The 2020 Marketing Conference Forecast

The events you don’t want to miss, all in one place.

We love conferences. Aside from being a fun break in the routine, they’re a great way to:

• Get our team’s creative juices flowing
• Hear from experts in our field
• Hang out with people who love marketing as much as we do
• Maybe take a quick peek at what our competitors are up to

Unfortunately, we don’t have an unlimited conference budget, so we’re super intentional with our conference spend, and we’re making it easy for you to be, too.

Here are our top conference choices for 2020 – listed chronologically – and some info to help you see why they might be worth wrapping into next year’s budget at your organization.

Modern Marketing Express

• January 23, 2020: San Francisco, CA

Data-driven marketing can deliver impressive results, but there’s plenty of misinformation about it that can derail your strategy. Oracle’s Modern Marketing Express is designed to connect marketers with the innovators, influencers and thought leaders that can help make sense of it all.

Adobe Summit

• March 29 - April 2, 2020: Las Vegas, NV

With 400 sessions and labs across 11 content tracks, Adobe Summit is the place to join the leaders in marketing automation, analytics, advertising, and commerce for five days of groundbreaking customer experience insight.Hint: Register by December 15 to save $400 on the regular price of a full conference pass.

MarTech

• West, April 15-17, 2020: San Jose, CA
• East, October 6-8, 2020: Boston, MA

The MarTech experience is carefully choreographed to help senior-level marketers find actionable tactics to solve today’s marketing challenges. Join key members of the martech community and learn to deliver exceptional customer experiences and better ROI. The Knak team attended MarTech East in 2019, and we’re planning to be back in 2020. Check out our recap here.

True North Dreamin

• April 23-24, 2020: Vancouver, BC

TND is a coast-to-coast-to-coast Canadian Salesforce community conference. It’s heading to Vancouver this spring on a mission to connect Canada’s SFDC pros, and in our experience, it’s an action-packed two days, full of training, team-building, and swag. Our Sales Operations Director attended the 2019 event and had an amazing time. Check out her thoughts here.

SiriusDecisions Summit

• May 3-6, 2020: Austin, TX

SiriusDecisions Summit is the place to be for B2B marketers. With the unveiling of new B2B innovations, sessions dedicated to best practices and new technologies, and a chance to connect with an elite community of sales, marketing, and product leaders, Summit blends content and community in the best possible way.

Email Innovations Summit

• June 1-3, 2020: Las Vegas, NV

This conference is laser-focused on email marketing’s latest technology, strategy, and design innovations. EI Summit also goes the extra mile with sessions designed to help marketers incorporate their learnings into their overall strategy once they return to the office.

HYPERGROWTH

• June 10, 2020: London, England
• September 2020: Boston, MA
• November 2020: San Francisco, CA

HYPERGROWTH is where marketing rule-breakers go for hands-on training, real-life examples, and industry-leading innovation. Hear from the masters who are using Conversational Marketing to drive conversion rates, pipeline, revenue and more at their businesses, and experience an event that’s unlike any other.

MozCon

• July 6-8, 2020: Seattle, WA

MozCon is a one-track journey into the depths of search marketing. Learn from the experts on SEO, conversion optimization, data-driven decision making, and more, and connect with fellow marketing pioneers at lunch-time discussions and evening parties. Plus, we hear they’re very generous with the swag and fist bumps.

Marketing Artificial Intelligence Conference (MAICON)

• July 14-16, 2020: Cleveland, OH

AI is poised to have a major (think trillion dollar) impact on marketing, but let’s face it: most marketers struggle to understand how to implement it in their day-to-day strategy. MAICON is the answer, and it’s a can’t-miss event for marketing leaders who are ready for the next frontier in digital marketing. Plus, we love that it’s geared toward a non-technical audience, so attendees without a background in analytics or data-science will fit right in.

Litmus Live

• August, 2020: London, England
• October 2020: Boston, MA
• November 2020: San Francisco, CA

Litmus Live is where email nerds get together to talk design, strategy, and development. A favourite of the Knak team and email marketers worldwide, this is the place to be for sessions on data-driven design, advanced personalization, improved workflow, and way more. Our lead email developer attended the London 2019 event: get his thoughts on the speakers, content, and sessions here.

INBOUND

• August 18-21, 2020: Boston, MA

INBOUND is a four-day event for creative marketers, start-up founders, and out-of-the box thinkers who are ready to consider some big ideas. It’s a huge event (26,000+ attendees and nearly 400 sessions), but it’s a great place to consider your existing opportunities for growth from a new perspective.

Call to Action Conference

• September 29-October 1, 2020: Vancouver, BC

Based on the traditional IQ framework, CTAConf is a single-track experience that covers the six core elements of marketing intelligence. Full of actionable tactics and brilliant speakers, it’s a unique approach to digital marketing that’s expertly curated and not to be missed. View the 2019 recap, including session recordings and speaker slide decks here.

Content Marketing World

• October 13-16, 2020: Cleveland, OH

Meet the best and brightest in the content marketing industry, and learn to create an epic content marketing strategy. With sessions covering storytelling, AI, demand generation, and more, marketers will leave with the tools they need to grow their business and build their team.

Dreamforce

• November 9-12, 2020: San Francisco, CA

SFDC’s Dreamforce user conference is packed with keynotes, demos, workshops, and sessions (more than 3500 of them) designed to let you get up close and personal with the technology of tomorrow. Be inspired by new ideas, and leave ready to challenge the status quo and build your career.

SaaS North

• 2020 TBA, November 26-27, 2019: Ottawa, ON

SaaS North is Canada’s largest SaaS conference for scaling up. We love it because it’s right here in our hometown AND it gives us a chance to hang out with our fellow Canadian SaaS pros. With an intentional focus on scaling for SaaS companies, tracks are designed to help drive growth at every stage.