APB Weekly

This week: futurist keynote speakers, recognition for Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Eric Liu, standout event moments, and a simple way to turn audience questions into social content.

Explore APB’s 60-year history, new change management speaker resources, Healthcare Quality Week, Chamique Holdsclaw’s latest feature, and recent event highlights.

For years, the keynote was the default format for paid speaking engagements, while moderated discussions were more commonly associated with celebrities or speakers who preferred a conversational setting. COVID changed that.

The conversation around speaker selection is becoming much more strategic. Rather than starting with a topic and asking who speaks about it, more organizations are beginning with the challenge their audience is facing and the change they hope the event can help create.

As organizations face new challenges and audiences continue to evolve, event planners are placing a greater emphasis on relevance. Economic uncertainty, AI, workforce changes, industry disruption, and organizational priorities all shape what audiences need from a keynote.

Every event planner knows that no matter how much preparation goes into an event, unexpected challenges can still arise. Travel delays, weather disruptions, family emergencies, and last-minute cancellations are all part of the reality of hosting live events.

Explore this week’s APB highlights, including why event planners value authentic speaker clips, Pride Month voices, bestselling books, innovation insights, and recent rave reviews.

As virtual access, content sharing, and post-event engagement continue to evolve, recording keynote sessions has become one of the most common points of discussion in speaker booking. Event planners often see recordings as valuable tools for extending audience impact and increasing accessibility, while speakers are balancing the need to protect their intellectual property with the reality that fresh keynote footage is important for future bookings and business growth.

Event planners have more speaker booking options today than ever before, especially as AI and technology continue to reshape how people search for talent and information. But while technology can help identify speakers faster, it cannot solve one of the most stressful realities in live events: a last-minute cancellation.