Social Brand Forum 2015 Recap: Photos, Videos, Slides, and More


October 20, 2015

social brand forum 2015

Last Friday, the curtain went down on another successful Social Brand Forum here in the heart of the heartland at our new home, the historic Englert Theatre in beautiful downtown Iowa City. Once again, the Midwest’s premier digital marketing event presented a bold intersection of expert content, engaging conversations, and a strong sense of community among attendees and speakers alike.

As you return to the office invigorated and ready to reinvent your organization’s digital marketing, we thought we would provide a quick event recap along with some resources to assist you.

Another Year of Exceptional Digital Marketing Smarts

Several key themes emerged throughout the nine keynotes of Social Brand Forum 2015. Mitch Joel began with a caution that the Internet, like an elephant, doesn’t forget. Amber Naslund told us that data is our lifeblood as marketers. Tom Webster closed Day 1 with a reminder that the real job of marketing is to look outside the organization — not inside.

Mark Schaefer ignited the opening keynote of Day 2 by telling marketers to embrace their inner B.A.D.A.S.S. Justine Jordan and Laura Fitton had tactical, practical lessons to make our email and our marketing funnels better than ever. After lunch Tim Washer helped us embrace our mistakes while Tamsen Webster cautioned us that communications failures drive marketing failures. Scott Monty closed this year’s event with a keynote summarizing all of the talks and sending us away excited to build better — more human brands — online and off.

We’re working on getting as many slides and resources from our speakers assembled here. Below is a list of what we have so far.

We’ll add others as we get them. If you’re looking for a great event recap, check out this video from Social Brand VIP Seth Sparks.

Maddy Osman was also kind enough to share her notes from the event as well. Download the PDF from Dropbox. Do you have a #SocialBrand15 resource you made that you’d like to share? Let us know in the comments below and we’ll post it here.

Photo Finish

John Richard took some great photos during the event that you can find on our Facebook page. Did you take photos at Social Brand 2015? Feel free to add them here or on Facebook as well.

Continuing Conversations

You can still follow the conference conversation on Twitter and Instagram using the hashtag#SocialBrand15. Here you’ll find some of the most powerful ideas from the event as well as important afterthoughts from both attendees and speakers.

Bonus! More Coloring Books

Did you love artist Laura Palmer’s social coloring book that we had on site at #SocialBrand15? If so, then you’ll love her sequel! That’s right — Laura created a second coloring book out of her sketch notes from the various talks. Grab your free digital download now.

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A Big Thanks to Our Sponsors

Again, a big thanks to all of our sponsors who make this event possible including Hubspot, Sprout Social, Zignal Labs, Feedblitz, Sysomos, Lithium, XO-LP, and Zephyr Printing and Design. I hope you’ll take the time to learn more about these businesses who have stepped forward in support of helping all of us building better brands online.

See You Next Year

Remember to mark your calendars for next September for Social Brand Forum 2016.You can also keep an eye on our events page for information on the forum and other live-learning events.

What was your favorite part of this year’s Social Brand Forum? We’d love to hear in the comments below or on social media using the hashtag #SocialBrand15. Also, please keep an eye on your email inbox as we’ll be sending out our post-conference survey very soon.

Thanks again for being a part of the Social Brand Forum community!

~ Nick and the Brand Driven Team

BDD-Brand Driven Digital 2015-0121


Email Brand Driven Digital

is a strategist, speaker, educator, and author of Brand Now: How to Stand Out in a Crowded, Distracted World and Get Scrappy: Smarter Digital Marketing for Businesses Big and Small. He is the Chief Brand Strategist at Brand Driven Digital, an educator at the University of Iowa, and host of the On Brand podcast. More about Nick.