Tackle Retail's 
Unique Social Media Challenges In 2024

Marc Gawith is a 15+ year business development leader with experience in front-end video creation, back-end video distribution (CDN), and post-video editing. He has also worked as a digital marketing agency consultant, where he led teams that created and distributed content for clients.

Marc is also a content creator in his own right—his experience includes photography, live streaming, and videography.

He believes that we are in the midst of a revolution where everyone has the power to create amazing videos at home or in their office.

Mike Allton is an international keynote speaker, an award-winning consultant & author at The Social Media Hat, where he has been educating businesses and organizations on the best use of social media & content marketing for reaching and converting target audiences. He has spent over a decade in digital marketing and brings an unparalleled level of experience and excitement to the fore, whether he's delivering a presentation or leading a workshop.

Since 2012, Mike has excelled at helping his community understand the nuance and best practices involved in utilizing social platforms, leveraging social media management tools, and creating 10X content. He has established a reputation for being able to explain complex tools or topics in easy to understand ways, all while bringing a necessary sense of overall brand strategy and business purpose.

When he isn’t writing yet another blog post, Mike also serves as the Head of Strategic Partnerships at Agorapulse where he strengthens relationships with social media educators, influencers and partner brands.

Agorapulse is a robust social media management tool favored by agencies and social media influencers around the world. Featuring support for all major platforms and a host of scheduling options, Agorapulse is designed to help managers save time. The reports are extensive and easy to export, and the streamlined monitoring allows users to quickly respond to messages and get to Social Media Inbox Zero.

Allton is also the co-author of The Ultimate Guide to Social Media Marketing alongside Jenn Herman, Stephanie Liu, Amanda Robinson and Eric Butow, available wherever books are sold.

Robin Dimond is the CEO and Founder of Fifth & Cor, a marketing & innovation company. Dimond brings over 18 years of experience that has led to a successful team and client success stories over the years. Passionate about the human experience, Dimond strives to bring sensory experiences and the heart back into all her team’s work, thus comes the name - Fifth (five senses) & Cor (Latin for heart).

Dimond strives to not only transform brands, but also communities. She sits on the Broward College School Board, participates in various charities, and finds opportunities to empower the next generation through technology and marketing advancement. Dimond is also involved in the technology advancement in south Florida through NSU’s Levan Center of Innovation and is a member of the Female Founder Collective where she finds opportunities to uplift other women-owned businesses.

Consistently named a top retail influencer, Carol Spieckerman is a recognized authority on retail and brand strategy. As president of Spieckerman Retail, she helps global retailers, brands, agencies, and technology companies successfully navigate retail from now to next. Before creating a thriving retail communications agency, Carol built multi-million-dollar businesses from the ground up for brands and solution providers that didn't know it was possible. Carol develops B2B communications strategies that drive awareness, engagement, and action and speaks on her latest Retail Trajectories – calls to action that transcend trend across categories, borders, business models, and touchpoints. Carol is passionate about solving tough retail positioning and business development challenges and aligning companies with where retail is going next. Carol is a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert for 2024 and you can find her thought leadership in leading business and retail publications including Reuters, Forbes, Bloomberg, Market Watch, Retail Wire and her podcast, Spieckerman Speaks Retail.

Often referred to as “the Queen of Facebook,” Mari Smith is widely known as the Premier Facebook Marketing Expert and a top Social Media Thought Leader. Forbes describes Mari as, “… the preeminent Facebook expert. Even Facebook asks for her help.” IBM named Mari as one of seven women that are shaping digital marketing. She is an in-demand keynote speaker, dynamic live webinar host, savvy corporate social media strategist and trainer, and popular brand ambassador. Her client list includes Adobe, AT&T, Bank of America, HubSpot, Meta, Nations Lending, Nu Skin, Pinterest, PNC Bank and Verizon. She is the author of The New Relationship Marketing and coauthor of Facebook Marketing: An Hour A Day. And Mari’s passion project for the past several years is professional studies of The Human Design System. She integrates aspects of Human Design into her social media marketing courses to help entrepreneurs grow their businesses in a much more authentic, impactful, and successful way.

Jenn Herman is a social media consultant, speaker, and globally recognized Instagram expert. She is a sought-after and international speaker providing tips, resources, and training for organizations of all sizes that need to structure their social media strategies. Her business background includes Administration, Sales, Human Resources, and Marketing and she enjoys bringing all these skills together to help you grow your business. Jenn has been featured in Inc., Fox News, BBC News, Yahoo Finance, Entrepreneur, HuffPost, The Verge, CBS Radio LA, and numerous other podcasts and publications. She is the author of “Instagram for Dummies”, “Instagram for Business for Dummies”, and “The Ultimate Guide to Social Media Marketing”.

Owen Hemsath a.k.a Owen Video is an award-winning YouTube Growth Strategist and High-Performance Coach for the Nations Top Companies & Business Influencers. Owen has been called a Pioneer on YouTube and is considered the leading expert on YouTube for business and revenue generation.

He has consulted for major brands like North Face, Oracle, and Excelon. Owen has helped his clients achieve millions of views and generate millions of dollars in sales and brand sponsorship. Owen has been invited to speak all over the globe and has been featured in major media like ABC, NBC, KUSI and Social Media Examiner.

Phil Pallen is a personal branding expert and keynote speaker. His non-conventional approach to digital marketing and talent for social media has built him a global audience.

As a brand strategist, Phil has advised hundreds of brands from over 30 countries, including a Shark on Shark Tank, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, politicians, and some of the most important names in entertainment. A digital nomad and globetrotter, Phil has delivered speeches on five different continents and frequently appears as an expert contributor in media outlets around the world, including CNN, Access Hollywood, and The Daily Mail.

Wave Wyld is TikTok Marketing & Trends Expert. She has helped thousands of creators and business owners grow their TikTok accounts with a “Content First”and "Community over Virality" approach.

Wave specializes in helping business owners use short form video marketing to generate more leads and sales so that they can make more impact with their businesses.

Wave’s background in personal branding and photo/video creation helped her launch a brand on TikTok in 2020 as the “Queen of Trend Alerts” which then started the movement of “Trend Alert” style videos that currently dominates social media feeds by other social media coaches.

She has built an engaged audience of over 375 K + followers across her social media platforms. She regularly appears on National TV, and speaks on top rated podcasts and social media marketing summits.

Jasmine Romaine is an International Keynote Speaker, Communications Strategist, and
International Best Selling Author of Speak to Profit: Speak with Confidence and Jazz Up Your
Sales! Jasmine was also part of the cast in the bold remake of the film, The Color Purple and
several other film projects. Her mission is to empower professionals to effectively communicate
with clarity and confidence so they can amplify their voice and have ultimate success in the
workplace and/or entrepreneurship. Jasmine will truly get an audience #JazzedAboutSuccess!

Chuck Hester is a nationally renowned executive LinkedIn trainer and speaker who helps people get the most out of LinkedIn. He has spoken at conferences throughout the United States, Mexico, and Canada on the subject of how to use LinkedIn for Business, Brand Equity, and content marketing.

He is the co-founder of A Purpose Partnership, a contrarian marketing and business consulting firm that works with its clients in all things marketing - from public relations to web development to corporate social responsibility.

As a LinkedIn executive trainer, he has helped C-Level executives and business owners understand and master the power of LinkedIn. Clients have worked with Nike, Cisco, and the Governor’s Office for the State of Utah.

As YouTube Strategic Partner Manager at Google with 9 years in start-ups and
business, I speak on behalf of YouTube with a focus on digital product offering at
international conferences, reaching an audience of 2,000+ in 2023. As an AI
evangelist and expert at Google, I educate 150+ employees on gen AI. I have
co-founded CollegePeek, School of the Young Scientist and am on board of
Advisors at SuperFlow (Forbes 30 under 30 founder). I advise imagi (featured in
Financial Times; Forbes 30 under 30 founders) and Imagen Insights (£3 million
revenue in UK in 5 years). My thought leadership on tech is featured in podcasts
with up to 50,000 listeners, as well as LinkedIn News UK (2M followers).

Kate Bradley Chernis is the Founder & CEO of Lately.AI, which identifies the makeup of the highest possible performing social media messaging for your target audience and generates posts that contains that content in your unique voice.

Lately's proprietary language models are not a layer on top of ChatGPT (or anyone else), which means your data remains 100% private, you own your results and your results are free of those public datasets and all their bias. We also deliver this content through our own social media management and employee advocacy platform, the only one that was built throughout with AI, from the ground up (and not a trendy afterthought).

As a former rock 'n' roll dj, Kate served 20 million listeners as Music Director and on-air host at Sirius/XM. She’s also an award-winning radio producer, engineer and voice talent with 25 years of national broadcast communications, brand-building, sales and marketing expertise. What she learned in radio about the neuroscience of music helps fuel Lately's artificial intelligence.

Prior to founding Lately, Kate also owned a marketing agency which got Walmart a 130% ROI, YoY for three years.

In addition, Kate's appeared as a guest speaker on hundreds of sales, marketing and entrepreneurial podcasts and has led presentations for Walmart, Ericsson, SAP, National Disability Institute, IRS, United Way Worldwide, SaaStr, SXSW, Content Marketing Institute, HubSpot, Hootsuite, Harvard University, Columbia University, NYU and others.

Anne Cheng is an award-winning executive CEO of Supercharge Lab, with extensive experience in business and marketing strategy, talent development and operational execution. She is a multi-exit serial entrepreneur who founded Supercharge Lab, an AI company that started with Cognitive Intelligence and has now expanded to intelligent workflows. She also founded Start Up Nation, a Southeast Asian angel investment network which, at its peak, had over $200M in assets under management.
She has been celebrated as a leader within the Southeast Asian startup ecosystem, having been awarded with titles such as Prestige’s 40 Under 40, and Women Top in Tech (Asian Entrepreneur). Anne has led and mentored thousands of startups and their founders, through her time as founder of Start Up Nation, and has been involved as EiR, mentor, panelist and judge to startups working with organizations such as WeWork Labs, Startup Leadership Program, Global Enterprise Challenge and other entrepreneur acceleration programs across Asia.
Anne started her career in the financial industry and had her first taste of leadership as a young VP of a regional bank at the age of 27, finally taking on roles as Head of Operations for multiple financial institutions before moving on to consulting for YPO. At YPO, Anne worked alongside close to 3,000 CEOs and Presidents of large multi-billion dollar companies to family-owned enterprises and learned how to lead leaders.
Through Supercharge Lab and its affiliated companies, Anne has completed over 200 projects in the five practice areas of AI, digital transformation, smart cities, healthcare technologies and financial technologies. Supercharge Lab works with companies through investments, building, and go-to-market strategies.

Dustin W. Stout is an entrepreneur, AI enthusiast, and Founder at Magai. Since starting his blog in 2011, Dustin has built a successful career as a full-time digital marketing consultant, speaker, and has created numerous products that help digital creators accomplish more. His current focus is Magai (maj-eye)—the worlds best AI tools in one place.

​Christina Garnett, fractional chief customer officer and advisor, spans experience across Fortune 500 companies, startups, agencies, higher education, nonprofits, and small businesses.

Committed to ensuring customer satisfaction and brand affinity, she excels in program optimization, problem-solving, and strategic positioning across social media and community engagement.

Emphasizing authentic connections, Christina leaves an indelible mark on brand-customer interactions in the evolving digital landscape.

Christina is featured in HubSpot Academy's Social Media Certification course and social listening courses, Semrush Academy's social listening course, and is a partner for On Deck's Community Builder Program, teaching a module on advocacy as a community growth lever. She has been a speaker for events like the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity (Hubilo-BizBash), INBOUND, Digital Summit, Social Fresh, Adapted Digital Media Summit, and MnSearch Summit. You can also find her featured in HubSpot, Social Insider, and Talkwalker ebooks and articles in Adweek, The Next Web, and Forbes.

Ted Harrison is the Founder and Executive Producer at neuemotion servicing Fortune 500 clients and beyond, author of Entrepreneurial Creativity: Repeatable Creative Success, and the former Head of Production at Twitter Inc. & X Corp.

Ted's past work has ranged from building a 9 figure content business as an "intra"preneur at Twitter, to animation onsite in Iraq, to award winning Super Bowl commercials, to script coverage for Academy Award winning director Jonathan Demme.

Brooke Sellas is shaping the future of digital marketing, one conversation at a time. As a CEO, she's the visionary behind B Squared Media, a boutique digital marketing agency that's redefining 'social care' for industry giants like Brother International, Endless Pools, and BCU. With her groundbreaking 2022 book, "Conversations That Connect," she's charting a course for authentic digital interactions. Dive into her insights on the Marketing Agency Show podcast, or from one of two courses she teaches at the University of California, Irvine.

With over 10 years of experience in Marketing and Sales for B2B SaaS, I am an Associate Director of Marketing at Airmeet, a virtual events platform for communities and enterprises. I have certifications and experience across functions in sales and marketing and continue to upskill and expand my knowledge.

I am passionate about Go-To-Market and demand creation strategies that leverage Events, Content, and Partnerships to create value for prospects and customers.

At Airmeet, I lead a team that works closely with Sales, CS, and Product to drive pipeline and revenue through content, ABM, events and partnerships. We focus heavily on creating great experiences for our audiences and helping them use Event-led Growth to meet their goals. I have also worked at multiple startups in the past, where I built sustainable processes and alignment between teams with a focus on growing the business.

My mission is to help B2B companies grow through sustainable and scalable GTM methods.

I'm a tech entrepreneur, podcaster, and professional stand-up comedian. I started my journey in the tech industry back in 1997 when I founded my own website development company, which was one of the pioneering companies in the country at the time. While working in technology, my comedic talents couldn't be contained, and I eventually took to the stage as a stand-up comedian.

My passion for comedy led me to create Hashtag Roundup (@hashtagroundup on Twitter), a platform that has contributed to over 8000 top 10 USA trends on Twitter. With the growth of social media, particularly Instagram, I founded Stampede Social, a company aimed at helping creators drive traffic to their content without relying solely on a link in their bio.

Marrying technology with business objectives has become my expertise, and I'm excited about sharing my knowledge and experiences with others

Amanda Robinson is the Founder & CEO of The Digital Gal Inc. She is a Certified Meta Lead Trainer and regularly presents on behalf of Meta at in person and virtual events. She is widely recognized in the digital marketing industry for her knowledge, training, skills and coaching as a Facebook Ads expert with her Swift Kick In the Ads Membership, her Facebook Ads Training Bootcamp, and for her creative chatbot skills. She is an author, international speaker, consultant, and educator who has taught thousands of business owners and entrepreneurs the foundational skills of Facebook Ads. Amanda brings personality and passion to teaching others how to make Facebook ads work for them.

Miya Knights has over 25 years' experience as a retail technology analyst, editor, author and consultant. She is the owner and publisher of Retail Technology magazine and has co-authored two best-selling books about Amazon and Omnichannel Retail. Miya serves as a consultant and advisor to a number of technology companies, judges a number of industry awards, and is also a member of the Retail Influencer Network, Customer Strategy Network and the KPMG Retail Think Tank.
Miya regularly appears as a retail technology expert on news and current affairs television programmes, and is quoted in the press, as well as moderating or speaking at industry events. She was also recognised as 2021 Arts & Media Senior Leader by the Black British Business Awards, and has been named one of top retail influencers in 2023 by RETHINK Retail and the Retail Technology Innovation Hub.

Ron Thurston's life mission is to celebrate, elevate, and empower the people and the spirit of the retail industry.

Boasting over three decades of experience at the helm of retail stores and operations for some of America's top brands, including Gap, West Elm, Apple, Tory Burch, Bonobos, and Saint Laurent, Ron has developed an extensive skill set in retail strategy, management, and innovation.

In January 2024, Ron co-founded OSSY, a comprehensive retail recruiting agency platform designed to bridge the gap between retailers, candidates, and solution providers, fostering successful careers and businesses.

Ron is also the best-selling book RETAIL PRIDE, which champions retail professionals to embrace their often accidental careers. He is the host of the RETAIL IN AMERICA podcast and tour, a venture that saw him traveling the nation in an Airstream trailer in 2022/2023, uncovering and spotlighting the unsung success stories and remarkable individuals in retail.

Ron's contributions have set him up to be recognized as one of the most influential voices in retail and retail technology and he lends his expertise to the Advisory Boards of several quickly growing retail tech companies, including Ometria, Reflex, Vendoor, and YOOBIC.

I am a social media practitioner and help brands formulate their KPI (Key Performance Indicator). Let me show you an affordable and easy to use social media management tool which impacts your bottom line and gives you an instant return on your investment.

Hana Ben-Shabat is the founder of Gen Z Planet ─ a research, training, and advisory firm. She helps business leaders across industries to prepare for the next generation of culture creators, employees and consumers. In this role, Hana combines her passion for turning insights into growth engines with her commitment to support the integration of the next generation into business and into society in general. She is the author of the book Gen Z 360: Preparing for the Inevitable Change in Culture, Work, and Commerce.

Known for her creativity, expertise, and insights, Hana is an award-winning management consultant who was named as one of the “Top 25 Consultants” by Consulting Magazine and as Top Retail Expert by Rethink Retail. She is a sought-after speaker and commentator on consumer behaviors and business trends and is being cited frequently by leading media such as The New York Times, Insider, Bloomberg, Associated Press, NPR, and CNBC.
Before founding Gen Z Planet, Hana was a partner and board member of the global management consulting firm A.T. Kearney where she co-led the firm’s Global Consumer Institute and advised clients around the world on issues of corporate strategy and organizational effectiveness. Before that she held marketing positions at several Israeli tech companies.

Hana holds a B.A. degree in Political Science (major) and Psychology (minor) from Tel Aviv University, an M.B.A from Rotterdam School of Management, and a diploma in Corporate Finance from London Business School.

Christopher S. Penn is an authority on analytics, digital marketing, marketing technology, data science, and machine learning. A recognized thought leader, best-selling author, and internationally renowned keynote speaker, he has shaped five key fields in the marketing industry: Google Analytics adoption, data-driven marketing and PR, modern email marketing, marketing data science, and artificial intelligence/machine learning in marketing. As co-founder and Chief Data Scientist of Trust Insights, he is responsible for the creation of products and services, creation and maintenance of all code and intellectual property, technology and marketing strategy, brand awareness, and research &development.

Mr. Penn is a 2023, six-time IBM Champion in IBM Data and AI, a Brand24 Top 100 Digital Marketer, an Onalytica Top 100 AI in Marketing influencer, and co-host of the award-winning Marketing Over Coffee marketing podcast. Prior to co-founding Trust Insights, he built the marketing for a series of startups with a 100% successful exit rate in the financial services, SaaS software, and public relations industries. His work has served brands such as Twitter, T-Mobile, Citrix Systems, GoDaddy, AAA, McDonald’s, and many others.

Mr. Penn is an IBM Watson Machine Learning Certified Professional, a Google Analytics Certified Professional, a Google Ads Certified Professional, a Google Digital Sales Certified Professional, and a Hubspot Inbound Certified Professional. He is the author of over two dozen marketing books including bestsellers such as AI for Marketers: A Primer and Introduction, Marketing White Belt: Basics for the Digital Marketer, Marketing Red Belt: Connecting With Your Creative Mind, and Marketing Blue Belt: From Data Zero to Marketing Hero, and Leading Innovation.

Anne Popolizio is the owner of the digital marketing agency Social Squib. In school, Anne was the nerdiest of creatives and the most creative of the nerds. This balance serves her well in social media. She focuses on specific story telling to your ideal client through the written word, video and sound, but she’s obsessed with analytics so you can measure the results of your efforts.

She has been doing social media for businesses since 2010 and knows how to leverage your social media following into clients.

Courtney Smith Kramer is one of the only 3% of female creative directors in the US and was named a “Top 200 Global Marketing Influencer” and “Top 20 Agency Strategy Global Influencer” by Onalytica, a UK-based Influencer firm.

In her career, she has built campaigns for global brands like Plantronics, Cisco, Pitney Bowes, MasterCard, International Culinary Center, IBM and Netflix DVD.com, to name a few. She also served as Global Head of Marketing for the Co-Active Training Institute in a 4-year tenure. Today, Courtney is helping purpose-driven brands like Stampede.Social as an outsourced Creative Director and CMO, and inspiring positive change by helping leaders realize their own value and worth in the world.

An accomplished creative strategist, writer and designer, she has earned hundreds of creative awards in her career and has been featured in the Print International Design Annual, Graphic Design Magazine, Content Magazine and Logo Lounge. She has served as a juror for numerous ADDY Awards, W3 Awards, Davey Awards and the National Student Advertising Competition (NSAC), and is a former national AAF and World Brand Congress board member.

Courtney has founded two companies with her husband, Bryan Kramer (TED speaker, bestselling author and founder of the H2H Human-to-Human business movement); Silicon Valley marketing consultancy purematter, and H2H Companies, which offers group and private coaching for leaders.

Her first book, “Be Your Creative Sexy Self: Humorous Stories to Help You Live a Happier Life” launched in July 2020 at the #1 spot in Business Humor on Amazon.