Business Animals are a guarantee of great first-hand content. And I got the chance to keep up with this golden standard and bring you, the readers, the trends, and tips that I’ve learned during this years‘ Web Summit. Here it comes…

Web Summit is probably the biggest and most well-known technological and entrepreneurial conference in the world. Last year, nearly 30,000 people visited. This year, the conference moved to Lisbon, doubled the number of visitors and attracted dozens of great startups. 2016 was my first Web Summit ever.

Was it worth it?

I was traveling to Web Summit with my colleagues from GliderPath Ltd. We expected tons of content and we got it. Frankly, we got much more than we could digest. It would take years to execute everything we have learned and I decided to point out only a few points that are stuck in my mind.

The content and the speakers

I spent most of my time at PandaConf, Startup University, and the Main Stage. All of these provided a nice balanced mixture of marketing, technology and startup methodology. I think I can honestly say that I got the best of both worlds of business and tech.

This year, Web Summit succeeded in attracting a huge amount of great personalities.

I highly recommend everyone to pay attention to Dave McClure from 500 Startups. Dave had a great interview about investments into startups. And surprisingly, he said something liked this.

”If you create a startup because you seek an investment, you are doing it wrong. And if you are a startup who can be bootstrapped but you are looking for an investment, there’s something wrong with you.”

I think Dave really hit the spot. I happen to be a part of a bootstrapped startup and the control our team has over the company is great and definitely more enjoyable than negotiating with investors.

Another huge name that stopped by at Web Summit was an actor named Joseph-Gordon Levitt. Joe has a startup aimed at artists called HitRecord. What he and his brother are currently working on is creating a better online place for cooperation.

Another sentence that really stuck with me is something that I’ve been saying for a long time.

”We can’t we just collaborate instead of competing?”

Joseph would like to erase all the unnatural competitiveness that occurs in the virtual world and would like to see more cosmopolitan mixture when it comes to business cooperation. And I can only admire this thought.

Sean Rad is the co-founder of Tinder. I wasn’t expecting that so many people would go and see his interview. Apparently, thousands of people came and sit down amazed by this entrepreneur.

When it comes to Sean, I really liked the transparency he likes to work with and in. His lifetime task of bringing people together is so genuine and straightforward I actually started about downloading Tinder.

Surprisingly, Sean had to stop for a second and break the script. He expressed his shock about people not understanding Tinder at all in the early stages. According to him, most of the people thought it’s a sex app and misused it. This left Sean laughing and in tears right on the stage.

Sean continued to talk about, what he calls, the locker room talk. The whole crowd literally blew into celebration when Sean said:

”There’s one thing that I just can’t stand. Locker room talk in business. I mean, everyone should know about everything in the company. Am I right?”

Well, I think we all can support Sean on this one.

And finally, my personal favorite, Gary Vaynerchuk! A C-list celebrity of the entrepreneurial world.

Gary almost didn’t make it on time. But he did and he blew the stage and minds of the crowd. There literally wasn’t one seat which was free.

As usually, Gary talked about his favorite topics which are self-awareness, regrets and buying underpriced attention.

If you asked me to quote him on every thought that hit my brain like a truck in full-speed it would occupy me for months.

But here’s one thing and I will just leave it here for you to think about it.

”We are in the best era of entrepreneurship. All you have to do is put in the work! The market will reward you!”

9 things that I’ve taken from Web Summit…

Here it comes…

• We live in the greatest era of entrepreneurship. All we need to do is…do!

This is something that Gary Vee was constantly reminding us. The market is rewarding anyone who works hard and smart, who seeks opportunities and looks at the right places. Be smart and work your ass off (that’s what he said).

• It’s hard for companies to stay relevant with the current audience and be attractive for the next one, especially millennials.

The general manager of Coca-Cola made sure that we never forget this point. Coke has been on the market for decades and I think its managers know what they are talking about. Staying relevant now and thinking about future relevance is very important in any type of business. Make sure you don’t forget about this.

• Huge companies and brands like Coca-Cola, Cadillac or Volvo are teaming up with startups and help them scale. On the other hand, startups give them their know-how.

Startups are just starting to be a big thing in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. But they’ve been around in the US for years. And finally, huge corporations are starting to cooperate with them very closely. Are we looking at a new startup bubble or is this the collaboration Joseph-Gordon Levitt is talking about?

• According to Coca-Cola, startups have the biggest problem with story-telling.

I think it’s fair if Coca-Cola says it. Why? Because they have one of the catchiest story-telling strategies in the world. As for myself, I have a different view of the problems. What about you?

• Each and every startup should have 3 Vs. Vision, value, victory.

One of the investors and CEOs of technological startups said this would be her advice for any startup. Have a vision, have a clear view of your value and make sure everyone in the team understands what is a victory for your company.

• In order to have great marketing dialogue with your customer, you need to analyze before anything.

Big data! They were a huge topic this year. It seems to me that business is starting to be a real science. If you are not paying attention to your metrics, you are putting yourself out of business. It’s as serious as that.

• Video marketing keeps on being the fastest growing unit despite the fact that any another marketing channel is slowly decreasing.

Something I’ve been preaching about for months. Video video video. Huge corporations are starting to build their own video marketing departments. Crazy? No, reality. Make sure you keep up with this trend.

• Cadillac and few more global companies are pre-planning Live Videos (that’s right, pre-planning).

Now this one sounds very weird. I always though LIVE videos are all about authenticity. Cadillac thinks differently and apparently, they have better results if they pre-plan their live sessions. What are your 2 cents on this?

• Consumers download 0-1 app per month in contrast with 10-15 apps a few years ago. The key is consumers needing your brands before needing your app. That’s the only way of getting your app downloaded.

Heartbreaking but true. App developers have a hard time distributing their products. It seems as if brands were starting to play a very, very (very!!!) important role in the download of an app. Make sure you create a real NEED for your product and only then base your marketing efforts on the process of an actual download.

Been there, done that!

Phew! That’s A LOT of content right? A lot of great content. I hope you are able to cherry-pick whatever feels good for you and will be beneficial to you and your company.

If you are wondering how Web Summit looked this year, be sure to check this video!

And if you got so far, thanks for your attention. Make sure to leave any comments and I’ll make sure I will respond.

Until Web Summit 2017…