Sept 29, 2021 Wednesday

Super excited to be bringing the first-ever Outdoor Recreation (OREC) case competition to the industry. We are bringing in OREC directors from 8 different states to bring you the toughest problem facing their departments. Everyone in the room divides into teams and brainstorms solutions then present their solutions to the room. It’s a great way to crowdsource ideas from the sharpest minds in the outdoor industry and to get awesome prizes along the way!

Think globally, act locally. Outdoor enthusiasts who want to make a difference on climate change, water / land conservation, healthy forests and more need to be informed, engaged and active in their local communities — and local journalism connects them to these issues, each other, and a lot more. While the old ways of producing and sustaining local news are disappearing, a new wave of innovative, community-centered local news is emerging. Join Meghan Parker of the Society of Environmental Journalists, Melissa Davis of the Gates Family Foundation, and Linda Shapley of Colorado Community Media to learn how local, national and corporate philanthropy are helping to catalyze transformation in local journalism — and how you can partner with local reporters on powerful and mission-driven projects.

When the words “blog monetization” are mentioned, many minds immediately go to ad sales. Think again. These two speakers have figured out how to make a good living my running blogs that they are passionate about. Michael Lanza, founder of The Big Outside, has a different formula where ad sales plays a role, but not the dominant role in the overall revenue picture. Jessica Williams, founder of You Did What With Your Weiner has found that some revenue streams that don’t work for other bloggers seem to work for her. Learn the secrets that have made Michael and Jessica successful as one person media operations.

Don’t just drive traffic, use Amazon (or Etsy) search data to drive the right traffic to your product pages. Without using search data, you’ll end up spending money on too competitive, too broad, or just plain wrong keywords. Learn how to optimize your content and ad strategies to get sales and lower costs.
Topics Discussed Include:
-How to stand out in an increasingly competitive marketplace
-How to index and rank for your main keywords, improve your click through rates and conversion rates to grow your sales
-How to make simple content adjustments that can boost your discoverability
-New tools and tactics for keyword research

Rebranding is a pain in the ass. It’s expensive, it’s hard and it’s not something to take on without good reason. Yet the risks are often outweighed by the benefits when done correctly. These companies have gone through successful rebrands and this session will examine four different case studies from a publisher’s perspective, an agency and conference perspective, a hard goods perspective and a supplement brand’s perspective.

“Within 5 years, more than 50% of publicly traded companies will have a Chief Community Officer” — Alexis Ohanian

The power of community is clear, and with Facebook shifting focus and investment into groups since 2020 (there’s even a secret group for ‘power admins’!) this platform is ripe for building an audience of evangelists that could be the secret sauce for your growth. .

But it takes work! Join (names) to learn tangible takeaways for using groups to drive sales, break into regional groups while maintaining one brand voice, and keeping your community engaged + growing organically.

Understand the process of generating partnership-driven editorial content using affiliate marketing programs as the foundation. From program set-up and management best practices, to the required materials, costs and expectations, this session will provide key tips that can help brands generate content from bloggers, commerce editors, social influencers, and other partnership types.

Outdoor Media Awards is where we celebrate the best voices in the outdoor industry from 2020.

When NPD looks at consumer behaviour data for the outdoor industry, they are able to pull some insight into who the customers are. One thing they are seeing right now is a boom in new outdoor participants, people who are experiencing the outdoors for the first time. Kay Rodriguez, founder of Urban Outdoors, Courtney Lanctot, founder of The Unpopular Black, Rick Stella, senior editor, Business Insider, and Kristin Canning, features editor, Women’s Health, will go deeper and share insights into who these new participants really are and how the outdoor industry can accommodate them.