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Ecomweek LA 2021 Replay Host
October 13, 2021 - By Acadia Otlowski

eCommerce Week LA 2021 Fosters Community and Accessibility for Brand Marketers

They say it takes a village and eCommerce Week LA™ 2021 proves that. 

eCommerce Week LA™ is the product of Hawke Media’s experts collaborating to produce an event experience that none of us could have created individually.  Our stellar host Chidi Ezemma, countless members of the Hawke Media Team, our sponsors, and our partners all made the second annual eCommerce Week LA™ a smashing success. 

Our mission at Hawke Media is to create accessible marketing for everyone. We also believe that every company deserves to have a CMO-level professional in charge of its marketing. In today’s COVID-19 landscape, virtual events like eCommerce Week LA™ truly provide accessible marketing and eCommerce advice for businesses of all sizes.

This year’s eCommerce Week LA™ was different from last year’s iteration, and as we continue to host this yearly event, we look forward to accommodating the changing marketing and eCommerce ecosystems. 

This year, we have a blend of in-person and virtual events and we think that going forward, hybrid conference models will create accessible experiences for everyone, which very much aligns with our lofty aims here at Hawke. 

Each of the sessions we put together reflects our brand values, which are: 

  • Get sh*t done 
  • Learn quickly
  • Be cool 

eCommerce Week LA™ is the result of those values, with sessions designed to help you network (be cool), provide relevant information (learn quickly), that you can act upon (get sh*t done). 

Here are some of the highlights and insights from eCommerce Week LA™ 2021, compiled for your reading pleasure. We’ve embedded the daily playlists, as well as linked to specific sessions for the insights we share. 

Marketing Monday  

We kicked off a week of virtual content at eCommerce Week LA™ with ClearCo’s Pitch Competition.  

It featured three incredibly relevant brands. They were: 

  • Kind Laundry — A eco-friendly, detergent sheet company  
  • Zenimal  — a meditation and white noise device for improved sleep 
  • FitVille  — An athleisure shoe company designed for wide feet  

All three brands did an incredible job, but there could only be one winner. Find out which brand won by watching “Clearco ClearPitch at eCom Week LA™ 2021

Some of the key insights from Monday’s eCommerce Week LA™ sessions included: 

Overall, Day 1 of eCommerce Week LA™ revealed that organic, authentic messaging combined with listening to both customers and their data is the secret sauce for successful marketing. 

Tech Tuesday

Los Angeles City Mayor Eric Garcetti gave a short address to kick off Tech Tuesday’s sessions. His address highlighted the partnership between Hawke Media and the city and how they’re working together to foster a sense of vibrancy and community in Los Angeles. 

Some of the key insights from Tech Tuesday of eCommerce Week LA™ were: 

  • We learned there’s a difference between organic and paid social media, and a lot of that has to do with friction. The buying process should also be as low friction as possible according to the experts on “Discovery Commerce with Facebook.”
  • While purchase decisions might seem transactional and cold, it is always an emotional process. On “The Non-Stop Shop: Exploring the Live Stream Shopping Boom” we learned live hosts help evoke conversations that spark joy, entertain, and eventually, convert viewers into participants into customers.  
  • Ann McFerran said understanding what triggers people to take an action is a key aspect of both sales and marketing in “Bootstrapping in Beauty”: The Glamnetic Story.”
  • In “The Future of Tech”,  Vance Reavie shared how AI helps answer “the why” behind someone’s actions, which increases performance and helps mitigate/avoid risk.  

In summation, Tech Tuesday taught us that while we can buy all the tech in the world and use AI and data to make our choices, in the end, we are all humans making decisions (primarily) based on relationships and emotions.  

World Impact Wednesday

The middle of the week for eCommerce Week LA™ was world-shifting. Representatives from Shopify and Google taught us how and why eCommerce brands use their tools, especially during the holiday season. 

These were some of the most engaging highlights of the week. World Impact Wednesday Highlights included: 

On World Impact Wednesday of eCommerce Week LA™, we learned about the softer side of business. These are the hot topics of diversity, equity, and inclusivity and speakers emphasized their importance. 

Those topics are intertwined with the conversations about authenticity and personal identity. The pandemic compelled us all to be more real, to embrace ourselves, and brands need to embrace that both internally and externally.

 

Team Efficiency Thursday 

Hawke Media CEO & Founder Erik Huberman hosted Team Efficiency Thursday, which contained two exciting announcements. The first was the winner of the giveaway to the beautiful El Perdido resort, Katherine Chicoine. Congratulations to the lucky winner, who will be taking a companion on the trip in January! 

Erik Huberman also made his first on-air announcement about his new book, The Hawke Method, which contains the three pillars of marketing that have helped  3,500+ brands grow their business.

Those pillars are: 

  • Awareness 
  • Nurture
  • Trust  

He shared some sneak peaks about the book and invites anyone interested to join his launch team for more exclusive, insider perks.  

Insights from Team Efficiency Thursday includes:   

  • Rob Dyrdek dispensed some kernels of wisdom in “Building a Company: Achieving Ridiculous Goals with Rob Dyrdek.
    • Goal-achieving can be approached the same way as learning a (skateboard) trick. You decide the trick you’d like to do, then break down how you learn it. 
    • Failure can be a lesson, so long as you continue to fail forward in the direction of your objectives.  
    • You do one thing like you do everything. 
  • Today’s mobile consumers are different than they were in 2019, according to Alana Corey in “Why 2022 is the Year of SMS Marketing.” 2019’s rules no longer apply, and mobile consumers will continue to dominate going forward. 
  • Alana Corey shared in “Why 2022 is the Year of SMS Marketing”, that 89% of mobile consumers want to receive texts from their favorite brands. 

For Team Efficiency Thursday, we saw consumer behaviors shifted tremendously since 2019, and that mobile will reign supreme in the coming years. We witnessed that failure is a part of success, but making the same mistake over and over is a waste of your energy. 

Finance Friday 

The final day of eCommerce Week LA™ is Finance Friday, where most sessions highlight getting funding, financial responsibility, and more. 

Some of the highlights from the final day of eCommerce Week LA™ included: 

In two sessions focused on women, business, and finance speakers shared these insights: 

On Finance Friday, we learned that money is power. Many entrepreneurs, marketers, and individuals shy away from handling their finances properly, which is to their detriment.  

All in all, eCommerce Week LA™ 2021 was a reflection of what eCommerce, marketing, and business is as we all work in a world reshaped by the global pandemic. Some of the themes of those changes, which popped up across sessions were: 

  • Authenticity — Both in the workplace and in marketing, individuals want to be seen.
  • Transparency — There’s no more tolerance for omission or concealment of mistakes or weaknesses. Today’s customers know better and expect brands to do better. 
  • Mobile —  89% of buying is now done on a mobile device. Optimize for it. 
  • Emotion — Hiding your feelings is so last decade. Today’s leaders and brands are expected to show emotional intelligence and sensitivity.  

What was your favorite part of eCommerce Week LA™? Did you have a session you enjoyed in particular?  

If you missed a session, the week, or want to rewatch a session you missed, you can view the complete list here

Here at Hawke Media, we believe every brand deserves to have CMO-quality marketing, no matter its size. Reach out today for a free consultation with one of Hawke Media’s digital marketing experts to learn how.


We’re ridiculously grateful to our generous sponsors and partners for all they’ve done to make eCom Week LA 2021 possible. We encourage you to support these stellar brands: