Brookfield, Wis. — Lessiter Media and Farm Equipment have announced the agenda and speaker lineup of the 2018 Dealership Minds Summit, built around the theme of "Intelligence Driven Marketing." The full agenda is available and seating reservations are now being taken at DealershipMindsSummit.com.

To be held at the Coralville Marriott Hotel & Conference Center in Iowa City, Iowa, July 24-25, the Dealership Minds Summit will explore successful marketing ideas for top-level decision makers at farm equipment dealerships.

On the advice and expertise Farm Equipment's Dealership of the Year Alumni and Editorial Advisory Board, a program has been assembled that features the top marketing minds in the industry, sharing actionable marketing ideas, metrics and tactics designed to be implemented right away into a dealerships' marketing program.

Presentation topics and headlining speakers for the 2018 Summit include Jeff Bowman, Chief Experience Officer for Titan Machinery. During his session, "Moving Your Marketing Department from Traditional Marketing to Intelligent Marketing," Boman will detail how Titan Machinery’s ($1.2 billion in sales in 2017) marketing staff of 5 uses digital marketing to improve customer experience and the sales team's ability to close the sale. Mike Wiles of the Ask Tractor Mike YouTube channel (5 million views with 20,000 subscribers) will detail practical ways that a dealership can start using videos and YouTube in their marketing strategy during his session, "Video Marketing — What Work’s & What Doesn’t." And Tyler Musson, Director of Marketing for Washington Tractor, will discuss the role data and analytics have in the creation of Washington Tractor’s marketing strategy during his session, "Proving Your Marketing ROI." The 2-day program will feature a mix of session formats, including...

  • Focused General Sessions — providing a roadmap for implementing leading marketing ideas and technologies for equipment retailing and servicing success.
  • Informal and Interactive Dealer-to-Dealer Roundtables — providing actionable dealer marketing strategies, and answers to attendees' specific questions, via an array of moderated yet informal roundtables.
  • Dealer-to-Dealer Panels — highly interactive sessions that provide practical, proven strategies in use by the industry’s most successful marketers.
  • Unrivaled Networking & Knowledge Sharing — a candid venue to exchange successes, dissect challenges and vet out ideas with director-level farm equipment dealership leaders in marketing, finance, operations and IT and top marketing integrators.

New for the 2018 Summit are "How-To Tutorial" roundtable sessions, offering attendees specific, actionable and direct instruction from industry experts for setting up social media ad campaigns and creating effective promotional graphics to bolster their digital marketing content. Discussing these first-of-their-kind Summit sessions, Farm Equipment managing editor Kim Schmidt remarked...

"An overwhelming percentage of dealers asked for hands-on help ... and we listened. Attendees are encouraged to bring their smart phones, tablets or laptops — and ideas and questions — to these how-to tutorial sessions. Our goal is to have them up and running with everything they need to know to set up a Facebook ads campaign and create attention-getting infographics BEFORE they leave Iowa City."

And just announced for the first time is a full redesign of the Dealership Minds Summit website, providing an improved user experience, useful attendee resources and an overall enhancement of the Dealership Minds Summit web presence. New website features and enhancements include...

  • A photo gallery page features multi-media event coverage, including Summit photos and video content.
  • A chronological timeline of the event agenda allows quick reference of key speaker bios, detailed session descriptions and Key Takeaways of each presentation.
  • A conference updates page centralizes past Dealership Minds Summit web content dating back to 2012.
  • Live customer service chat allows visitors direct and instant communications with event staff.
  • Responsive design maintains a consistent user experience across all viewing platforms.

Limited seats are available and reservations are now open. A discounted registration rate of $439 is available through 4-30-18, offering a 19% discount off the full rate of $539. Registration can be made online or by calling (262) 432-0388 between 8:00 a.m. and 4:30 p.m., Monday-Friday.

Sponsors of the 2018 Summit include A&I Products, Ag Direct, BigIron Auctions, CLAAS, Fastline Media Group, HBS Systems, Iron Solutions, Machinery Scope, Montag Manufacturing, Team SI, Western Equipment Dealers Association (WEDA), Yanmar, Topcon Agriculture and Yetter Mfg.