Aartrijk Brand Camp 2010 Reflections

This is the 2nd year for this event.  I attended last year and was so impressed that it was a no brainer to be here this year.  The attendees are a great mix of insurance industry people.  The mix includes insurance agents, insurance carrier staff, trade association staff and consultant/partners. While Camp began officially on Tuesday, there was a pre-conference session for those that wanted to attend Monday afternoon.  It was an open question and answer session about branding and social media.  About 25 people participated.  It was a great session for sharing and learning.

Topics at Brand Camp 2010:

• Value of Brand
• Your Brand Transformed
• Brand Audit:  The Big “A-Ha Moment”
• The Integrated Marketing Challenge – Setting the Stage
• What’s Next:  Panel & Demonstration
• Let’s Get This Straight:  Internal Brand Alignment
• Integrated Marketing Challenge”  The Work Continues

While each session had valuable information and great presentations “The Integrated Marketing Challenge” was the highlight of the event.  Each of us was assigned to a group.  Each group represented the overall mix of the attendees.  Each group was given one of three situations in which the group had to provide a presentation on Wednesday morning.  One situation was the development of a new association program, another was the merger of two insurance agencies and the third was the expansion of a regional insurance carrier.

It was awesome to see how each group interacted and developed their ideas.  Each of the presentations were unique.  There was voting, some trash talk on the twitter hashtag for the event, a winner, prizes and great fun.  The twitter hashtag for this event is #ABC2010.  Interesting and fun comments and a good stream.  You should take a few minutes to view these comments to get a flavor of the impressions of this event.

While the learning is great, what I like most about this event is the opportunity to reconnect with friends I only get to see at the event and the opportunity to meet new people and make new friends.  It is also a great opportunity to meet people in person that you have met online.

It’s not all work and no play.  The Tuesday evening event was at Max’s Wine Dive.  While I didn’t attend this event I understand it was great.  Thanks to Mike Wise of WebWisdom took these great photos of the event.  You should watch for the dates for the next dates for this event.  Too important to miss.

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