Last night was the inaugural round of Affiliate Summit Meetups where people all around the country gathered with other affiliate marketers or people who were interested in affiliate marketing. All in all there were around 380 people who got together in 49 different cities. Some of those cities only ended up with 1 person attending but there were others like Orlando that had 67 people sign up, Austin with 59, San Francisco with 55, and Chicago with 51.
I am happy to say that Spokane had 5 people attend. Of course I was there but also Matt Paschall (@mpaschall), the affiliate manager from Onecall.com, and Danielle (@DCDoughertyJEB) and Jon (@jonathandgood) from JEBCommerce. Also my wife joined us and she may have even gotten a good lead for the florist she works for from Danielle. So there was business being done! I had met Matt before but it was nice to meet Danielle and Jon.
Overall it was a pretty laid back time. I was hoping to get a few people there who had never heard about affiliate marketing or were just getting into it but maybe we will have to wait until next time for that. We did chat about how the Illinois tax will effect some of their merchants and affiliates, how they as affiliate managers can do a better job communicating with affiliates, some innovative ideas we have seen affiliates use, and so on.
All in all it was a fun time and hopefully we can keep the group growing in the coming months! If you are interested in attending one of these meetups check here to see if there is one in a city near you. If not please feel free to get one going!
BTW, sorry for no pics. Totally dropped the ball and spaced that one.
Well, it sounds like it was a great time, even though only 5 of you were there. In 6 months that could be 500! You never know. Thanks for putting this together!
Yeah, it was a good time. I know there are at least a few more affiliate marketers in the Spokane area and I know there are people who want to learn more about it. Maybe we will shoot for 10 next month.
A big thanks to Joe for heading us in the right direction. It was nice to chat with you again and great to meet your wife, Jon and Danielle.
It's awesome that you put one together for Spokane. I love the idea of using these local meetups to bring some new talent to the business by encouraging newbies to come out. I had a great time at the orlando meetup working with some folks who were just getting started. In the process of the meetup, I was able to connect some of them with some good advice and some awesome tools that were being used by other affiliates there.