paidContent’s The Future of Business Media Conference Was the Best of its Kind…So Far

Attending paidContent.org’s Future of Business Media Conference today was a pleasure. The bill was full of interesting, relevant, topical, high-level speakers, the program was executed smoothly, and the Waldorf=Astoria is a great venue. The best part about it was the level of the attendees. The sponsors must love Rafat, et al right now. I saw many top level B2B media players there, and they mostly seemed happy to be there, too. Overall, a great experience: thanks, paidContent.

But, for FOBM’s success, I don’t think that anyone has really nailed this format, yet. DeSilva + Phillips had something similar not too long ago, and I didn’t think it was as good, and I think that the content at even this show was a bit lacking. For instance, while I found the Q&A with Gordon Crovitz incredibly interesting, I didn’t see much takeaway there for someone who is looking to run his/her business better. While I thought the back and forth between David Carey (Conde Nast Portfolio) and Keith Fox (BusinessWeek) was really interesting (and civil…kudos, boys), I didn’t understand why someone representing The Economist and Mansueto were on the panel. I see The Economist as more competitive (for both readers and advertisers) with TIME, Newsweek, et al (though they might disagree), and I think that Inc./Fast Company belong more on a panel with Wired and the now-defunct Business2.0. It just didn’t seem to be a well-though-out panel.

Now, that’s not to say that I wasn’t enthralled by most of the content I was exposed to, but I don’t think I learned much aside from gossip and quasi-inside info about Fox Business News from the Neil Cavuto luncheon keynote. Maybe that was supposed to be a lighter part of the program, a break, a change of pace, but I think this was applicable to much of what we heard. As usual, the most valuable info was being exchanged between attendees in the halls.

I’m not sure what the right format is, but there has got to be some way that you can plan a day-long program where operators can sit down and learn real lessons about their businesses.

Again, kudos to paidContent for a job relatively well-done, but I think this space is still open water for B2B media.

If you’re a B2B group publisher, publisher, COO, CFO, CIO, or CEO, wouldn’t you pay for a day of real lessons, ideas, real, take-home value? I know that this is what’s promised at these conferences…but I think it is not truly delivered…yet.