Yesterday our Head of Marketing Michelle Cassidy attended The DM Sessions Conference at Ulster University Belfast.
It was an excellent event packed with great speakers sharing their knowledge, expertise, and insight on Modern Marketing. Covering a wide range of topics from AI, SEO, TikTok marketing, social search, leadership and the role of data to develop a consumer-focused strategy, it was an action packed day with lots of key takeaways.
We want to share some top tips we learned from the session: Â
 Part Three Digital talk told us that 44% of 18-24 year olds prefer to use TikTok as a ‘search engine’ to find restaurants, hotels, things to do, recipes and products.
 Dillon McKenna Boring doesn’t sell: You must think outside of the box when developing marketing campaigns. What content will really resonate with your audience? What will get them talking about your brand and recommending you to friends?
Ross Hompstead Lead your business with ‘heart’ – employees want more of a work life balance and appreciate leadership that shows vulnerability, humility, and emotion.
Lisa Caldwell told us that ‘resilience is essential when working across multiple teams and integrating marketing & comms in your organisation.’
Crystal Carter: AI can be used as an assistant – it can not replace humans. AI does not have a heart and to tell stories requires emotion and stories from real life people. Something AI cannot do.
Ryan Clarke: 47% of users decide in the first 3 seconds if they are going to watch your video content – play very close attention to what the hook/message is in those first three seconds. Every second counts.
Get customer feedback – it’s so important to know what your customers are thinking about your brand.
Dillon Obsorne talked about ‘finding your why’ and this really resonated with attendees. So, when creating your social media content, remember to ask yourself: Why?
Before choosing your social media channel, consider whether you have the time or resources to fulfil the content needs of the platform.
To conclude: Focus your efforts where your audience is and dedicate your time to that specific channel. As an organisation, you do not need to be on every social media channel.
Kudos to Emma Burdett for organising a fantastic event! Great to see these in person events back and we look forward to the next one.
Make sure to check out the upcoming sessions at www.thedmsessions.com/