One of the emerging trends that web 2.0 is helping to facilitate is bottom up marketing. I touched on this as it relates to web applications a while back.   Basically, bottom up marketing occurs when rank and file users adopt a technology that eventually percolates up to upper management. In terms of groups, technologies often begin with fringe users and spread into the centre.

These principles apply to the dissemination of information as much as they do technology.  It’s a very natural progression any way you slice it and the adoption curve is steeper than ever thanks to web 2.0 technologies.

At the mesh conference, we are going to be looking at how bottom up marketing affects traditional marketing – it’s something every marketer needs to understand inside and out. It is the way of the future, and let me tell you, I am totally sold.

Why? Mesh is a living, breathing example of the power of bottom up marketing. As the organizers we gave ourselves 7 weeks to sell a little over 300 tickets. Just seven weeks. What was our advertising budget? $0. Seriously.  Talk about a leap of faith <grin>…

After 3.5 weeks we had sold about 200 tickets  – exclusively as a result of us blogging about it and the word spread and if that is not amazing, I don’t know what is.

What have we seen along the way? Well, we have seen that people are willing to come from California, from New Zealand, and all over Canada to attend. (And we have had great support from Vancouver – thanks, Van city!). What kind of people are coming? From our five blog posts the word has trickled out and up. CEOs of publicly traded companies will be there. Government types. Start-ups. Consultants and political wonks. The crowd will be diverse and engaging and we’re honoured to be providing a forum for people to connect.

Why is bottom up marketing great? For one, your ear is to the ground. In the blogosphere, it is not hard to hear what people are saying about you – just check your web stats! It’s also not hard to see what you’ve brought to life.  For example, Jen Nolan is an IBM developer (her husband, Chris, is speaking at mesh) and she is going to use the Unconference Room to talk about women in web 2.0.  Excellent, excellent stuff.

So, it’s great to be able to walk the walk with mesh. As 5 guys with other jobs, we are grateful to everyone for the support mesh has received. We’re still gunning to sell out and I encourage you to buy a ticket or tell friends who are planning to attend to get theirs soon, because with 2 weeks to go, there may not be enough to go around.

Mathew, Stuart, and Rob are talking the web marketing from the bottom up meme today as well.