---
title: "7 Insights from AdWeeK DC: Effective Marketing in Today's Landscape"
description: Industry events and other opportunities for continuing education in our rapidly evolving field.
---

[Yes& Insights ](https://insights.yesandagency.com)

# [7 Insights from AdWeeK DC: Effective Marketing in Today's Landscape](https://insights.yesandagency.com/seven-lessons-from-adweek-dc)

 Written by [Robert Sprague](https://insights.yesandagency.com/author/robert-sprague) | Oct 18, 2019 4:00:00 AM

 

 

It’s hard to get out of the office—but it’s worthwhile to attend industry events and other opportunities for continuing education in our rapidly evolving field. That’s why six Yes& staff members and I attended the sessions on October 3 at the Ronald Reagan Building.

Rather than monopolize the conversation as usual, I challenged each of my colleagues to come up with one key learning.  And here they are.

 

**1.** Post-Production Supervisor **Austin Smokowicz** said, *“The only way to touch people is to be personal. That inherently means getting political; don't be afraid to go extreme.”* Austin was probably referring to a presentation demonstrating the benefit to brands like Nike, willing to take a controversial position and weather some blowback for eventual benefit.

 

 

**2.** From VP of Account Management **Max Entman**:* “We need to think bigger about helping our clients to start a conversation (e.g. on Twitter) that feels organic and achieves strategic goals."*

 

 

 

**3.** Account Manager **Jacqui Balough** added: *“Our work should consider not only diversity of ethnicity, orientation, or gender, but also things that might be easier to forget—like age, ability, etc. Everyone's input is valuable!”*

 

 

 

**4.*** “Brands without meaning have little impact with consumers,”* says VP of Business Development **Howard Bomstein**.  *“Purpose driven marketing also motivates creatives to work towards developing a message platform that is meaningful.”*

 

 

 

**5.** Adds Production Coordinator **Lauren Schild**, *“Generation Z is entering the workforce as well as the marketplace.  They don’t like to be sold—they want advertisers and marketers to be their ‘co-conspirators’ in building a better future.”*

 

 

 

****

**6.*** “And for 86% of Gen Zers, out-of-home is the channel to which they will pay the most attention,”* follows up VP Account Management **Veronika Oleynik**.

 

 

 

**7.** And I?   I learned that an effective marketing message now has to be “thumb stopping”—i.e. something to cause a busy scroller to stop long enough to read or click.

I usually think that one good insight is worth attending an event like this, and we came away with at least seven. Nice job,** [ADWKDC!](https://advertisingweekdc.com/)** See ‘ya next year.

 

 

(Max Entman, VP Account Management-Associations; Bob Sprague, President & CEO; Judy Markoe; Imani Greene; Veronica Oleynik, VP Account Management-Government)

 

[View full post](https://insights.yesandagency.com/seven-lessons-from-adweek-dc)

```json
{
  "@context" : "http://schema.org",
  "@type" : "BlogPosting",
  "author" : {
    "@type" : "Person",
    "name" : "Robert Sprague"
  },
  "dateModified" : "2025-04-22T20:25:17.278Z",
  "datePublished" : "2019-10-18T04:00:00Z",
  "headline" : "7 Lessons From AdWeek DC 2019",
  "image" : {
    "@type" : "ImageObject",
    "height" : 801,
    "url" : "https://www.beacondigitalmarketing.com/hubfs/Imported_Blog_Media/AdWeek%20DC%20Stock%20photo.jpg",
    "width" : 1308
  },
  "mainEntityOfPage" : "https://insights.yesandagency.com/seven-lessons-from-adweek-dc",
  "publisher" : {
    "@type" : "Organization",
    "logo" : {
      "@type" : "ImageObject",
      "height" : 60,
      "url" : "/hs/hsstatic/content_shared_assets/static-1.4092/img/default-amp-logo.png",
      "width" : 60
    },
    "name" : "Yes& Insights"
  }
}
```