Your Custom Text Here
#INBOUND17: Brian Halligan
HubSpot co-founder Brian Halligan talks about the key differences between startup and scale-up mode and the importance of culture in his keynote at #INBOUND17.
Of course I was excited to see HubSpot founders Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah speak at #INBOUND17. Last year's talk was inspiring and informative. This year, they decided to split their keynote, each focusing on their strengths (but with enough thematic overlaps and joint references that they still felt like related talks). I was also glad to see the return of the Brian & Dharmesh puppets on-screen. :)
As I said in a previous blog post: I hadn't originally planned to grow my company, but now that is absolutely part of my plan. I don't ever plan to become big like HubSpot, but I was still thrilled to hear lessons on startup mentality vs. scale-up mentality, and the important things to absorb or remove from each. His journey from starting HubSpot, through its exponential growth, and general commentaries on companies and marketing in general was engaging and on-point.
My favorite quote wasn't able to fit fully into a tweet, but I've found it:
"Netflix didn't disrupt Blockbuster; their late fees did that. Apple didn't disrupt the music industry; buying the whole album did. Then Uber, they didn't disrupt the taxi industry; waiting outside in the rain did."
#INBOUND17: Adam Grant
Adam Grant of the Wharton School of Business discusses creating space for new ideas at #INBOUND17.
Organizational psychologist and Wharton professor Adam Grant knows a thing or two about the many roadblocks to original, creative thoughts that tend to lurk within established organizations. He's aiming to change that culture, helping mavericks and organizations work together to create and innovate without falling back on the tried-and-true.
How can original thinkers present their new ideas in a way that resonates with decision-makers and convinces them to cast their doubts aside? How can managers encourage their teams to think creatively, without squashing ideas that are untested? Adam's literally an expert on all of this; he broke things down to their most basic levels, and demystified the ways in which we can all - bold thinkers and brand stalwarts alike - move forward with excitement.
What can we learn from mall management? Plenty.
Sometimes it's good to let the people managing your property within a given community handle communications with their customers. Sometimes, however, it's best to just let corporate run it. How one company learned this lesson...while improving responsiveness and community engagement.
I'll admit that I was highly distracted during this presentation, and probably didn't do my very best Tweeting. It was right after lunch and I had just recorded my episode of Social with the CEO of the organization putting on the event... and was thus posting my broadcast all over creation while also listening to Anne speak. I did listen, though!
“Integrating online customer feedback with offline customer experiences
Anne McKnight, Manager, Paid Media, GGP
Based on its mission to provide outstanding experiences, GGP, a leading owner and operator of high quality retail real estate in the U.S., transformed its marketing technology ecosystem. GGP streamlined 300+ social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for 118 properties), to ensure responses to customer comments/inquiries fell within the set SLA and feedback was aggregated in an actionable format.”
GGP, like our hosts The Content Funnel, is in the real estate world, so I wasn't sure how relevant the talk would be. Turns out it was a customer service tale that contained applicable lessons for any business that deals with the public:
- Ensure you're responsive, both online and in terms of real-life action on feedback.
- Maintain a consistent procedure and brand voice.
- Constantly learn from mistakes and use them to improve processes moving forward.