I recently had the opportunity to head to Nashville, Tennessee to attend the Ultimate Product Party, a 2-day conference for product sellers. Even as a service based business owner who works with product sellers, I had SO MANY TAKEAWAYS from this event.
In this blog post, I’m going to be sharing some of my favorite moments from the conference. While I won’t highlight all of the speakers and roundtable leaders, I do want to emphasize this: EVERY SINGLE PERSON was amazing. All of the speakers were awesome, I learned a ton from every single roundtable I went to, and all of the keynotes were just top notch. So, while I won’t mention them all below, know that they were still 100% amazing.
Okay, now onto some of my favorite moments from the Ultimate Product Party.
Ciara Bennett’s Opening Keynote
Ciara Bennett with Vintage Oats was the opening keynote and omgosh, her personal story was AMAZING. It’s always so amazing to hear stories of women who triumphed when the odds were stacked against them, and Ciara is one of those women. I found her story really inspiring and encouraging as someone in a growth stage in my own business.
Follow Ciara over on Instagram here.
Amanda Dare’s Breakout Workshop on Business Funding
Amanda Dare with Women Owned Wallet did an amazing session all about money and how to fund your business. One of the things she said that really stood out to me, and I think can apply to so many different business scenarios is this:
Don’t do what helps you today; do what helps you in 3 months, 6 months, a year…
In other words, be future focused and don’t think so much in the “right now”. I know I can get so shortsighted sometimes, and so this was a great reminder to really focus on the long term plans I have for my business.
Check out Woman Owned Wallet here.
Q&A Panel on the High High’s and Low Low’s
Sometimes in business, especially I think as a solo entrepreneur, it can feel like I’m the only one dealing with the business struggles I go through. So, when this Q&A session happened, it was honestly so refreshing to hear that – surprise surprise – other business owners deal with struggles too. I especially appreciated Monica Little’s stance on how problems can be opportunities. It doesn’t always feel like that in the moment, but I do like how she suggested looking at them as opportunities to solve things.
Allison Carter’s Breakout Workshop on Visibility
Allison is one of the two hosts of Ultimate Product Party, and one of the most genuinely friendly and authentic people you will ever meet. For her workshop, I love, love, LOVED how easy Allison made putting together a plan for visibility. She doesn’t sugarcoat stuff, but instead helps you figure out exactly what will work for your unique business.
One of Allison’s tips during her session was to stop spending time doing stuff that doesn’t work, like posting on Facebook business pages when they have little to no visibility. I have personally been posting frequently on my FB page and Allison is right… almost no one sees my posts there {except maybe my mom and my boyfriend – hey y’all! ?}
Check out Allison’s website here.
Erin Alexander’s Breakout Workshop on Creating a Nurture Sequence
Erin’s advice for product sellers to create a longer nurture sequence to create better connections with your customers was one of my favorite breakout workshops! So much of what she shared can apply to service based business owners, too. My current welcome sequence for my customers is 3 emails, but the tips Erin gave inspired ideas for me so that I can generate up to a year’s worth of content {and maybe more.}
One of her tips for finding content for your nurture sequence was to go back through some of your best Instagram posts, and turn that content into your nurture emails and use it in newsletters. So smart, so simple, and so easy to implement!
Check out Erin’s website and podcast here.
Monica Little’s Roundtable on Selling on Instagram Stories
Monica is a master of selling on Instagram, but also not being salesly. Her roundtable helped me figure out a way to share the testimonials my clients give me that showcases my work without being the only one to say it’s amazing {lol}.
Monica has her Selling on Instagram Stories free mini Masterclass which is what she shared at her round table, available for you to check out for free here.
Cat Hildner’s Closing Keynote on How to Focus Your Inputs to Maximize your OUTPUTS!
Cat Hildner, who hosts Ultimate Product Party along with Allison mentioned above, gave an amazing keynote. In fact, she said something during her closing keynote that I have been thinking about for a week now:
You don’t need to wait for someone to tell you what to do.
So often in business, I find myself waiting for permission {from who, I do not know} to do certain things. Or wanting to do things a certain way because “that’s how everyone else is doing it”.
Cat’s simple statement made such an impact on me though, and I know that I don’t need to wait on someone else or for permission to do something to get into action around my business.
I’ve got big goals for Create Your Affiliate Program, and I am the one who will make these things happen. No more waiting around on someday or someone … it’s up to me to go after what I want, and I’m so grateful to Cat for getting up on stage to share about her personal business journey. It impacted me so much in such a powerful way.