potential clients (Thanks Alyssa) or sharing a laugh over a beer (can’t wait to do it again Megan) or stopping by the booth to brighten our day with a smile and word of encouragement (see you back in NY Seema) or how about when your client takes YOU to a Boston Red Sox game with “sick” seats (David, TJ, and Jarrett) or especially when they greet us with a big warm hug (David you rock)…NETexponent clients are a rare breed and truly valuable to us. Thanks!
After a few more booth visits the team and I called it quits as the exhibit hall was shutting down. Erin, Teresa, Erica, and Sal stayed to pack up the booth and start the long ride home. (Thanks guys!) Lorrenn and I caught the Bolt Bus back to NYC (in fact I am writing this post on the bus and using their great free wifi) and Kramer is at the Red Sox game with our friends from Advanta.
I must close this recap with my Thanks to the wonderful NETexponent team who truly made this event a success. The team worked hard, worked long, and made clients and publishers happy. Generic thanks is not good enough so…
Thank you Erica for your spirit and enthusiasm which is truly infectious
Thank you Erin for your mastery of the English language and your help in promoting the event
Thank you Leslie, who did not attend, but organized the entire booth creation
Thank you Sal for driving and networking your butt off
Thank you Lorrenn for interviewing with the affiliate summit camera crew and spilling stuff at the bar
Thank you Teresa for orchestrating some great meetings and sharing your fear of mascots (I may get in trouble for putting that one on the blog)
It was a good Affiliate Summit and we are already looking forward to Vegas in 2009
Check out some other great Affiliate Summit Recaps here:
Posted in Affiliate Marketing, Events by Peter Figueredo | |
on August 13th, 2008 at 9:37 am
Pete- we all had a great time! Thanks for not publicly revealing all the details of my beef with mascots… though you have to admit that crab guy was SCARY!
on August 13th, 2008 at 10:20 am
That crab mascot running around the exhibit hall was very creepy…yikes