HubSpot #INBOUND24 Is Almost Here! (Yes, We're Very Excited + a Little Nervous)

In this episode of HubHeroes, we’re diving headfirst into the wild ride that is HubSpot #INBOUND24. George, Max, and I are breaking down what it’s actually like to gear up for one of the biggest events in inbound marketing. From the sheer panic of realizing you missed a session sign-up (like Max and me) to a deep existential crisis over whether your hoodies and hats are coordinating (like George). So, we’re peeling back the curtain on how to not just survive, but actually enjoy this chaotic, jam-packed event.

🔥 Go Deeper: #INBOUND24 Main Stage Speakers Preview Show

The countdown is on—we’re juggling a mix of excitement, anxiety, and that classic “oh well, here goes nothing” energy. George is in full-blown prep mode with THREE sessions to lead (yes, three!), Max is doing his best to wing it while passing out popsicles, and I’m somewhere between sprinting for a train and plotting a revival of my infamous childhood grape-flushing escapades.

But amidst all that madness, we’re covering the essentials:

• How to prep without losing your sanity. George has some killer tips for “draining the brain” and mentally gearing up for a four-day marathon of learning, networking, and, let’s be honest, chaos.

• What you need to survive. Comfortable shoes are a must (please, no cowboy boots), and of course, we’re talking hats, hoodies, and whatever else gets you through the week.

• Sessions, serendipity, and surprises. Max is teasing some very exciting HubSpot product reveals (I’ll just leave it at that), while George gives us the inside scoop on his AI-assisted content creation sessions. And of course, we’re all about those impromptu hallway conversations that just might be the highlight of your week.

🚀 Learn More: Check Out Our 10-Week HubSpot Super Admin Training Program

Whether you’re a total pro like George or, let’s face it, barely holding it together like Max and me, we’re here to remind you that Inbound is all about the experience. Don’t sweat the small stuff—pack light, stay flexible, and who knows, maybe you’ll even catch us reenacting my grape-flushing childhood adventures on stage.

Keywords

INBOUND24, HubSpot, event preparation, AI-assisted content creation, inbound marketing, product updates, sessions, conference survival tips, serendipity at events, event networking, HubSpot product reveals

What We Cover

• Chaos Prep and Surviving Inbound: George shares his strategy for blocking off time to mentally prepare, making space for new information, and recharging your energy to survive the whirlwind of sessions, networking, and random hallway magic.

• Packing Essentials and Fashion Tips: It’s not just about looking good—it’s about staying comfortable. Max reminds us of the importance of comfy shoes, while George reflects on making sure your hoodies and hats are perfectly coordinated.

• Sessions You Don’t Want to Miss: George is tackling some BIG topics this year, including a hands-on 90-minute session on creating AI-assisted, human-powered content. Max teases some exciting HubSpot product updates that we definitely can’t spill yet, but let’s just say it’s worth paying attention.

• Managing FOMO and Finding Serendipity: Missed your session sign-up? No worries—George explains how to still get a seat by being first in line and staying flexible. Plus, the magic of Inbound isn’t always in the sessions. Sometimes, it’s the unexpected conversations that matter most.

• Event Survival Mindset: I break down the most important lesson: don’t get hung up on what you miss. You won’t see everyone or attend every session, but embracing the chaos can lead to moments of serendipity and unexpected growth.

• How to Leverage Inbound for Real Impact: We break down how to take INBOUND lessons and turn them into action items for your business. Whether it’s networking, learning about new tools, or getting inspired by keynotes, we’re sharing how to apply those takeaways once the event is over.

• Overcoming the Overwhelm: INBOUND is big, loud, and non-stop, so we’re talking about how to prioritize what matters most—whether it’s making new connections or honing in on strategies you want to take home.

• The Grape-Flushing Story (Yes, Really): And of course, you can’t miss the story that Max and George never let me forget—my childhood adventure of flushing grapes down the toilet. How does that tie into INBOUND? You’ll just have to listen to find out.

And so much more ... 

Additional Resources

• Why Go HubSpot? Your Free Ultimate Business Growth Guide
• Why Go HubSpot Service Hub?
• What Is Customer Delight + Who Is Responsible?
• How Have Inbound + HubSpot Changed?

Episode Transcript

Liz Moorehead: Hi everybody. George, normally you open the show by going, Liz, I know you're about to talk, but I want to say something. So I was actually just trying to get ahead of it by leaving you the birth

George B. Thomas: Oh, you were trying to give me the space to tell you that I have officially had ChatGBT write me a song about grapes in the toilet? Okay, sweet, I did, but we'll talk about that later.

Liz Moorehead: realize for the audience at home who does not join us live, they have no idea what it is that you're talking

George B. Thomas: Oh, zero

Liz Moorehead: now have to say

Max Cohen: Noah's fault. That's going to be Noah's fault though. Cause the recording button was hit.

Liz Moorehead: out of context. When I was a child, George.

George B. Thomas: Yeah?

Liz Moorehead: When I was a

Max Cohen: You put yourself into this situation, Liz.

Liz Moorehead: so most parents who are dealing with kids, little kids going off to school right now are dealing with kids who are crying on their way. And those who are screaming as soon as they get back home, because how dare you leave me to learn letters and numbers and shapes and blocks and sharing and, and friendship pictures.

I was not that child. Um, when I was dropped off at school, my mother apparently would try to be like, Elizabeth, have a good day, and I would be like, Bye mom! You can go, you can leave. Apparently at one point I turned around and said, Why are you here? And then I just ran off into the school. Uh, and then I was either, when she came to pick me up, refusing to get in the car because I would be on top of the jungle gym, because I had decided I did not want to go.

George B. Thomas: New

Liz Moorehead: Or there was one particular occasion where my mother couldn't find me on the jungle gym, so she went inside and asked, where is Elizabeth? Well, Elizabeth is currently flushing grapes in the toilet.

George B. Thomas: Oh yeah, we're gonna talk about

Liz Moorehead: To which my mother, you know, just the inquisitive woman that she was, Well, why is she doing that? Uh, my teacher apparently replied, uh, unclear, but Elizabeth was on a mission, she's not one to be derailed.

Max Cohen: Hmm.

Liz Moorehead: was kinda

George B. Thomas: That hasn't changed.

Max Cohen: Yeah. I feel like that is a pretty good description of you.

George B. Thomas: Yeah. One not to be derailed.

Max Cohen: We do not derail Liz.

George B. Thomas: Nope.

Liz Moorehead: is your session planning for Inbound going, Max?

Max Cohen: Not well, not good at

Liz Moorehead: Not well.

Max Cohen: No,

Liz Moorehead: No.

George B. Thomas: Shots fired.

Max Cohen: no. That train, that train has derailed. In fact,

Liz Moorehead: Was it ever on the tracks?

Max Cohen: I completely missed it. And I don't even think I went to the station. I didn't even make it to the station to see it going off into the sunset. Uh, I saw, I saw a LinkedIn post that said, uh, session registration opened up 40 minutes ago.

And I said, Oh, geez, I should hop in there. And then I saw that the post was posted. Four days earlier, and I said, Hmm,

George B. Thomas: I might be

Max Cohen: I, I because I wanted to, cause I was like, I'm going to go in there and I'm going to register for Georgia session this time. Cause I want to go and see it. And so I went and went and check it out and it is books.

George B. Thomas: Register for the encore. Register for the encore. There's an

Max Cohen: didn't even know there was an encore. I could do this.

George B. Thomas: the encore's book too. Oh

Max Cohen: me the Chad Encore's book. So yeah, I don't know, you know what, George, you might have to invite me up to the stage just to sit there with

George B. Thomas: will you be my

Max Cohen: I'm a special guest and I'll sit there and do absolutely

Liz Moorehead: Max

George B. Thomas: be my

Liz Moorehead: sit on the stage and flush grapes down the toilet.

Max Cohen: Yes. Yes.

George B. Thomas: sitting on the stage and flushing. There is no toilet on the stage. But Max, will you be my bouncer?

Max Cohen: I'll be your bouncer if they let me.

George B. Thomas: go. There we go. I can get you in then.

Max Cohen: Cool. I'll check everybody in with the Van Happily.

George B. Thomas: Oh, you're the content strategist, I guess. It's funny because I'll just be like, yeah, my content strategist, my bouncer, my wife, like,

Liz Moorehead: She yells at me and asks me existential questions about my childhood and she says blog posts come out of it.

Max Cohen: Wait, Chad says my wife runs the staffing. I'll get you in. What? Chad, is this true? Cool. Mmm.

George B. Thomas: how? Wait, what?

Liz Moorehead: Stop! What?!

George B. Thomas: No, wait,

Liz Moorehead: ladies and gentlemen at home, while they are weight wadding and wowing their way to glory,

George B. Thomas: Okay. Oh

Liz Moorehead: to the frantic one week countdown to Inbound, where we ha

Max Cohen: Get Chad, get Chad in the room. Let's have him as a guest.

George B. Thomas: do you ever have, sorry, Liz, I know this is like herding cats and we're going to talk about inbound, I promise, but have you ever found out something in your life that you didn't know? And then you're like, how did I not know that? And then your brain explodes and you don't know where to go from there.

That's me right now.

Max Cohen: Alright.

George B. Thomas: I never, how the,

Max Cohen: This is amazing.

George B. Thomas: Liz.

Max Cohen: Liz is not herding cats. She's herding two nasty pigs on a farm that are not well behaved.

Liz Moorehead: I'm herding two drunk kangaroos with super soakers full of Gatorade. Goy, why what's the problem, Liz? What could possibly be wrong? Just setting everything on fire. So welcome

George B. Thomas: that is the inbound shot challenge. Every time we say inbound, we take a shot. Is that what I heard? Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: I've got gin somewhere. To be honest, this chaos represents the energy. I think all of us are feeling with one week to go to inbound, which is why we are having this conversation because we have George, the planner, right? The ringmaster who I'm going to guess you didn't have a problem signing up for sessions.

George, you were, you were there ready to rock and roll.

George B. Thomas: The ones I wanted to get to I am signed up for the

Liz Moorehead: Meanwhile, Max is watching in the distance, a train that he was supposed to be on catch on fire. Thinking he was supposed to be on a plane three days later. So here we are, ladies and gentlemen, the full range of the human experience.

George B. Thomas: Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: Welcome. Want it all. So let's just jump right in. How y'all feeling?

George B. Thomas: and excited and confused all at the same time.

Max Cohen: Yeah, I'm also those things.

George B. Thomas: How about

Liz Moorehead: great podcast guys. What great podcast guys. We'll just cut. Are we done? Are we done here? No, I'm just joking.

Max Cohen: Oh, no, no, I'm actually I'm so stoked for him, man. I like I can't wait. It's gonna be

Liz Moorehead: my God.

Max Cohen: I like I um I'm still peeved it happens in september just because it's like right when you know kids are going back to school My wife's also a teacher. She's going to school. So it's like, you know We just get into the new routine and i'm like see ya and i'm gone for a week and I feel like super guilty about it um, but You know, I mean, dude, this is our summer camp.

This is, this is HubSpot summer camp.

Liz Moorehead: It's inbound

Max Cohen: family reunion. Yeah, inbound prom. It's all of those things. All mixed into one, and it's gonna be frickin awesome. I can't wait.

Liz Moorehead: just excited because I get to go.

Max Cohen: Yes! You did not get to go last year.

George B. Thomas: Yes.

Liz Moorehead: the year before, or the year before. I haven't been since, jeez, I want to say 2019.

George B. Thomas: Well, that's like grandpa in internet

Max Cohen: It's been a minute.

George B. Thomas: a hot minute.

Liz Moorehead: That's right. And this granny is going to whip us all into shape today. That's right. So I am also excited. There is an element of great flushing confusion. I don't know what to do with myself. I, I don't know where to go. I got some sessions, not all of them. Um, cause I was somewhere in between George and Max where it's like, I wasn't four days late, but Liz was definitely running after the train and like hurling her butt.

Like Keanu Reeves in speed when he has to jump on the bus while it is in motion. That was me getting into my session, so I'll admit that, but I am frickin pumped, but we're all frickin pumped for different reasons, because George, you're showing up as a speaker, Max, you're showing up as both Popsicle of Happily, and also a former Big Orange Sprocket Shill, right, you're shilling Big Popsicle, and I'm just, I'm there for the vibes.

And the learning. And for me. And I love that. George, I want to start with you.

Max Cohen: and to see your, your baby, your baby boys though, too, right?

Liz Moorehead: I could hug you so much.

Max Cohen: Yeah, me too. Wait,

Liz Moorehead: of you, aren't I? Because I'm taller than George, for

George B. Thomas: Well, God, you're definitely taller than me because I'm

Max Cohen: I'm, I'm six feet tall. Then

Liz Moorehead: am also six feet.

Max Cohen: the same

Liz Moorehead: Tiny George

Max Cohen: Little George Sandwich.

Liz Moorehead: Tiny George sandwich.

George B. Thomas: not do

Max Cohen: the

George B. Thomas: That's,

Liz Moorehead: Squish.

Max Cohen: Oreo. Mm hmm.

George B. Thomas: know when to get my exercise at inbound. When I see Liz and Max together, that means run. Run.

Max Cohen: run, because you're going to get squished. We are going to squish you, Betuitas. Yes.

Liz Moorehead: I bet this isn't making any of our listeners uncomfortable at all, whatsoever.

Max Cohen: George is going to get a little squish.

Liz Moorehead: Squishy.

George B. Thomas: me uncomfortable. Does that matter?

Max Cohen: We're going to squish you, Georgie. Twix.

Liz Moorehead: and your session filled up so quickly. You now have an encore presentation and for the listeners at home, your session is really exciting because you're, you're giving a tactical, real world, practical playbook.

Of how to create human powered AI assisted content. And I would love for you to just talk, take us behind the scenes a little bit. How's preparation going? How are you feeling? You are one week out as an attendee and a speaker. What's that like

George B. Thomas: Yeah. I'm, I'm super excited for the session. Uh, both sessions, actually three sessions, but I'll get into that here in a hot minute, actually three sessions and two late night shows. Anyway, I'll get into that

Liz Moorehead: seasons in a movie.

George B. Thomas: Yeah, it's, it's crazy. Like, I, I mean, inbound is quickly becoming like content creation Mecca.

But again, we'll, we'll talk about that in, in the future in this episode as well. Liz, the preparation is going good. It's probably one of the best presentation decks that I've ever created. Uh, just in general, but for sure, uh, inbound, um, the use of graphics and Um, it's, it's just sexy, but also I love the fact that this is going to be the first time that I'm not really strapped down to just the presentation deck because it is a 90 minute, uh, session that has some workshoppy, like three to four workshoppy areas where I get to pull up my screen.

I get to share with people how I do stuff in real time, how they can do stuff in real time, um, how they can interact with their assistant, um, how they can leave the easy button where it belongs, not on their desk, not on their computer, um, probably in the closet somewhere, how they can embrace their humanity, their power, maybe even the power that they don't yet know that they have, and the augmented, like, um, energizing, Uh, expertise that they'll have at their fingertips after the session.

So, so I'm just excited, um, to hopefully be that catalyst for people who are trying, but stumbling, um, are maybe possibly afraid and keeping it or giving it the Heisman. Um, and even dip the toes in the water of like more advanced stuff that people were like, Oh, I didn't know we should be using that when we're doing that.

So it's, it's just, I'm excited because it's going to be a big nerd fest. And it's all about the humans. And it's all about empowering them to move forward with better content in the future.

Liz Moorehead: So I want to throw something out there that you haven't really mentioned, which is I think most people attending inbound or maybe who haven't attended in the past couple of years or so we're used to the standard. It's a 45 minute session. We're going to go in. You are doing a 90 minute session

George B. Thomas: Two 90 minute sessions.

Liz Moorehead: twice, twice.

So I get, I want to go behind the scenes. How do you even prepare for that?

George B. Thomas: Uh, the,

Liz Moorehead: heaving into a paper bag for two weeks straight and then just praying?

George B. Thomas: no, it's actually using AI as my power assistant for the last two years. And have not been talking about it online and trying to be an expert at it and just simply being able to finally share with the world. Here's all the stuff that I've been playing with. Here's all the stuff we've been doing.

By the way, here's the stuff we've been doing and not near one of you that reads our blog. Or knows who we are have ever said, Hmm, that smells like AI. Nope, nobody. And so I I'm just, again, I'm not dry heaving. Um, listen, I've been doing 90 minute sessions, uh, 12 weeks in a row for the super admin training that we do.

So the time length is like, whatever. I, I can talk for that long. I can teach for that long. And there's just so many good juicy areas that we can get into. My biggest fear is that we'll get into a pocket of juiciness and, like, miss out on some of the stuff, to be honest, if I'm worried about anything, but, yeah, 90 minutes, two different times that people can join us, um, and it's, again,

Max Cohen: Sounds like it's going to be an absolute juicer of a session, George.

George B. Thomas: I, I'm challenging myself, it's gonna be a juicer, I'm challenging myself to make this the best ever inbound talk that I've ever given,

Max Cohen: Oh.

George B. Thomas: which is saying a lot.

Liz Moorehead: So here's my question though. And this is where I, I'm someone who's a big fan of how the sausage gets made. And I know when I've gone and seen like really big talks like this, like if somebody were to ask me, you know, Liz, what have you been working on in content for the past two years? It would be a three hour run on sentence

George B. Thomas: Yep,

Liz Moorehead: and nobody would have any idea what I'm talking about.

So how do you synthesize all the work that you're doing Into a 90 minute presentation that doesn't break all like all of our hearts, right? Because I think when I go to inbound, I sometimes I, for the most part, I feel really excited. I feel like I'm learning things, things that I can take away and immediately like use, right?

But we've all been in sessions where it's like, why am I here? Why aren't any of us here? What is happening? Like, the stuff where there's all fluff, no substance. All promises, no payoff.

George B. Thomas: there's, there's, there's no fluff in this bad boy. Um, I'm allergic to fluff, by the way. I literally was on a podcast earlier today, uh, where we were doing a nice, dope kind of interview about the journey that we've been on here at, uh, George B. Thomas, LLC, Psychic Strategies, BYD, and now Superhuman Framework.

Um, and like that, that came up where they're like, yeah, we just know that we're never going to get fluff from George. Like, we're gonna get what we need to hear and what's, what's supposed to be said and I'm like, that's just, and so, Liz, there's two things, one, there is no fluff in this presentation, I'm not fluffing to be able to make 90 minutes, um,

Max Cohen: Is there guff? Is there any guff? No, no, guff,

Liz Moorehead: about marshmallow fluff?

George B. Thomas: There's no marshmallow fluff, although marshmallow

Max Cohen: only, there's only pickles in that peanut butter sandwich, Liz. You know this.

George B. Thomas: fluff and peanut butter is a good sandwich too, but,

Max Cohen: Yeah, and f ing milk in your eggs too.

George B. Thomas: here's the thing, here's the thing, here's, here's the thing, um, I, I believe, and I've been told historically, one of my superpowers is being able to simplify the complex. man, did we have to simplify the complex when we were building out this presentation and the things that we're going to talk about, because it would be way easy to just go over everybody's head, but that's not what we're doing.

Max Cohen: Liz, you looked so concerned looking off camera to the right there, just

George B. Thomas: at her whiteboard and I

Liz Moorehead: know what the real answer is? Do you wanna know what the real answer is?

Max Cohen: Cause I was convinced you were staring at a ghost, if I'm being honest with you. You were like,

Liz Moorehead: This is where I'm gonna show my ass as a word nerd. I looked at the board, which is a scribble of brainstorming notes. Things that will never see the light of day. There are internal use only will never be published on a website. And I spelled a word wrong. And I felt like an idiot sandwich when I caught it out of the corner of my eye.

That is legitimately what happened.

George B. Thomas: Oh, well, that's not that big a deal. I spell stuff wrong all day and people still

Liz Moorehead: It's not a,

Max Cohen: I just don't love the way you spell.

George B. Thomas: No, they don't love the way that I spelled, but they love me. Anyway, this is enough

Liz Moorehead: with enthusiasm, not

George B. Thomas: inbound. Hmmmmmmmmmmm

Max Cohen: spells with his heart, not with his brain.

George B. Thomas: facts facts

Liz Moorehead: Max. Okay. So you're coming at this from the other side, right? Cause you're like, well, I never made it to the train. The station is on fire. What are sessions, but you're there and you are busy. So how are you preparing on that? Cause you're the chief evangelist to happily, right? So what, how are you preparing?

What are you doing?

Max Cohen: I'm preparing mentally is what I'm doing. I mean, last time we went, I wasn't expecting necessarily to be spending six hours outside both days handing out flyers. Popsicles to people, um, and looking like a complete freak when I did. Um, so like, I mean, now at this point, I'm just like. Kind of going into it being like listen.

I know my schedule is not gonna be my schedule I'm gonna get pulled around in a thousand different directions and have to do all these different things and make all this content and You know shake shake hands kiss babies do all this different kind of stuff and so I'm just I am just going to clear my calendar completely assume it's gonna be total chaos and not make any Any, uh, uh, commitments, because I'm sure there are going to get overlapped with some other stuff that I have to be at, right?

Uh, that, and I'm also just like, So I think like the ADHD in my brain is just like, you know what, just be there and talk to people at the booth and that's going to be enough.

George B. Thomas: it's the

Max Cohen: I'm like,

Liz Moorehead: the happiest

Max Cohen: know what I mean? Yeah. It's like, it's like I can just plan to be at the booth and tell everybody how awesome our apps are and maybe I'll walk around and get a Soty pop and say hi to people, but that's all I can handle.

You know what I mean? Instead of just being like, oh man, I'm going into it and I have all these like things I have. plan and all these things on my calendar, and I'm not going to have enough time to get between them. And I'm going to get stopped by people, walk out of the bathroom and do it, you know, and so I'm just like, I need to, uh, I I'm my, my brain is just doing everything it can to just say, don't stress out about it, just be there.

Don't have any obligations, nothing. You know, I try. The one thing I put on my calendar to block out for myself was when I knew George's thing was happening. The one thing I neglected to do was actually book a seat at the session. Uh, so, you know, George, I'll be there in spirit, I guess, unless apparently Chad can make me the bouncer or something.

George B. Thomas: yeah, so here's here's the thing though. I want to double down on that because Anybody who's listening to this, like, I'll say inbound, but attending any, um, event should not be a reason for, uh, anxiety and mental breakdown. Like, when I think about inbound, and if you want to get the most out of inbound or the most out of any event that you go to, you lean into, Serendipity. Like yes, you make a little bit of a plan. Yes, you set a few expectations. Of course, you're going because you want to learn things, but opening your brain up to that, not everything you will learn and maybe not even the most important thing that you will learn will be from a keynote stage or a breakout stage.

It may be in the, in this case, the, uh, Westin lobby. Drinking a, you know, Pepsi or, uh,

Max Cohen: Coke zero.

George B. Thomas: Coke zero or a bloody Mary or whatever beverage you like, and you might have a conversation that just changes your life, changes your business, um, changes the way that you think about everything that you historically done.

And it was not from a professional speaker. Because we all have the ability to add value to those lives that we're going to meet at these events.

Max Cohen: Oh, I mean,

Liz Moorehead: George, you brought that up last year with magic in the hallways.

George B. Thomas: Yes. Yeah. It's,

Max Cohen: happens in the hallways.

George B. Thomas: Listen, I've, I've seen it happen over and over and over again. Like, and again, there's a lot of great speakers. There's a lot of great sessions. There's a lot of places that I want to be. But I am always opening and, uh, or open and listening to, Ooh, this might be more important than that. Let me go ahead and take time out to go do this thing. Like for instance, if I get a chance to talk to Tony this year, I'm going to talk to Tony this year. I'm just saying, cause I heard a lot about Tony last year from Max.

Liz Moorehead: have an I heart Tony shirt,

George B. Thomas: yeah,

Max Cohen: boy,

George B. Thomas: yeah. If you don't know what we're talking about, go back and listen to last year's episode where Max talks about Tony's

Liz Moorehead: friendship, and definitely a hundred percent getting people's names, right. On the first try.

George B. Thomas: name is John.

Max Cohen: his name is John. I'm like, no, it's not.

George B. Thomas: Anyway, moving on.

Liz Moorehead: love that. So, George, I actually want to stick with you here for a moment because you're starting to dig

George B. Thomas: feel like I'm in the hot seat. Good Lord.

Liz Moorehead: No, but it's because

Max Cohen: You are, because I'm not prepared.

Liz Moorehead: Max, how do you feel?

Max Cohen: talk about. I have anxiety.

Liz Moorehead: Max, how do you feel? Present.

Max Cohen: I'm here. I am here and I'm excited and I'm also staring at my calendar next week and I just don't want next week to have to happen. Anyway. Yeah. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: to be honest though,

Max Cohen: Just want to fast

Liz Moorehead: right now do you think are listening with kind of a similar, I'm excited!

George B. Thomas: Yeah.

Max Cohen: this is excitement. Yeah.

George B. Thomas: there's packing and there's flights and there's all sorts of stuff in the middle of,

Max Cohen: I just don't want to drive. I just don't want to drive into Boston if I'm being honest.

Liz Moorehead: while I stressfully clutch dry erase markers. Talk Max and I and our listeners off the ledge about it's okay to be a little, you know, calm down. What should we be doing? What should we be doing this week leading up to inbound? What should we be doing right now? Thank you.

George B. Thomas: I think there's a couple of things, um, and we can get to the like micro pieces, but from a macro level and again, this is hard to maybe imagine and somewhat hard to do. Yeah. But I literally have Thursday and Friday of the week before we go to inbound mostly blocked off. I have some important meetings, but I have it mostly blocked off for what I would call the decompression of information that I don't need in my brain.

Meaning if I'm about to go fill up I need to like make some space. I need to think about like, what can, what can not be on my brain that I might be thinking about? What things can I close out so that I'm not using that energy? How do I free myself? to have a four day experience, a four day human centric experience, and not have these like lingering pieces that I'm thinking about and worrying about.

So literally like a how do you drain the brain a little bit so that you can refill it with the stuff that's going to happen Um, I'm also during this time, um, What should I pack? Do I have comfortable sneakers? Do I have enough hoodies? Do my hoodies match my hats? Like the important stuff? Like do you have the right jewelry to go with your outfit?

Which by the way,

Liz Moorehead: I too am worried if my hoodies

George B. Thomas: listen, listen, listen, you have to dress comfortable. So like, that's the one thing it's funny the amount of times that inbound the team has messaged people that it's like casual professional, like, make sure you have comfortable shoes, like Don't wear your cowboy boots, probably don't wear your high heels, like be comfortable because again, it's, it's, it's about the experience of the humans that you're going to be around and the education that you can bring into your life.

And so there is a level of packing, there's a level of decompressing, but I was telling Max when we got, uh, started, I love Max's guest appearance of his dogs on the podcast every now and

Max Cohen: I'm sorry. She's

Liz Moorehead: How's she

Max Cohen: all day and now she found her squeaky toy.

George B. Thomas: we keep it real. So, so, um, here's the real thing though, that, and I talked to Max about this before we hit the record, Liz, before you got here, right now, what everybody should be doing is, is mentally thinking about how they can absorb.

As much energy as humanly possible into their body, their spirit, their psyche, whatever, like I'm, I'm for the next week, I'm like charging up to have the energy that will be expended over that four to five day period. So like drain the brain, infuse yourself with energy, take lots of vitamin C before you get on the dang plane and spend time with about a bazillion other humans.

Make sure you pack properly, and then go for it. And, and I would treat, uh, inbound, and I, I know I mentioned serendipity, I would treat inbound, your inbound experience like a four day rollercoaster. Let it take you where it's gonna take you. Try to stay on the tracks that you created the most you can, but just enjoy the dang experience.

Liz Moorehead: I love that. George, you're also prepping us up for something a little bit extra special. That's outside of your two sessions. Are we allowed to talk about it?

George B. Thomas: Yeah, we can talk about it, which, which, by the way, I keep referencing three. I have two sessions that I'm doing the 90 minute sessions. And then I want to also mention, because I need to mention for, uh, the other human that is going to be part of this. Uh, we are doing a debate. Um, and, and it's an AI debate and I could have swore.

Yeah, yeah, here it is. So, uh, debate AI in marketing pilot or co pilot. And so it's going to be myself and it's going to be, uh, Doug David off and it's going to be Dale, uh, Bernd Rand.

Max Cohen: nice.

George B. Thomas: about AI pilot or co pilot. So I'm excited about that. But Liz, I don't think that's what you were mentioning.

I think you were mentioning the, uh, inbound late night show with George V. Thomas. Yeah. Uh, so it's happening two nights. Wednesday night and Thursday night. Uh, from 5pm to 5. 30. Uh, there is a location, a stage that we will actually be able to be on. It's like a news anchor desk that has like four chairs. Um, we're going to have different humans in those chairs.

Wednesday and Thursday, I think Max is going to be there Wednesday or Thursday, Liz might be there. I've got Chris Carolyn. I've got other people that were inviting to be part of this. Heck, it might even be a little bit of a round Robin, sit down, get up, let somebody in during the 30 minute session. But we're going to break down all the things that we're loving about inbound, uh, things that we're learning, things that people should be thinking about, um, we're going to do our best to, uh, make the audience that is present, laugh and enjoy and, and some additional education, but really we're going to try to, we'll see if we can pull this part off.

We're going to try to do a LinkedIn live for each of those nights so that people who couldn't make it to the inbound could actually See what we're talking about see the different guests see the kind of around the experience that we're gonna be in the middle of so I'm excited because a couple years we have done this show like audio only in hallways in the yard In what felt like a broom closet one year.

So the fact that we're actually going to be on stage and there can be an audience for this, uh, five to five 30 Wednesday and Thursday inbound, uh, late night show. I'm, I'm, I'm pretty psyched to see where it goes and what we can do with it.

Liz Moorehead: We need to have a live recording of Hub Heroes next year, and I do solemnly swear that I promise not to get us canceled

George B. Thomas: Oh, don't promise. Don't

Liz Moorehead: all I'll do, all I'll

Max Cohen: I'll take care of

Liz Moorehead: I'll do The worst I'll do is flush grapes down the toilet. Okay. That's the worst I'll do. That's it. And Dharmesh, if

George B. Thomas: that right there. Just. Yeah, we, anyway.

Liz Moorehead: I really can't be trusted. Can

George B. Thomas: No, not really. Not

Liz Moorehead: Okay. But we actually do. It would be written. Okay. So you're telling me, are you, I can keep it together. I'm, I can do it. I'm an adult.

George B. Thomas: I believe in you. I believe in you. I think you can do it. I, I trust you. We can do

Liz Moorehead: So what, what everybody's listening to right now is the mental collapse of my psyche, what I perceive myself to be and the realization of who I am.

George B. Thomas: Uh,

Liz Moorehead: and aspire to be. A functional adult human.

George B. Thomas: hey.

Liz Moorehead: I am, in reality, a literate chaos gremlin. And that's fine.

George B. Thomas: It's, it's, everybody needs to be who they are. As long as you're showing up as a whole ass human.

Liz Moorehead: love that.

Max Cohen: Whole ass grumbling.

George B. Thomas: Yeah. Just don't feed him after midnight or get him wet, I guess, is what they say, so.

Liz Moorehead: But what if I want ramen after midnight?

George B. Thomas: Oh, I like, see, I like ramen, but, anyway. Yeah, we need, okay, we need a, we officially need a t shirt that just says whole ass gremlin.

In the

Liz Moorehead: Whole ass gremlin.

George B. Thomas: in the chat, whole ass gremlin. Yeah,

Liz Moorehead: Whole ass gremlin. That, that would be Liz. That would be me. I'm a whole ass human before midnight, after midnight,

Max Cohen: I know that, I know that we, we, we, we, I'm assuming we're getting on to some of the things that we're excited about. Uh, beyond some of the session stuff we've already talked about. I don't know. I'm not sure if I missed that boat, kind of like I missed all my sessions yet,

Liz Moorehead: let me get this straight. You were four days late. To signing up and now you are, you are quote unquote being the responsible one, getting us back on track.

Max Cohen: No, I was, you know what I was? I was the one that said, I hope that question wasn't asked and I forgot to answer it. And this is me casually bringing it up, just in case I missed that segment.

Liz Moorehead: And you said you had, you were panicked.

Max Cohen: About what we were excited about. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: You said you didn't know that's how we got onto the trains.

Max Cohen: Oh no

Liz Moorehead: All right, Max, how about this? Max, for the very first time, never been asked before, how are you feeling about inbound this year? What are you excited

Max Cohen: Well, I thought that was different than like what specific things happening at Inbound are we excited about? I thought there was gonna be a whole conversation about which sessions and stuff like that, but maybe I've completely missed all of it. I just wanna say I am particularly her. I am particularly.

Excited about the product spotlights this year because. I don't want to say anything that's going to get me in trouble. There's a couple of things that I've been privy to that I, I, and I will not explain, uh, I will not, uh, name any of my sources. I will not give any hints to what it is. All I know is there are things that the, you know, that are coming that are very, very, very exciting.

Um, I was caught a little bit off guard with all the AI stuff that happened last year, which was really cool. Um, but there are some really, really big things that I've at least, you know, no one are coming down the pike, uh, that are going to be super cool. Um, and so I'm very excited about the product spotlight stuff, uh, this year.

I just want to. Say that and I'm going to leave it there because I definitely can't talk about what it is. Um, but yeah, it's going to be cool. It's going to be a good one. Everybody buckle, buckle the up. It's going to be an awesome product. Spotlight

George B. Thomas: I feel like that's payback for earlier, when we wouldn't

Max Cohen: might be

George B. Thomas: with you. But, you know, I'll take it,

Max Cohen: Yep. Yep. Mm

Liz Moorehead: I never get to be the one with secrets.

Max Cohen: hmm.

Liz Moorehead: Now I have one,

Max Cohen: And like, mind you, I think some of this might be like super nerdy stuff that maybe the general public may not appreciate as much as me, but as someone who eats, breathes, and drinks and sleeps HubSpot, uh, you know, really big fundamental, uh, stuff.

George B. Thomas: Oh, man, now I'm really in the mm.

Max Cohen: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

George B. Thomas: So,

Liz Moorehead: this is where I want to go with you, George. This is where the journey I want us to go on because we've talked a bit kind of more in the abstract about how to prepare for the event, but they're in addition to the sessions inbound is also where we see product reveals, product updates. Although last year I remember it being kind of strange because you guys reported from the front lines.

We had big products from spotlights. And then they launched a whole ass hub without telling anybody.

George B. Thomas: Yeah, yeah, well, yeah,

Liz Moorehead: how do you keep, how do you, what is your approach going into this year of how to make sure you're getting all the product updates you need, how to absorb, synthesize, take away the right things?

How would you advise your audience, our audience to do the

George B. Thomas: yeah, well, so first of all, I would say, um, the days of waiting for inbound to pay attention to HubSpot, uh, product updates are long gone. Like, uh, Um, how do I prep for inbound for product updates? I read the product updates inside the HubSpot thing almost daily and sign up for betas as they're released.

Um, and so I'm curious to how much will be a beta that I already turned on that they're talking about. Um, but I'll be looking for then the, the nooks in, uh, the nooks in the crannies or however you say that, whatever, you

Max Cohen: Nooks and wait, did you say

Liz Moorehead: Nooks and crannies

Max Cohen: the crannies?

Liz Moorehead: muffin.

George B. Thomas: yes, yes. I'll be looking for that because there, I feel like, especially after Max's thing, there's going to be some like hidden gem secrets that all of a sudden will like, kind of, So I'll be paying attention to the micro because for the rest of the year, I've been paying attention to the macro that's been happening of like hundreds of updates and almost hundreds of betas.

Um, but there, but there are certain directions where I'm trying to see threads that are continuing. For instance, one of the things that I'm excited that I want to try to get to is a session called money moves. And it's how to sell like a pro with Commerce Hub because it's Jack Cooper Smith, who's actually doing the session.

And I feel like he's the type of guy that will say about as much as he humanly can. About what you could do and we'll be able to do in the future with the commerce hub. So I'm excited about that. So like there, there's even one, I think it's, I'm trying to think of it's Mark Han or Kyle Jepson, or there's literally like one that's called, uh, updates from Q3 that you could go to and literally pay attention, which by the way, when you're doing an updates and you got to limit it to a quarter of updates to do a presentation on, it's like. Okay. Um, so like, that's, that's the thing you could look for that Q3 update session. Uh, you could look at the hubs that you love because there's certain ones that are there speakers that are HubSpot employees that are going to dive into the, the minutiae and nerdiness of those. That, that would be my suggestion.

Max Cohen: I would also say only if there was a weekly show every Monday morning hosted by Max and Kyle that meticulously went over each and every single new product update and put it into perspective.

George B. Thomas: Oh, is that a thing?

Max Cohen: It might be a thing. It's called the Monday morning briefing and I have a sit with Kyle Jepson every Monday and we go over every single one of those darn

George B. Thomas: you see that at max? If, if I'm listening to this and I don't

Max Cohen: Yeah. Good question. Um, I'm. If you go,

Liz Moorehead: thing were to exist.

Max Cohen: yeah, if it were to exist, um, we do a live on LinkedIn every Monday, right? Uh, and we, LinkedIn is like so stupid in the way that like you schedule lives and stuff like that. But if you go follow, uh, the HubSpot tips and tricks LinkedIn page. That's where we go live from every Monday at 10 30 Eastern.

Uh, so that's where you should go check it out. Yeah, for sure. Uh, but yeah, me and Kyle, we just literally bring up the product update panel. We sit there with our coffee and we just go, what do we got? And we, you know, and I very intentionally don't pay attention to product updates until that, because I try to give my genuine reaction on it.

And I also just like, literally have no time to even look at that panel. Uh, and so I'm just like stumbling across people talking about it, like during the week, like in their, you know, LinkedIn posts and stuff like that. Um, but you know, uh, me and Kyle are going to try to do something to, You figure out what's the best way that we can kind of synthesize, you know Everything that that drops and inbound the the week after so it'll be a good show What do you mean

George B. Thomas: is it terrible that I was like, as you were explaining this, I'm like, Oh, I wish I could sit with Max and Kyle on a Monday and

Max Cohen: come to us?

George B. Thomas: product updates, but

Max Cohen: You should join us for one

George B. Thomas: I don't know if I could add one more thing to my plate, but I was literally having FOMO knowing that, but I can at least go back and watch the recordings. Yeah, anyway, I digress

Liz Moorehead: I love that for all of us.

George B. Thomas: that I

Liz Moorehead: Honestly, you want to know my yes, uh, I love product updates I feel honestly a lot more relieved hearing you george to talk about them and same with you max because I think Again, we, I made it as a joke earlier, but we do kind of have the full spectrum of experience here at the virtual table of going to inbound with the exception of someone who's never been, although, quite frankly, it's been so long, it kind of, it's so different.

It is the first time, right? But when I think about what it used to be, like, what leading up to inbound. All of the big things were going to get revealed there. Now it's a bit more of a wild west situation where you open up the portal. It's like, well, where's this to us gone now? Where's this? It's different.

Right. Every day you're kind of like opening a door and now there's a new room on the other side or the wallpaper used to be pink and now it's orange and you're not really getting notified of these changes, but then we'll have weird little blips like last year where we did have a lot of announcements and they're just like, oh, and also, uh, by the way, there's a hubspot commerce hub.

There it is. Hello and goodbye. Right. So hearing you talk about that really makes me realize that, you know, inbound is still To connect, to learn, to see what the next evolution of HubSpot is going to look like, where we are, where we're going, how we're going to get there.

George B. Thomas: Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: But you're reinforcing an important thing that I think some people have forgotten. have to self educate. We have to make it a point to stay connected,

George B. Thomas: Without a doubt.

Liz Moorehead: to learn. Now, I do have a

George B. Thomas: Now, well, before you jump in there, because this is actually a perfect segue, Liz, because people might have heard you say that. And they're like, well,

Liz Moorehead: What does that even mean?

George B. Thomas: That sounds uncomfortable. If you just heard what Liz was talking about, and it sounds uncomfortable to you, then you should check out Jay Schwedelson session at inbound that is thriving in discomfort.

How being uncomfortable fuels growth. I'm just saying that might be the session for you. If, when Liz said that you have to do those things, you're like started to Twitch.

Liz Moorehead: I make people twitch on a regular basis. I completely understand now, George here. I have a question that is for Max, but also for me because I wasn't late, but I wasn't on time either.

George B. Thomas: yeah.

Liz Moorehead: So there may be folks who either missed the train on scheduling their sessions, did not realize there was a train they even needed to catch or some sort of horrible in between limbo state.

George B. Thomas: Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: What do you do if your sessions aren't booked yet or you're only partially, but what, what's your plan of attack? If you were in our situation,

George B. Thomas: Yeah. Um, be really, really good at getting first in line. And what I mean by that is every session that is booked out right now, they leave a percentage. of empty seats for people who can make it into a line for people who don't show up even though they booked the session so it as full as full could be it isn't really full and so if there's like one three or seven sessions that you're like oh the train just went on by just figure out how to map your running from one to the other To be first in line.

Um, and you'll probably make it into the room. Now,

Max Cohen: When what what what time is your session again george, okay Adding

George B. Thomas: see. The first one

Liz Moorehead: friends, for our listeners,

George B. Thomas: Yeah, for, for,

Liz Moorehead: not for.

George B. Thomas: let's see. Let me look here real quick.

Liz Moorehead: Max, you're so selfless for the listeners.

George B. Thomas: So Thursday it's at 9 45, so you'd probably wanna be there at about mm

Max Cohen: that back to the calendar now

George B. Thomas: probably to get first in line. Uh, Friday it starts at 1245, so you'd probably want to be there at 1230, which by the way, I didn't even mention that.

I'm excited and I'm just gonna, I'm gonna be like Liz for a minute. She had a year where she said, I opened for John Cena. My Friday session, I'm basically opening for Ryan Reynolds. I just want everybody to know that it's me,

Liz Moorehead: that the best thing? Cause technically it's true.

George B. Thomas: true technically.

Max Cohen: Wait, he's coming on to the same stage that you're going to be on right

George B. Thomas: stage, but it's the slot after me.

So,

Liz Moorehead: If someone were to look at the agenda, they would have seen that Liz Murphy forehead, whatever. Liz was the last session on the last day. The last thing you watch before you and your suitcase go see John Cena.

Max Cohen: Alright. I have a kind of similar experience. The closest thing I've ever gotten to this is, um, uh, back when I played competitive paintball a whole lot, there was actually a time where Nesson, which is the New England sports network, which is like where you watch all your sports on TV if you like live in New England, um, Came out and they filmed one of the events like to do it on the set.

Have you ever heard of like Dirty Water? It's like a Boston TV show where they do like a lot of local stuff and and they filmed the event and I actually had they interviewed me because I was like one of the players and we had just played a Whole thing and all that kind of stuff and like I was one of the first clips of the beginning Guess what aired directly before that on that channel?

Patriots, uh, football, uh, post game conference with Mr. Tom Brady.

George B. Thomas: wow.

Max Cohen: Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: Tom Brady opened for

Max Cohen: Tom Brady opened for

George B. Thomas: wow. My good.

Max Cohen: Yeah,

Liz Moorehead: Well, obviously it's New England Sports Network, Mid Atlantic Sports Network. That's fine. The only, so I actually do have, I do have one bragging right that I usually don't talk about, but I would love to show because it's a real one.

It's not like I opened for John Cena. So one time I had to give a talk in front of Dharmesh, which is fine and not at all something that makes me

George B. Thomas: Oh, I know where this was. I know where this was. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: yeah, it was at Hartford. It was at Impact Live. And. Kathleen Booth, who I was working with at the time. Who now is the, she's over leading up marketing at Pavilion, an incredible online community for CRO and marketing leaders.

Just

George B. Thomas: Slightly shilling slightly shilling right there.

Liz Moorehead: even work for them. She's just a nice person anyway. So I get off stage and I'm a little bit panicked. Cause I knew it went well, but I had, I went a little bit over time. I was a little freaked out. I was teaching people about pillar content for the first time, which is something people think is like homework.

I thought I had made it fun and engaging and Kathleen pulls me aside and says, you need to check Twitter. And I said, why? And she said, well,

George B. Thomas: Yeah, bro.

Liz Moorehead: Dharmesh was in the audience and he was on his laptop. And then about two minutes into your session, he closed his laptop and started watching. And then later on, he picked up his phone.

And then I went on Twitter and I saw that Dharmesh tweeted, Liz is funny. And that's a lot for me. That's a lot coming from me because I have Netflix. I printed it out and hung it up on the wall.

Max Cohen: Oh my God.

George B. Thomas: as one

Max Cohen: put that on your LinkedIn. Are you kidding me? That's

Liz Moorehead: I don't, I just, I just, you know, sometimes I get really sad. Like, but that one time back in 2017, Dharmesh thought I was funny.

George B. Thomas: Yeah. What's your claim to fame? Darmish thinks I'm funny. Boom.

Max Cohen: Dharmesh was in the chat of the last, uh, uh, Monday morning briefing that we did, and I almost died.

George B. Thomas: Yeah,

Max Cohen: Uh, I was like, Oh, he's watching. I was like, I'm like, I'm going to put on the best possible version of myself that I can. Yeah.

George B. Thomas: feel like he's always watching though, like somehow, someway, like he'll just appear in places and be like, Mm hmm. I see you.

Max Cohen: First time, long time. Yeah.

George B. Thomas: Yep.

Liz Moorehead: Whenever I see him, I want to say hi, but apologize at the same time. And I have no idea why.

Max Cohen: Um,

Liz Moorehead: Not a clue. Anyway, back on

George B. Thomas: Nick, Nick from Fargo said he has an agent for that. Ha ha ha ha ha.

Liz Moorehead: is

George B. Thomas: Chat spot is everywhere.

Liz Moorehead: that was my, that was my claim to fame, my excitement. But okay, I need to know this. We've talked a lot about do's. What are the don'ts? What are the absolute don'ts? I actually want to start here on this one.

George B. Thomas: Oh,

Liz Moorehead: want to start here. I actually, I finally have some advice instead of sass. Don't beat yourself up about a number of things. You have likely all been connecting with people who you haven't seen in a long time and you're hoping to see them at the big show. You will see some, you will not see others. You will not make it to all the sessions that you want to go to. Some of the sessions that you want to go to that you will really be excited about will let you down. You're not going to get as much sleep as you want. You're not going to get everything done that you want. And that's okay. The biggest don't for you is don't focus on the things you don't get to do because you're going to miss out on the magical opportunities you could not plan for that you will have.

George B. Thomas: Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: It is a chaos show because it is a magical glitter, unicorn, orange explosion, happy time. And we all leave better and happier.

Max Cohen: Yeah, I agree with that

George B. Thomas: Um,

Max Cohen: I think just a piggyback on the don't there is like give your give yourself Space to be a free range chicken a little bit, right and just have have empty spaces Like don't you don't have to account for every single f ing hour that you're there Like give yourself time to just roam around and suck it in and do something You Like, you know, let, give yourself space to let spontaneous moments happen.

Whether it's running into someone in the hallway, discovering some cool solution at a booth you didn't know about, talking to another partner, or seeing someone that you've only seen on LinkedIn before. Like, give yourself the space to do that. You know,

George B. Thomas: Yeah.

Max Cohen: use the bathroom. Like, you know what I mean? Like, that's the thing.

George B. Thomas: Yeah. One of the biggest don'ts. Don't pee, uh, in the middle of a keynote

Max Cohen: Don't pee in public. Yep. For

George B. Thomas: But for sure. Uh, Nick from Fargo

Liz Moorehead: I'm sorry, and I'm the one who gets this canceled.

George B. Thomas: Yes. Yes. So whatever. Uh, so here's the thing. Here's the thing. Uh, again, Nick from Fargo. Yes. Human time.

That's what you want to pay attention to. Human time. Um, but Liz, I don't know if you covered the biggest don't of inbound. Yeah. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: Maybe I left it for you like a

George B. Thomas: The biggest don't of inbound is don't get drunk the first night.

Max Cohen: Or do if you like to f ing

George B. Thomas: you hear me don't get drunk the first night, because then all you do is you walk around as a human with a hangover for the next two days. And you're like, why did I do that? Uh, I can't learn anything. I don't really want to talk to anybody because I need a three Advil and like some tomato juice or something.

Like, listen, there's, there's. Go to the parties, have fun, but like,

Max Cohen: Get a good night's sleep. On Monday.

George B. Thomas: get a good night's sleep the first night so that you're energized and prepped and ready. I can't tell you the amount of years I've gone there. And I've gone out like just because we're going to eat and stuff and had what I call Oh boy moments where I'll see somebody that I know has an inbound tag and I'm like, Oh boy, like that person's in trouble like the rest of their like they might be I I know of a human that spent half their time in their hotel at inbound because of the first Night of their experience.

Max Cohen: That's tough.

Liz Moorehead: have a story and then another don't. The story, you are not allowed to ask follow up questions, but

George B. Thomas: Oh, no. No, that's not fair. That's not fair.

Liz Moorehead: I will, don't, I'm going to preface this by saying the reason you can't ask follow up questions is because genuinely this isn't about me. This is genuinely about a friend, not a quote

Max Cohen: she's gonna start this story saying So I was playing shuffleboard with Shaquille O'Neal on top of Dugga Tower in Dubai. You can't ask me about it.

Liz Moorehead: you can't. No. Actually, what happened was the one of the last years I was at InBound, I You know how agency be agency life be like have you considered rooming with five other people in a room built for two? so we had four girls in a room and Two of the girls had gone out the previous night And by the way, they didn't get wrecked.

They didn't get trashed. And they were still up the next morning. In fact, one of them, one of them was a sociopath and was at the gym by five and I hadn't even been drinking. And I'm like, who are you? And why? Right? Exactly. But what was really cute, it was kind of a cute thing. They came back and I was there with a friend of mine and they were trying to be quiet.

That is in quotes. So they apparently had gone to McDonald's then they were

Max Cohen: you go to

Liz Moorehead: want to wake them up. They went. They went into the bathroom and closed the door because they didn't want to wake us up. The problem is, is the bathroom was a giant echo chamber. So for about an hour, it was just giggles.

And then when I went into the bathroom in the morning, there was a hamburger bun just stuck to the side of the shower.

George B. Thomas: Oh god. Yeah, don't put hamburger buns in your shower. That's a don't

Max Cohen: don't put

Liz Moorehead: make memories, make sober memories. Now my other don't, and this is very practical and very tactical. Don't Wear stuff that's uncomfortable. Wear stuff, don't wear stuff you are wearing for the first time. Time. You need to get up and go. You need to wear things that are comfortable and broken in. You need to wear things that you feel good in because you're going to be not, and I'm not talking about like, I look good, I feel good.

Know that it looks good put together. Know that it like is polished and you don't look like a cheeto dusted covered potato who just rolled out of bed. But like where things that you don't have to pull on, where things that don't make you feel insecure because you are wearing them for the first time.

Like whenever I wear cardigans or blazers, I'm constantly tugging at them because if I raise my arms, the blazer pops up like I'm not comfortable, right? Where things you feel good in, where things you can walk in, where things that go from daytime to nighttime. And then also understand it's a conference.

And people are going to be a lot more forgiving than you think. Simple is better. Less is more.

George B. Thomas: Yep, yep. I have, uh, one last don't. Don't be shy.

Max Cohen: Oh,

Liz Moorehead: Gross.

George B. Thomas: please,

Max Cohen: shy.

George B. Thomas: introvert, just be slightly extroverted. Just, people,

Liz Moorehead: You know Devin would yell at you if

George B. Thomas: I know he would, I know he would, but, but here's, he's not here, so I can say this, like, If you see me, come say hi, come shake my hand, give me a high five. If you see somebody else that you know from online, like, don't, don't be the person from afar, don't, oh, I don't want to bother them, it's not a bother, like, it's, it's the energy, it's the gas that keeps us going, because again, this is a family reunion, this is a, uh, inbound prom, this is a, whatever analogy you want, so just take the four days, And, and don't be shy.

Liz Moorehead: Well, I would also say don't make the assumption that it's not built for introverts because one of the things that Devin talked about a lot last year is that yes, there's the part where it's like, whether you're an introvert or an extrovert, it doesn't matter what vert persuasion you are. Some part of inbound is going to push you outside of your comfort zone.

Some part of inbound is going to feel a little bit fish out of water. You might be an expert extrovert. Who's going there on their own. You might be a leader who's there with your team and you have to lead your team, get sales, but also empower your people. Like there are going to be lots of different ways in which you are challenged to show up differently than a way that is your usual, your natural, your default.

Right. But I would say because inbound is so big, I think it had. They have done a really good job of creating micro networking station, networking opportunities, right? They also have quiet rooms. They have created spaces, whether you're just, for example, whether you're naturally introverted, or maybe you have a neurodivergency where you might get overly stimulated in a way where you need to find a way to reset, right?

Those spaces are available. But then also you have the ability to go back to your room, right? Like if you just need some time to take a beat, take a beat, but don't be afraid to go there and meet people. They are, conferences are scary no matter what. They're scarier for introverts. I can understand that for sure.

But it is a place where there is a concerted effort to genuinely create opportunities for everyone, no matter who you are, how you learn, how you like to interact, to grow better together.

George B. Thomas: Love it. Love it.

Liz Moorehead: That's what I would say.

Max Cohen: I have one quick do, I have one quick do, cause, cause I have to go soon, is uh, hmm, doodoo, uh, speaking of that, um, go, hmm, cause it'll, this'll make you doodoo, uh, do get a porchetta sandwich from Penny Packers, uh, or Chicken and Rice Guys, but if you can get a porchetta sandwich from Penny Packers, which is one of the vendors, one of the illustrious vendors that they're gonna have, uh, at the, uh, Food truck circle.

Do it. You will not regret it. Thank me later.

George B. Thomas: or do this. Get a lobster mac and cheese from Yankee Lobster. It's a hole in the wall, but O M G. You know what, Liz? I, I

Liz Moorehead: That is my inbound tradition.

George B. Thomas: yeah, it's Liz, I thought. Is this a dream, or a twisted fruity fate? Why are they in the water, when they should be on my plate? Grapes in the toilet, what a crazy sight. Bobbing and weaving in the porcelain light.

Oh, I don't know how they got there, but now they're making waves. Life's got funny moments, like these grapes in the drain. Did they roll off the counter in some midnight race? Or did someone decide this was their final resting place? Her name might've been Liz. I could see them bobbing gently, like they didn't have a care.

I laughed so hard thinking, how'd they get there? There's no rhyme or reason, no sense to explain. Sometimes life's just silly, like fruit down the drain.