The art of persuasion
Thurs 21 March, 2024
Curzon Cinema, Westgate Oxford
Sorry, camp’s over for this year!
But you can see from the pics and comments below that we had a blast 🙌
So just watch this space for details of our 2025 conference, coming soon… and in the meantime you can always join us at one of our monthly meet-ups.
What our 2024 campers said
So glad I made the effort to drag myself out of bed and onto an early train for this wonderfully welcoming and uplifting event. Heading home feeling inspired, motivated and generally topped up. Thanks, Marketing Camp team!
Rin Hamburgh
Founder and Director at RH & Co
”
A day full of so many fabulous little moments. Amazingly friendly people, very practical zero-BS talks, super delicious food, great atmosphere. Count me in for next year.
Hannah Pye
Comms Manager at Makespace
”
You know those events that just go like clockwork, and everything's relaxed, and on time, and easy to find, and the speakers are top-notch, and the excellent lunch and the cocktails afterwards are included in the very reasonable ticket price? Well it was one of those. Well done team.
Ned Wells
Director at Cicada Consulting
”
I had a fantastic time speaking at the conference and everyone was so kind and supportive. It was a brilliant day with tons of great talks (I learned so much), lots of lovely local marketers, and some very delicious cake. Such a stellar event. I’m already looking forward to next year!
Laura Hewitt
Marketing & Brand Manager at Imperial War Museums
”
From the warm welcome and the relatable and useful talks to the fab food and comfy seats - everything was spot on! I was definitely persuaded to come to more Marketing Camp events in the future and I’ll be encouraging my marketing mates to join me.
Hannah Qualtrough
Associate Director of Journals Marketing at Wiley
”
Great day at the Marketing Camp conference, such a fantastic event. Lots of learning, chatting with friends old and new, and cinnamon buns to die for – what’s not to like?! Will definitely be going again next year.
Sarah Wyatt
Director at Juicy Designs
”
2024 agenda and speakers
9.15 - 10.00
Register, then grab a snack and get settled
10 - 10.30
Welcome happy campers
SESSION THEMES
Persuasion: the foundations
How do you build a strong starting point for your marketing work?
Persuasion: the activities
How do you get people to take the actions you want them to?
Persuasion: the data
How do you know you’re persuading the right people about the right stuff in the best way?
10.30 - 11.25
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Catherine Warrilow from The Plot
“People buy from people” may be a cliché, but it’s a cliché for a reason. Connecting with the humans behind a company can be much more persuasive for your audience than engaging with the wider brand, at least at first.
So this talk will be exploring what having a personal brand really means (and what it doesn’t), how to personally build recognition and trust, and both the fundamental principles and outward activities you need to be thinking about.
Whether you’re a solo business owner keen to be more influential in your industry, or you’re part of a larger organisation and want to help your CEO or other team members be better ambassadors for the business, this talk will give you the tools to get started.
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Red Barrington from Red Star Digital and OXCOM
Email is one of the most secure channels we have in our persuasive toolkit, because both the content and the data are totally owned and controlled by us. But with 347.3 billion emails being sent globally each day (!!!) it’s more important than ever that we stand out in people’s inboxes, creating emails they want to open, read, and respond to.
So in this session we’ll start by looking at creative ideas for getting people to say yes to being on your list in the first place. Then we'll be learning how to send the kind of emails that people actually want to open and read – from practicalities around segmenting and creating workflows through to content advice.
And finally we'll be nailing down ways to turn readers into buyers, with a ton of examples (both hot and not) along the way.
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Ben Mumby-Croft from Imperial Enterprise Lab
Great marketing starts with knowing your audience. And that means not just accepting what they think or say they'll do in the future, but understanding how they'll actually behave.
Because all the great content and campaigns in the world can't help you if you're not clear about exactly who you're talking to, how your product is a fit for that bit of the market, and what they need to hear in order to be persuaded to buy in.
So this talk will help you with exactly that, introducing you to a mix of interesting and super-practical concepts - like Pretotyping, Lean Startup, The Mom Test - that you can use to better understand your audience and drive your business forward.
11.25 - 12.20
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with Paul Simpkins from Herd
The average person spends less than one minute on a website. And it takes less than one second for them to form a first impression of any new site they visit. If it’s no good, they’ll leave. It’s a brutal world for websites.
So this talk will offer up 10 key things to consider when building a site that converts visitors into loyal customers - from how it looks and sounds to how it works (in the back end as well as for your visitors).
We’ll be focusing on the key things it takes to remove friction (anything that makes life more difficult for a user) and create compulsion (evoking a desire or solving a problem for them) with a whole host of real-life examples to keep things super practical.
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with Becky Hopkin from Digital Gearbox
Our social media feeds are busy places. So how do we cut through the clutter and stop the right people in their tracks - and then get them to take action?
With a focus on the Meta platforms (Instagram and Facebook) this talk will be unpacking the entire journey of making a successful ad - from the auction process, how the algorithm works, and insights for choosing your audience to how to set and manage a budget and how to gather and learn from your data. Plus we’ll nail down how you make sure any ads tie in with your overall strategy, and how you can measure their wider impact as well as keep an eye on immediate ROI.
We’ll also be thinking about how to make our ad creative as strong as possible. Partly by looking at some best-practice tips for each platform, but mainly by engaging with examples of ads - analysing the ones that have done well and the ones that have flopped, and why.
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with Louis Lobban from Zest
Figuring out which bits of our marketing are most effective is especially important when we don't have much money and time. But testing can be tricky, and it won't be much use to us if we end up monitoring the wrong things or not knowing how to properly interpret the results we get.
So here we'll be exploring split tests, one of the most common ways of experimenting with marketing content. We'll look at the different types of split testing, how to know which kind to use when, and exactly how to manage it - with lots of examples along the way, and tips for avoiding the most common mistakes businesses make.
We'll also learn how to properly analyse the results of our tests and make smart decisions based on what we find. And all without spending big money.
12.20 - 1.15
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with Amy Kimber from Bottle PR
There's no denying that the media has never been so saturated. But still the press offers huge potential for reaching people who might otherwise never come into contact with your brand. So this talk will be helping us learn how to overcome the challenges and embrace the opportunities of PR.
We’ll be looking at what makes a creative, engaging PR idea – as well as how to know which media our stories would be a good fit for and how to get journalists interested. We’ll check out some handy tools for content creation too. And we’ll also be thinking about potential barriers you might face internally, and how to get all your stakeholders on board with your new plans.
Then we’ll finish with several case studies of stereotypically ‘safe’ brands who’ve had some imaginative PR wins, taking inspiration from their creative approaches.
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With Matt Eastland-Jones from Story Ninety-Four
We all know the stats and the power of great video in marketing. But when we’re not experts, how do we make sure our videos actually are great?!
This talk will help us tackle that challenge both creatively and practically. So we’ll kick off with some inspiration about the different types and formats of video we could be using in our marketing and what ingredients consistently make for an engaging watch.
Then we’ll look briefly at the pros and cons of handling things ourselves, getting a videographer, or using a production company. Finally we’ll dive into the detail of things we need to think about before, during, and after making a video – from creating a solid brief to practical production tips.
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with Ollie Hawkins from Zest
Ok you've done your audience research and you've done some experimenting to see what kinds of marketing work best - but how do you know if you're really being successful?
This talk will be looking at how to give yourself a good foundation for measurement by setting smart goals right at the start, with practical examples of the framework Zest use with their clients. Then we'll explore how to know which are the most useful metrics to keep an eye on - and how to accurately measure them.
Then we'll end with some practical guidance for how to analyse and make sense of the data you get, and use it to inform your next campaigns and strategies.
1.15 - 2.15
Time for a spot of lunch
2.15 - 3.15
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with Laura Hewitt from Imperial War Museums
It's pretty hard for an organisation to be successful without marketing. But still it can be a real challenge to get others in our company to understand and appreciate the value of our work. So it can be tough to get the things we need - whether that's budget, sign-off of a creative idea, or support and input from colleagues.
So here we'll be looking at how we can use our persuasive abilities internally, especially in situations where we don't have direct authority. We'll unpack strategies for influencing key stakeholders, as well as learn how to choose the right strategy for different situations. And we'll be getting into how we can track and show ROI for our work, as well as how to understand what different stakeholders care about and need to know.
You'll leave armed with some clear tactical steps to make sure your marketing work and your input into the wider business is heard, seen, and respected.
3.15 - 4.30
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with Colin Cather from Bottle PR
The tools and techniques we use to persuade people are changing all the time. But people themselves? Not so much. The basic realities of the way humans think and feel are actually quite constant, despite our changing world.
So here we'll be exploring some of those realities. Like what are Universal Truths – and how true are they? And what’s truth-ier – all the facts, or a good story that we can see ourselves in? How does the ‘Curse of Knowledge’ get in the way of marketing, and can ‘Cultural Imprinting’ really change people's minds?
At the end of the day (literally, in our case) it comes down to this: if it's true (as smart marketer Jeremy Bullmore said) that “people build brands as birds build nests, from the scraps and straws they chance upon”, how can we as marketers make sure the nest-building sticks we're putting out into the world are persuasive enough to stick in people’s heads and hearts?
4.30 - 6.00
Drinks around the campfire
