Inbound 2016 was an excellent digital marketing conference. A summary of some of the best speakers and sessions follows. I selected sessions based on personal preference and what I thought would be of value to my company. With few exceptions, I got many ideas and great value out of each session.

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Summary of Inbound Marketing Conference 2016
Conference held Nov 8 – 11, 2016 in Boston
by Jimmy Smith, Jan 2017

2. Inbound 2016 was an excellent digital
marketing conference
• Summary of Best Speaker/Sessions Follows
• I selected sessions based on personal preference and what I thought would
be of value to my company
• Tip of the Ice berg
• More information available about speakers and topics
• Many of the sessions were video recorded
• I can also provide the PowerPoint decks from many
• In some cases neither video nor PPT deck is available in which case I’m just
going off my personal notes 
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3. Keynote with Gary Vaynerchuk
CEO of VaynerMedia, NYT Bestselling Author
• Importance of Creativity
• We are all battling for attention.
• Once you have my attention, creative is
the variable of success
• His company stitched together a two-
minute video making it look like Harry
Caray was calling the final out in the
Cubs World Series win.
• It had 3 million views in one week.
• Bulk email does not work. Stop it.
• Make sure emails are as targeted as
possible
• “I bought these Nike shoes because
of branding, not because of the CTR
of a campaign.”
• Social media platforms of today are
the TV networks of yesterday
• Use social media more for high-level
awareness and brand building campaigns
• Influencer marketing. Do it. Find the
big players.
• If you don’t put yourself out of
business, somebody else will.
• You have to evolve your products and
services.
• Always be solving the customers pain
points
• Think: what is the customer hiring our
product to do? (from Clay Christensen)
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4. Could a Robot Create Your Content?
Carmen Simon - Cognitive Neuroscientist, Rexi Media
• Algorithms are everywhere we turn.
• Guy in dating service exchanged emails
for 4 months. Later found out “she” was
a robot.
• Bots that can write content are
emerging
• Computer that compose music so
well you can’t tell that a robot wrote
it
• Are you building “hand crafted”
content or “robotic” content?
• Hand-crafted takes longer but
connects with the audience
• Techniques to create content that are
uniquely human
• 1) Disrupt the pattern the brain is
expecting
• 2) Add unique style to your writing
• 3) Make room for the unpredictable
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5. Origins of the Marketing Intelligence
Paul Roetzer - CEO, PR 20/20
• The many things artificial intelligence
(AI) can do these days…
• Write reports: The AP now writes most
earnings reports by machines
• “Natural language generation”
• Tell Stories: Epagogix is algorithm that
will analyze a move script and predict
how much money it will make.
• Even recommends plot lines to improve it
• Facial Recognition: Apple has a feature
to automatically recognized people,
dogs, Legos, etc. without having to tag
the photos.
• Pull Insights from Data: IBM Watson
analytics will look through your data and
find a story to tell about it
• Search: Google announced that it is an AI
company several years ago
• Diagnose Illness and Prescribe
Treatment: Mayo Clinic cancer patients
analyzed by Watson found hundred
cases where doctors missed important
treatments
• How we will use AI to augment
marketing productivity
• Humans have access to mountains of
data but we have a finite ability to
process it
• AI must be given data but then have
almost infinite ability to process it and
deliver recommendations (and do it
faster and cheaper than humans)
• What to look for in the (near?) future
• Marketing intelligence engines that
process data and recommend actions to
improve campaign performance
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6. Brian Halligan Keynote
Co-founder of HubSpot
• Match how you sell with how people buy
• The 2016 vs 2006 buying process:
• Buyers have MANY more choices
• Much more competition for each customer
• How do they learn? Old school = reading.
Today = watching video.
• “Don’t just get a blogger, get a videographer”
• In 2006, Social media was the drive-through
lane. Now social media is their favorite
internet café where they stay for hours.
• Provide engaging content that informs and
builds the brand
• Yesterday, search helped people find
answers. Today Google gives them answers.
• “The salesman should augment the
website, not the other way around.”
• Cold calls are dead. Email is not.
• “Don’t incentivize account managers to get
more sales, incentivize them to increase
customer satisfaction.”
• The 2016 vs 2006 buying process cont:
• People expect to get some value before
they buy your product.
• “Don’t strive to extract value from the
customer but rather to add value to the
customer”
• Top sources of information today:
• 1: word of mouth
• 2: media articles
• 3: customer references
• 4: vendor authored materials
• 5: analyst reports and recommendations
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7. Dharmesh Shah Keynote
Co-founder of HubSpot
• More than 50% of shoppers start looking
for a product on Amazon
• To win at SEO you have to be good at HEO
(Human Enjoyment Optimization)
• Does your website provide an enjoyable
experience for users?
• Messaging apps (WhatsApp, Slack,
Facebook Messenger, WeChat) are
outpacing the growth of social networks
• GrowthBot
• It’s a chat bot that HubSpot Labs is working
on for sales and marketing
• Ask it a question and it can look up data
and return summaries in natural language
• GrowthBot can integrate with your CRM.
• It can monitor results and take action
• Can also be configured to be customer
facing
• “Decades ago, business started building
websites, soon, they will start building
bots”
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8. Voice Search, Chatbots and Conversational UIs
Purna Virji - Senior Manager, PPC Training, Microsoft
• The future of search is now: Visual,
Smart, Vocal
• Visual search
• Users are 80% more likely to engage with
content that has relevant images
• Use images that add value and relevant
information rather than fluffy pictures
used to make the page pretty
• Virtual reality app that let’s women see
what clothes will look like on themselves
• Captionbot.ai website will describe the
photo you upload.
• Smart Search thru chat apps
• 2.5 billion people using messaging apps
• Bing has a chatbot powered by search
• Microsoft has prototype glasses that
describe what is going on around you
• Video of these glasses describing the
world around him to a blind man
• Vocal Search
• By 2020, 50% of search will come from
voice
• We use more intent words in voice
search
• SIRI and Amazon Echo can interface with
Venmo, Uber and other apps for you.
• To find out what users search for by
voice…
• look at organic search keyword filtered by
mobile device (not exact, but a good
start)
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9. Rise of the Chief Marketing Technology Officer
Sheldon Monteiro - Chief Technology Officer, SapientNitro
• 7 key levers to reinvent marketing with digital
at the core:
• 1. Experience: move from customer focused to
focusing on the customer experience
• Companies that focus on the user experience are
the fastest growing brands
• Customer experience leaders out perform the
laggards by 35% over 8 years
• 2. Marketing: move from mass marketing to
precision marketing
• It is not sufficient to yell your brand message
• 3. Commerce: move from single point solution
to omni-channel commerce
• 4. Ecosystems: move from individual products
and services to integrated ecosystems
• 5. Data: move from backward looking data to
real-time and forward looking data
• 6. Enterprise IT: from industrial to multi-speed
IT
• 7. Organization: from silos to collaborative
organizations
• Be prepared for disruption
• An S&P 500 company is being replaced every 2
weeks, on average
• Marketing is changing because customers are
changing
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10. How to Develop Your Inner Producer
Arvell Craig - CEO, Design That Speaks!
• Topic: How to get projects done that you’ve
been putting on the back burner
• Marketing DNA measures your preferences in
four sliding scales:
• 1. Alchemist (starter, creative) to Producer
(finisher, wants structure)
• 2. Text (words written, spoken) to Images
(Photoshop, video, a visual person)
• 3. Comfortable Live (networking) to Recorded
(wants everything polished)
• 4. Empathy (understands wants, needs,
emotions) to Analytical (data and stats)
• Find your Marketing DNA and commit to it
• Beating Resistance
• Giving in to resistance stunts your growth
• 1. Start small. Build momentum
• 2. Don’t let originality slow you down.
• 3. Allow for failure
• Failure gives you experience. Learn fast.
• 4. Minimize decisions
• Develop good routines
• 5. Disconnect from all forms of media
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• Habits that increase productivity:
‒ “No one has a discipline problem, you have a
habit problem.”
‒ 1. Stay in your lane (Marketing DNA)
‒ 2. Find accountability.
» Ask others to hold your feet to the fire
‒ 3. Pick a complimentary partner who has skills
you don’t and will compliment you
‒ 4. Separate creating from shipping.
» Create daily but do not necessarily ship daily
‒ 5. Airplane mode.
» Relocate to be by yourself.
‒ 6. Capture existing content or interactions for
future use and publication
‒ 7. Reward every win. Weekly milestones.
‒ 8. Remember the “Why”
» Your reasons. How is it tied to your values?

11. The Neuroscience of Decision Making
Carmen Simon - Cognitive Neuroscientist, Rexi Media
• We are at this conference because we
want people to move in our direction
• Brain decides to move in only three ways
• 1. Reflexive. Automatic. Hot stove.
Subconscious
• 2. Habitual. Actions that have served us
well in the past. You know what has
worked.
• 3. Goal-Oriented. Making a decision in light
of new information.
• Requires the most cognitive energy.
• Stay top of mind by using to peoples’
reflexes, habits, and goals
• Reflexes
• Physical properties and aesthetics are the
way to appeal to this in marketing
• Attention paves the way to memory
• Professor had woman with crying baby in class.
Instead of getting mad, he held the baby
throughout class. It was a very memorable
lecture
• Simplifying is done at the expense of memory
• Habits
• The more the habits forms, the less cognitive
energy required
• Appeal to habits to make it easier for them to
move toward you
• Goals
• Memory is about the future, not past
• Memories help us make better decisions
• Consider devaluing a goal (like poison in the
cheese that makes a mouse sick) to change
habits
• We share content here (A) hoping consumers
will remember and act there (B)
• Give people cues that trigger memories to help
them do what you want
• Food pyramid printed on a plate
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12. Why Inbound PR is the Future of PR
Iliyana Stareva - Channel Consultant, HubSpot
• What is Inbound PR?
• PR is media relations, and media has evolved
with digital
• Earned media (news), Paid media (ads), Shared
media (social), Owned media (blog)
• Inbound marketing model applied to PR:
• Attract (Blogs, SEO, Social, Press Releases)
• Convert (forms, landing pages, CTA, Newsroom)
• Close (Email, Events, Exclusives)
• Delight (Inbound Links, Social Monitoring)
• Why Inbound PR?
• 80% of purchasing decisions are made before
ever speaking to a sales person.
• People do their own research.
• If you are not out there in the community/social,
you won’t even be considered.
• Traditional PR uses outbound methodologies
and that reach is more and more limited.
• 7 steps to get started with inbound PR
• 1. Nail the stakeholder personas.
• Do your research. Who are the influencers?
• 2. Define their journey.
• What challenges do they face?
• 3. Create a content plan.
• Persona --> Define questions and keywords -->
Answer with content --> Publish everywhere
• 4. Promote your content.
• Use all media: earned, paid, shared, owned
• 5. Do Inbound Media Relations.
• Create remarkable content
• Make it easy to get in touch with you
• Create an Inbound PR newsroom
• PRs, bios, whitepapers, case studies, media kit,
factsheets, product/services guides, blog, social
• 6. Nurture Your Media Leads
• 7. Measure Results.
• Measure outcomes, not outputs.
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13. Design is Not Art
Austin Knight - Senior UX Designer, HubSpot
• Art is about personal expression
• Art has intrinsic, independent value
• Art is about provocation, friction
• Art is about exploration, it is whimsical
• Art is about appreciation
• Art is reflective of creator
• Art is about the artist
• Art comes from internal data sources
• Art is subjective
• Art expresses creativity
• Design is about use and function
• Design has extrinsic dependent value
• Design is about reducing friction
• Design is about observation and iteration
• Design is about function
• Design is reflective of audience
• Design is about the user
• Design must utilize external data sources
• Design is objective
• Design leverages creativity
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• Dangers of confusing design with art
‒ Something aesthetic but not functional will not succeed
‒ Something functional but not aesthetic may still succeed
‒ Artistic egos can do real damage to teams
‒ A designer practicing art is less likely to receive feedback
• Benefits of keeping design and art separate
‒ Design decisions are verifiable with data and research
‒ Design brings together function and aesthetics to delight
users

14. How to Keep Up With Google in 2017
Rand Fishkin - Wizard of Moz, Moz
• What Marketers Must Do Differently in the Years Ahead
• #5 Diversify traffic to Keep Earning Visits from Google
• #4 Evolve Keyword Targeting to Match Google’s Sophistication
• #3 Use Searcher Intent & SERP Features to Break Through
Google’s Changing Results
• #2 Create a Link Strategy That Scales with Decreasing Friction
• #1 Searcher Engagement May Be the New Silver Bullet in
Rankings
• #5 Diversify traffic to Keep Earning Visits from Google
• Google gets suspicious when they see that your site gets most
of its traffic from them.
• If 80% of traffic comes from Google, 80% of marketing efforts
should be non-Google.
• How is your presence on other major search engines
• YouTube is the 2nd biggest search engine
• Amazon is the most under rated search engine
• #4 Evolve Keyword Targeting to Match Google’s
Sophistication
• More “answer boxes” at the top spot
• Counter intuitively, “answer boxes” increase traffic to your
site
• Give people what they want, and they want more
• For your site to become an “answer box”, phrase/format your
content to match the *answer* users are looking for
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15. How to Keep Up With Google in 2017
Rand Fishkin - Wizard of Moz, Moz
• #3 Use Searcher Intent to Break Through
• Google is masterful at understanding intent
• Matching your content to searchers’ intent is
more important than ever
• Image SEO is valuable and doable.
• It pays to generate visual charts
• Keyword matching isn’t what it used to be
• Though still very important
• On-Page SEO in 2016 Requires:
• 1) Intelligent keyword use in meta data
• 2) Use of related topics to indicate relevance
• 3) Serving KWs w/ matching intent on one page
• 4) Thorough answers/solutions to the queries
• 5) Unique value over other sites in the SERP
• Moz has seen the emergence of content
comprehensiveness trumping all other factors
• #2 Create a Link Strategy That Scales with
Decreasing Friction
• Find points of friction (where you content isn’t
getting traction) and inject hacks there
• That doesn’t mean it is spammy or inauthentic,
but it requires strategy
• #1 Searcher Engagement May Be the New
Silver Bullet in Rankings
• We must focus on engagement and quality
• If your site doesn’t satisfy, your results will
decline
• How do I sell “sous vide” cooking machines is
the WRONG question
• How to help people looking for “sous vide”
cooking machines is the RIGHT question
• Rank for long tail of topics, then you’ll be there
when they are ready to buy
• Long tail ranking requires lots of content relevant
to valuable keywords and topics
• User experience is cornerstone of SEO
• Authoritative, comprehensive content
• Uniquely valuable content
• Loads quickly. Speed, speed, speed
• Easy, enjoyable experience on every device
• Encourage visitors to engage, share, and return
• Avoid features that dissuade or annoy
• Create an emotional response of awe, joy,
anticipation, and/or admiration
• Solve a problem or answer a question
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16. Scientific Secrets of Superpowerful Storytellers
Amina Moreau, co-founder Stillmotion
• We're not trying to convince people
of something. We're trying to make
them feel something.
• Don’t just tell people what to do but
help them feel compelled to act
• Story over stats
• The story you tell is as important as the
product you sell
• Coming to their own conclusions
• People don’t like being told what to think
or how to behave.
• Conflict is vital part of the story line
• Don’t shy away from talking about the
problems and go straight to the solution
• The conflict, the problem, is an
important part of the journey in
storytelling.
• Having meaningful conversations is a
two-way street
• Her calls to action for us:
• Find a unique angle for your company
• Develop and use personas
• Choose a character to represent the
concepts you're trying to convey
• Highlight their desire
• Explore the conflicts that stand in the
way
• Take your audience on a journey
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17. Summary of Action Items for My Company
• Make emails as targeted as possible
• Use social media for high-level awareness
and brand building campaigns
• Provide engaging content that informs
• Always be solving customers pain points
• To connect with the audience by creating
more “hand-crafted” content
• Conduct periodic usability testing to find
out what delights and what frustrates
users about our website
• Use images that add value and relevant
information rather than fluffy pictures
used to make the page pretty
• Improve image SEO
• Conduct voice keyword research project
• Build an Inbound PR Newsroom
• Develop and/or use personas
• Build with business goals in mind on
landing pages
• They are not pieces of artwork to be
admired, but rather tools to serve a
purpose.
• Boost YouTube and Amazon SEO
• Expand and edit editorial content to
become Google Answers
• Develop content that matches the intent
behind valuable SEO keywords
• When someone searches for <keyword>,
what do they want? What do we want them
to see?
• Measure and improve user experience:
• Customer satisfaction survey for our
website
• Usability tests for key tasks on our website
• Display different results types for the
different keyword searches on our website
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18. Other Discussion Points for My Company
• Are there industry influencers we could
work with more in digital marketing?
• How can we produce more content that’s
engaging and “hand-crafted”?
• A: Hire, insource, outsource, etc.
• What repetitive, manual marketing tasks
could be intelligently automated?
• Emails? Press releases? Etc.
• What opportunities can we explore to get
more out of our data through AI?
• What marketing automation tools would
we need to do that?
• Should our presence on Amazon be
optimized or augmented?
• Even if only for facilitating product research
• How can we capitalize on the emerging
bots and intelligent messenger apps?
• Does our 2020 strategy include facilitating
voice searches?
• “Siri: Buy 10 cases of _________.”
• What can we do to make the online
experience as excellent as offline?
• Digital sales chat line?
• Content that addresses customer pain
points
• Can we capture and publish content we
are already creating?
• Videos for the annual meeting
• Presentations from product managers
• What habits do our sales people have that
we could use to encourage more usage of
the website?
• What physical reminders can we give
customers and sales people to use
eCommerce?
• How can we help customers feel they’re
part of a community journey together?
• Authentic marketing that really connects
• User groups or user conferences
• How can we make our website more of a
two-way street?
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