It really did. It was during my stint at Shopflo. I was taking care of all things marketing, and when it came to events I used to try to perform these whacky ideas to get attention.

I’ve vlogged at conferences, recorded testimonials while hiding in a store room (something all organizers encourage), and put memes on booth walls instead of dead boring product features no one actually cared about (because if they did we’d be sitting on a panel at center stage and not in a booth in some corner).

So when my time at Shopflo came to an end the biggest worry anyone in my team had was who would do these kinds of stupid amazing shit at events and to solve small talk problems - I put this internet meme on a tshirt.
<BDSM tee photo> 

Little did I know that a lot of people would find it helpful and that I’d actually build things to solve problems I first hand struggled with as a marketer.

Because as marketers, we've solved for attention everywhere except the one place where it matters most // networking events //

especially in B2B, where boring seems to be a competition, we've been showing up with the same awkward energy for a decade

"So... what do you do?" (I know what you do, I’ve been stalking your linkedin for 3 days). 

And these rooms are actually kind of important. They hold some of the highest-signal moments at a density no algorithm can replicate.

The right conversation at the right event has started companies, partnerships, funding rounds, and hiring pipelines.

I've run 50+ of these events and seen it open doors you genuinely can't engineer any other way.
And I've also seen smart, interesting people exhaust themselves and walk out with nothing.

It's not that they're bad at networking, but in a world where everything is AI generated, having a presence is the differentiator and attention is increasingly rare.

So here’s my sidequest to make life of marketers like me fun and easy at events