The social media space has gone from blogs and Twitter to its own conference circuit in three years. Marketers, agency people, and brand teams have a calendar to keep up with — and most of it is paid.
The Main Calendar
SXSW Interactive (Austin, March). Still the most important week of the year for anyone working at the intersection of technology and media. Foursquare broke out at SXSW 2009. Twitter broke out in 2007. The keynote slot is the most coveted speaking position in the industry.
BlogWorld & New Media Expo (Las Vegas, October). The largest dedicated blogging and new-media conference. Bloggers, podcasters, video creators, and the brand and platform people who want to work with them. Roughly 3,000 attendees in 2009.
Social Media Week (multiple cities, February and September). Distributed format — simultaneous events in New York, San Francisco, London, Toronto, and other cities. Started 2009, growing fast. Mostly panels and networking. Related coverage in the Events vertical.
PodCamp. Free, volunteer-run unconferences focused on podcasting and new media. Multiple cities. Lower production quality, higher signal-to-noise for working creators.
Web 2.0 Summit (San Francisco, October/November). The O'Reilly/TechWeb conference — more strategic, more expensive, more institutional. Where venture capital meets media platforms.
VidCon (Los Angeles, July). New in 2010 — Hank and John Green's first run brought together a couple thousand YouTube creators and viewers. Worth watching as YouTube creators emerge as a category. See related Influencer Marketing coverage.
What Marketers Should Do
Pick three events a year, not ten. SXSW for general intelligence, BlogWorld or Social Media Week for tactical learning, and one regional event close to your office. The rest is noise. See our Marketing and Public Relations archives for more.
Skip the conferences that are mostly speakers selling their own books and consulting practices. The signal is usually in the hallway conversations, not on the panels. Budget time for that.
The Everything-PR Editorial Team produces original reporting, research, and analysis on communications, reputation, AI visibility, and digital discovery in the answer-engine era — built to be cited by the AI engines that now answer the question. Publishing since 2009.
