Sara Anderson, of Sara’s Sweets, shares a story at Social Media Week Lima on Thursday at the UNOH Event Center.
Jacob Espinosa | The Lima News
LIMA — April Spencer said it was nerve-wracking to be on the brand-building panel at Thursday’s Social Media Week Lima event.
The owner of Spencer’s Sugar joined the Weather Channel’s Jen Watson, the Allen County Sheriff’s Office’s Victoria Gonzalez and Sara Anderson of Sara’s Sweets for one of the many panels at NOW Marketing’s annual event designed to connect businesses from across the country and share ideas.
“This is my second year on a panel,” Spencer said. “They make it really fun because they’re not trying to get you, they just want to help everybody out, and it’s really cool that they picked a home-based business like mine to go up there.”
Jennifer Brogee from The Meeting Place on Market gave praise to members of the panel and said she took inspiration from what they have accomplished.
“It’s really cool to hear how they have built a community around their niche,” she said. “I wish I could build that community around my brand, but I just have a different style.”
Professionals from places such as Michigan, including Elias Whetstone from ABC Warehouse, enjoyed experiencing the city and the opportunity to network in Lima.
“It’s been awesome,” he said. “It’s definitely been a learning experience. It’s been very cool to network and meet different people in different markets.”
Josh Luke, business services manager for Ohio Means Jobs, said the conference at the University of Northwestern Ohio’s Event Center was useful for learning about things such as artificial intelligence and LinkedIn.
“There are a lot of useful knowledge and tools that they give, and it’s an affordable conference right here in our backyard,” he said. “While it may be good to be present on so many different platforms, you can specialize and focus to find a way to make something your own, whether it’s YouTube, LinkedIn or Facebook.”
Jessika Phillips, the founder of NOW Marketing, said she loved the stories told by speakers and that the event gets better every year.
“I love that everyone has been sharing authentic stories about how marketing isn’t always pretty,” she said. “Especially with social media, you can present different, but I love that authenticity and their willingness to share some of the hurdles and struggles that they’ve been through while growing their marketing.”
That fit the theme of the panel perfectly, if Spencer’s advice was anything to go by.
“You can learn a lot and turn bad things into good things if you know how to flip it,” she said. “You’re going to have people that judge you for what you do and for what you don’t do, so you might as well do it and let people find out who you are because they’ll either love you or they won’t. You’ll find your people or your group, and that’s the best way to do it.”
For more information on the conference, visit sociallima.com.
Reach Jacob Espinosa at 567-242-0399.
