I simply had to write a blog post about my experience at the Women's Inspire Conference in City North Hotel.
This was my first venture into sponsoring an event and it was a very simple step for me to do. There were two reason's why I felt I wanted to sponsor, the business/practical side and the more emotive and personal side.I have been to a few of Samantha Kelly's Women's Inspire events over the last couple of years and I have to say, I have always taken away value from them. She always manages to pull in excellent speakers who come with the same ethos as her. I also knew it would be well attended and well run (they always are). Her "brand" and her target audience are the same as mine, so on the business side it made sense for me to support her too.The sponsorship package was really good too and I got a lot from that as well. I am definitely going to be looking at sponsoring other events from now on, but on a personal level, it really worked for me!
Every speaker on the day had a story of how their business grew with support from others. Some stories were very heartfelt and really demonstrated just how far some people have had to come to be the success they are today. It really makes you sit back and think how lucky we are to have these supports and friends in place. Easily the hardest story to hear about was from Kerry Manning Colson who has just managed to turn her whole life around in the last couple of years to embrace exactly who she is and what she wants out of life. Her story stirred the entire room and she was powerful in her address.There were so many speakers who stood up for the first time too like Miriam of Sewing Concepts. She explained how she grew her business from the very beginning online and with the support of the Local Enterprise Office.
There were several opportunities during the course of the day to view the stands, which ranged from networks you could join like the Women In Business Network to Colourstick (love this product, I use it myself!) to jewellery like from BusyBeaders and gorgeous lamp shades from Amanda Christie Design.
The venue provided some great lunches and space for people to mingle and network which I enjoyed a lot of too. Everybody who was there wanted to meet each other and were open to learning more about you and your business which made it a lot easier to interact.
I was invited to run a workshop on the day too. My workshop this time was about an "Introduction to LinkedIn" and I went through how to optimise your LinkedIn profile and use it as more a marketing tool, rather than as a recruitment one. The attendees were great, very interactive with me and thanks to those that attended on the day. I really enjoyed presenting it to you!
Since Women's Inspire Network inception, it has become the "go to" brand for female entrepreneur start ups and this successful event was attended by sooo many new women who had never been to one before, I can see it only growing more and more over the next year or two.
As of today, the tickets for next years event are now up! Speakers will be confirmed nearer the time of course. The event is taking place this time in Cork, so a chance to visit another part of Ireland for me. I have already booked my ticket, I know I'll be there - will you? Click the Eventbrite logo below to book your tickets.
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