Welcome to a new episode of Xero Cafe.

I'm Guido Jansen, and guess what?

After a long hiatus, I am back with some new episodes that you don't want to miss.

It's been a while, but just like a superhero returning from a secret mission, I'm ready to dive back in the world of CRO.

Are you guys still calling it that?

I don't know.

Anyway, next week I am visiting the Growth Marketing Summit in Frankfurt where a hand selected line up of optimizers will take the stage and inspire you with their raw knowledge.

And I am the lucky bastard that was asked by the organization to interview all these experts from the stage and the audience in our own Serial Cafe podcast booth on the exhibitors floor.

So naturally, on today's episode, I have Andre and Julia, the masterminds behind this event, to talk about growth, the mind, and superheroes.

So welcome back, and let's get started with my first question to Julia about how this event actually got started.

Yeah.

Actually, you know, I just thought about that because I came in here now and, took took over the event from Andre this year to to take care of everything.

And then I looked back and thought, he initiated this in 2010.

And then I asked, I remember Andrea asked you, why did you do that?

And what was like the the main idea of doing an event like this?

And you said, you know, initially we just wanted to bring together optimizers to connect, to network with.

We had some clients, that just wanted to exchange ideas and talk about challenges they are facing.

So in 2010, Andre came up with the conversion summit.

And Andre, if I'm right, there was like a 2 day event.

Right?

With a boot camp workshop, and bringing together already 200 people at that time.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's true.

We we wanted to do a combination of conference and, bar camp.

Back then bar camps were very famous and that's maybe an unhappy anecdote.

We called it conversion camp, for the very first edition and we did not know that the Catholic church in the US was doing something they called conversion camp which was to convert, gay people into straight people which is horrible.

Horrible idea.

We did not know that something stupid like this even exists but that was feedback from people in the US.

I heard similar feedback when, when Tom organized this conversion hotel in the Netherlands.

Yeah.

You also the Americans were thinking, oh, where is this going?

What?

What?

Who's converting?

What?

So no.

It, so we quickly renamed it.

We quickly renamed it to conversion summit because our idea was of a summit is like we wanted to have the best people together.

Back then I was already traveling around the world giving speeches at conferences and I saw there's this huge gap between the brightest people doing the best talks and the lesser good talks.

So my my, basically, my strategy was I create like a handpicked lineup of the best people I meet during the year so you don't have to travel around.

Basically, you do your notebook.

Right?

Oh, this is a good speaker.

This is a good speaker.

This is a nice little bit.

Approach the people directly.

So I I my value proposition back then was you don't need to travel to 5 or 6 different conferences.

I already handpicked the the best people for you.

So How did you

get the growth marks and similar?

Yeah.

We I mean, we were talking about this at the beginning.

C CRO is dead, isn't it?

I don't know.

Some people know.

Conversion.

We, I mean quickly you realize that conversion rate is a stupid metric to focus your experiments on.

So, or maybe not the best in all cases.

So, yeah, we wouldn't we didn't want to have it in that kind of niche.

We thought conversion rate optimization is too narrow.

Or you could even go go back to landing page optimization.

What if I mean, there was a time back in 2008, I think Tim Asch published his book called Landing Page Optimization.

That was a huge thing back then.

So meaning you only optimize the landing pages and the rest doesn't matter?

What a stupid idea.

No.

It's where people start.

So I think there was this time of landing page optimization, AB testing, then it, kind of submerged into conversion rate optimization.

That was a time we call it conversion, summit but we quickly realized it's about experimentation and, customer experience optimization and these topics and and they are basically there for for growth.

So we thought about calling it Growth Summit but then, yeah, we found the name Growth Marketing Summit interesting so that's how we ended up with that name.

We always wanted to find a name that, yeah, clarifies what we stand for.

Just to add something to that is also that the audience profile changed a bit, you know, because we noticed that Interesting.

More people from like areas like product management are interested in this, in this topic as well and joined the the summit.

So we see more product owners, product managers coming to our, event, UX designers.

So it was quite a broad audience.

Whereas in the beginning I think Andre it was really like the pure CRO people.

And then like we broadened it up and so we had to change the name to also make sure people understand it's really about something more holistically called growth.

Yeah.

And then the question of course becomes is, is growth marketing summit still a good name?

Yeah.

That's, that implies what this, podcast already called Growth Minded Superheroes and and the answer is no.

I, growth marketing implies this is for all the people that work for marketing inside marketing together with marketing, but the world is changing.

And maybe this represents the maturity I just talked about, landing page optimization, conversion rate optimization, then we call it experimentation and more and more teams are getting involved.

So, now we realize, growth is a discipline for all teams and we don't want to still have kind of a focus, like marketing.

So how do we get rid of the marketing term?

It's still also for marketing people, for product people, for everyone.

Yeah.

And and this is, yeah actually what what Julia came up with, an idea I really like and I really support is renaming it to growth minded superheroes because everybody who comes to this conference is a superhero because these are people that care, they want to learn more, they want to raise a maturity, these are the the fighters for truth inside each company, we want to support them, We want to make them, the superheroes of our conference.

So we we we will call it growth minded superheroes in future.

Nice.

This also exemplifies what we stand for as a as a community with a growing, evolving.

And, yeah, sometimes the names need to change because, audience changes, reality changes.

So, Julie, I'm I'm now of course very curious.

Does it does it only, imply a name change or what what else is gonna change this year?

I don't wanna, tell too much.

So

Not too many spoilers, but just some hints will be nice.

Not spoiling too much.

No.

I mean, in the end, just to add to Andre's point, what was important also by changing the name is for us, because it's it's all about the community.

It's about the people, you know.

We noticed over the years that what makes the event so special is of course on the one hand side, the hand selected lineup of speakers that Andre is always selecting, to have the best and, yeah, most relevant topics on stage.

But then it's all about the attendees because we have such a strong community of people.

A lot of people coming back, growing.

So we are each year, we are growing the community and the networking aspect of the conference is so important.

And that's why we thought we need to put in the middle of everything, the people.

So that's why we want to call it superheroes because it's about the people, about the superheroes that make the event so special.

And then about your question, what will be changed?

Yeah.

Of course there will be a few surprises, but yeah.

I don't wanna spoil it too much so people should experience it themselves.

We always try to improve.

We always try to optimize the conference.

And what Andre and I did, was talking to a lot of attendees from last year to get some feedback, to optimize the event itself, and to put this feedback into the event.

And I really hope that this worked out.

So the biggest complaint last year was this fresh fruit fruit fruit sorry.

Fresh fruit was missing for the breakfast.

Okay.

If this is the biggest complaint, well

Sounds like a great

news.

Happy.

Biggest complaint.

Yes.

Exactly.

That's the biggest complaint.

Yeah.

What changed is that we increased the possibilities to network with others.

And it sounds maybe, inconvenient for introverted people but we make it as convenient as possible because I think, you have the possibility to talk to a couple of 100 people there who do or who did maybe on average a couple of dozen or 100 experiments.

So you can learn so much by talking to other attendees and we we try to make that as easy and convenient for everyone, even the introverts who say well, hey, hey, don't want to talk to other people.

No problem.

Come to Growth Marketing Summit and experience it.

Are there any, particular topics or speakers that you're looking forward to to this year or that you personally think, hey, this is gonna be a really important topic, looking out for next 5 years

in CRO or growth.

What's gonna be really important for people, to listen to or to think about?

It's a

tough question because, as I said all the speeches are kind of hand picked and I'm looking forward to each of them.

It's always surprising that finally it turns out different compared to what you had in mind.

So but what I am looking forward to is a speech that we never had before.

And it's a talk from my colleagues, from 2 colleagues of Konmerzunskaf both coming from a product organization.

And talking about the pain they experienced inside product organizations and how to solve it.

And that was their motivation to switch into CRO or experimentation, and optimization.

And and now they see the benefits that the 2 worlds could have from each other.

And it's it's a speech that is all about, closing the the gap, bridging the worlds together.

So I'm I'm really looking forward to this one although it's from our own team.

It's it's it's a tough one for our people, you know.

They know, that there are many well experienced speakers so there's a high

And no pressure.

Benchmark.

Yeah, no pressure.

Could you please talk about this and that's all?

I I I have have a lot of respect for, our colleagues that also take the stage there.

Yeah.

And, Julia, talking about, going out there, especially after COVID, everyone's used to working remotely now.

And there's a lot of, online conferences, webinars that we can, follow.

So why do we still need to go to an to an offline conference?

Why do we still need to travel?

Why is this so important?

Yeah.

Yeah.

You know, we were a bit scared after COVID, if people would really come back to the event because everyone was afraid.

And then we noticed people love that, you know, they they really needed, the exchange with others, the networking and the the personal exchange and not only talking online.

And that's why we see the growing numbers also of attendees, joining and we are convinced that it's so valuable to be there, to have the time.

Also at the get together in the evening, you know.

That gives space that you would never have in an online meeting to discuss things very personally.

And that's why I'm totally convinced that events will, will be very important also in the future.

People are social, I mean, people are social, period.

Right?

The social interactions.

Even for introverted people, they need social interactions.

And this is why we think growth marketing somewhat is an experience, including the networking breaks and the coffee breaks and the we will have some activities where people can participate in everything.

We have the networking reception after the conference because, yeah, speaking with other people is so valuable.

Some people say well this is even more valuable than the speeches.

Speeches they they were inspiring but, yeah, connecting to like minded people, people who are in a different or similar situation, learning from them from the coming from different companies, but being in a similar situation that's so valuable.

So you you can't do that online in one word.

Talking as as someone that's leading toward towards the introverted side.

I mean, I started the podcast to still talk to people, but, still going to to, offline events.

I mean, I think after COVID, it even gives some extra energy because people are at home all the time now.

It's extra special to go through.

There's there's more intent behind it.

There's more, energy, to go into such an event to make it even more special.

And then you can go rest at home again.

That's fine.

That's also good.

That's nice.

But the the the meeting of, of everyone that you're already talking to to a screen all day, it's very nice to do that, in your life.

And as Andre already said, we wanted to make it as easy as possible also for the introverted to connect with each other, you know.

I mean, you don't have to talk to each other, of course, but so you're not forced, but we will make it as easy as possible.

For example, by providing for the first time an event app this year.

That also helps, you know, connect easier with people to set tags for topics that you are interested in, that you wanna learn more about, and to find the right people to match, you know.

So I think that's also something that will really, yeah, make a difference this year.

And, as as a as a final question, for you, as a visitor, how can I get the most out of out of the events?

Should I bring certain things?

Do I need to prepare something?

What do I need to do?

How can I make this the best event of the year for

me?

Well, how should you prepare?

That's a good question.

I mean, basically, you you don't need to prepare anything.

No.

Just be there.

Be be open minded, you know.

I

Exactly.

That would have been my answer.

Just be open minded.

Go there with like a positive attitude and just think, okay, you can learn.

You will definitely take something from here.

If it's from the talk, if it's from the networking.

Just be open, talk to people and use the opportunity that it gives.

The only thing that I would say is now that I talked about the app, download the app like a few days before.

You know, set up your profile, set up the tags and things you're interested in to connect easier.

You won't miss a talk as we only have the single stream.

That's also different from other conferences where you have to pick topics and then and then you have this, FOMO and think, oh my god.

I need to attend this or no.

I want to attend this.

But you have the single stream, single track conference where you can't miss a thing.

That's also important for me.

But other than that yeah, just enjoy.

Be present.

Yeah.

It's, it's not that often that I'm speechless, but this time you caught me, no idea how you could prepare for for the, attending the conference.

But I have one answer to that question as well, you know.

What because what I observe is people sitting in their companies, talking to their colleagues, and I would call it being trapped in their bubble.

Everybody is trapped in their job bubble.

And many times you think, well, am I the only one that needs to convince their bosses to do x y whatever?

Am I the only one that has a lack of resources here?

Am I the only one that thinks I'm fighting against?

Whatever.

And I think this is something you will learn when you you come to GMS, right?

That there are people that have the same bubble in different companies.

And that that's what I mean when when I say the only thing, you need, is be a little bit open minded because you can learn from these people.

They might have solved some things that that you still need to solve.

And also regarding the the different names and and the history we have, what we went through, you will see people that already are in a different stage.

Well, we now have product teams and we want to make them experimentation ready.

While you are still in a center of excellence and you try to to have a centralized approach and you still remember how it was when you were the only team that did AB tests and whatever.

So you will be helpful for everyone else that that has a different maturity.

You can learn from each other, because you maybe solved some of the hurdles already to move forward.

And some people that's the only thing you need.

Be open mind.

Listen to the stories of other people.

Exactly.

I mean, at at minimum, you can just give each other a hug or cry together because you have the same problems.

But more likely you will be able to solve your problems by talking to, to people and sharing.

Yeah exactly.

I would say that These challenges that you have.

That's the value proposition, the the whole community of Growth Marketing Summit attendees is maybe the the the biggest walking asset, the biggest database of knowledge and experience that you can find, in the world.

You won't find another place where you have that many people.

For the real networking, that happens in between, and that's the way you talk to your peers about, hey.

I have the same issue or I solve this in this way.

And, of course, at the networking, and then, and the get together after the events.

And maybe during breakfast, we have some nice fruits.

Fruit.

Yeah.

That's something that's something we really improved, and I I think that will raise our NPS, to astronomical heights.

We all we all had so many bananas, and you can't imagine I met so many bananas.

No.

Number one tip in organizing a conference in 2024, bring, bring fruit and lots of it.

Awesome.

Yeah.

That's true.

Awesome.

So, yeah, for everyone, June 19th in Frankfurt, book your tickets.

If you don't have them yet, go to, growthmarketingsummit.com, and we'll all be joining some fresh fruits, together then.

Thanks.

Yeah.

That's

what we will do.

Thank you.

Julia, thanks, Andre.

Thanks, and see you there.

Thank you.

See you in June.

Yeah.

Bye bye.