Conference Agenda

Opening: What Can You Actually Execute in 2026?

Mike Hobgood

Growth ambition is easy. Execution capacity is the real constraint. This session opens the conference by reframing the year ahead — not around what you want to accomplish, but around what your business is actually built to deliver. If you’ve ever committed to a growth target and watched it strain the business, this is where we start.

• Growth framed through execution and capacity, not aspiration
• Where RMX companies are currently stretched or underutilized
• Capability gaps showing up across the network
• How RMX is investing in Partner capability development in 2026

Uncomfortable Truths About Growth, Margin, and Scale

RMX Owner/Executive Panel

This is the conversation most conferences avoid. A peer-led panel where owners and executives share what growth actually looked like from the inside — the complexity it introduced, the margin it quietly eroded, and the warning signs they missed. No polish. No post-game spin. Just honest leaders being straight with each other.

• Decisions that looked like wins and turned into operational weight
• How margin erosion shows up months after the growth decision
• The real tradeoffs between scale benefits and operational strain
• Early warning signs — and what to watch for now

AI is Changing Marketing: What's Real and What Actually Matters

Danny Dovell, BlueVine

A look at what’s changing in search, from Google AI Overviews to shifting traffic patterns, and what to do about it. We’ll cover how to stay visible, how the Marketing Rule of 7 is evolving, and tackle the key questions we’re hearing from partners.

• Google AI Overviews
• What type of traffic you may be losing (and what that actually means)
• Activities that build long-term leverage vs. short-term noise
• The Marketing Rule of 7 and how it’s evolving in today’s landscape
• A few of the most common questions and concerns we’re hearing

The Levers that Leaders Actually Control

Moderated Executive Session

Metrics, margin, and process aren’t three separate conversations — they’re one. This session frames them as interconnected leadership levers and focuses on the decisions you can actually make. The compounding effect of small, consistent choices over time is where durable advantage gets built.

• Which metrics are driving behavior — and which are just being tracked
• Margin as a leadership decision, not just a financial outcome
• How process discipline creates capacity as companies scale
• The small decisions with the longest tails

The Designer’s Perspective: How We Choose Who We Work With

Interior Design Industry Speaker

You can have the best product and still lose the specification. This session puts a working interior designer in front of the room to tell you directly how they evaluate vendors, what builds lasting loyalty, and what quietly gets you removed from consideration. No filter. No sales agenda. Just the perspective most vendors never get access to.

• How designers make vendor decisions — and who actually influences them
• What separates a trusted partner from a transactional supplier
• The behaviors and gaps that cost you specifications without you knowing
• What RMX companies can do differently to get and stay in the conversation

People Strategy as a Competitive Advantage

Owner/HR Leader Panel

In a tight labor market, the companies winning on people aren’t doing it by accident. This session explores how compensation, recruiting, benefits, and mentorship directly affect growth capacity — and how people strategy becomes a real differentiator when it’s built around alignment, not policy.

• Compensation models that align behavior with business outcomes
• What’s actually working in recruiting right now
• Benefits employees value vs. benefits that look good on paper
• Mentorship as a retention and development tool

Technology That Simplifies or Complicates

Operators, IT Leaders, Vendor Perspective

Every technology investment promises simplicity and delivers something else entirely. This session cuts through the noise with real-world examples from people who made these bets — what reduced friction, what created it, and how to evaluate the next decision before you make it.

• Practical AI and automation use cases that are actually working
• Tools that simplified operations and why they did
• Technology that added complexity and what the warning signs were
• Adoption, infrastructure, and the hidden cost of change

Hidden Capabilities: Did You Know We Did That?

RMX Partners

Some of the most valuable services inside RMX companies didn’t come from a strategic planning session. They emerged from customer demand, operator instinct, and a willingness to say yes before the playbook existed. This session surfaces those capabilities — and the real story of how they became profitable.

• Services that started organically and scaled into real revenue
• How demand signals from customers created new offerings
• The operational and profitability lessons that came with them

Sponsor Session

Thought Leadership Presentation

This session is structured around insight, not product. Our sponsor brings relevant expertise to a topic that matters to this room — and the value is in the perspective, not the pitch.

• Speaker and topic details to be announced

Dinner + Mike Duff Award Presentation

Country Music Hall of Fame, Nashville

The Mike Duff Award is the network’s highest individual honor — established to recognize individuals who embody the spirit of collaboration, generosity, and leadership that defines RMX. Named in memory of a true pioneer in print, the award celebrates those who understand that the real strength of this industry lies in the knowledge, support, and ideas we share with each other. Dinner, museum tour, and a moment worth being in the room for.

Selling Value When Buyers Have More Leverage

Kate Dunn, Evolve Sales Group

Buyers are more informed, more price-conscious, and more willing to push than ever. This session is about holding your value when the pressure is on — not through tactics or scripts, but through sales discipline that’s grounded in what you actually deliver.

• How to sell confidently without caving to pricing pressure
• Shifting conversations from price to value — and making it stick
• Avoiding customization creep that kills margin after the deal closes
• Aligning what sales promises with what operations can deliver

Sponsor Session

Thought Leadership Presentation

This session is structured around insight, not product. Our sponsor brings relevant expertise to a topic that matters to this room — and the value is in the perspective, not the pitch.

• Speaker and topic details to be announced

New Markets: How to Research Before You Commit

Owners with Expansion Experience

Market expansion can be a smart growth move or an expensive distraction. The difference is usually how well you did your homework before you committed. This session gives you a real framework for evaluating new markets — built on hard experience from operators who’ve done it, not theory.

• How to research a new market before making a real investment
• Looking beyond the industry echo chamber for signal
• Aligning expansion opportunities with your actual core strengths
• When diversification helps your business and when it just divides it

Closing: Designing Defensible Growth for the Year Ahead

Facilitated Discussion — Mike Hobgood

This session brings the conference together. After two days of honest conversation about growth, margin, capability, and pressure, we get specific. What do you need to protect? What deserves more investment? What should you simplify or stop doing entirely? This is where insight becomes direction.

• What to protect in your business right now
• What to strengthen before the market forces you to
• What to simplify — and what to stop doing

Personal Action Planning: From Insight to Action

Guided Individual Reflection

The most expensive conference is the one where nothing changes when you get home. This session gives you structured time to translate what you’ve heard and discussed into concrete next steps — with clarity on what’s immediate, what’s longer-term, and how you stay accountable to it.

• Identifying your top three priorities coming out of the conference
• Separating immediate actions from longer-term decisions
• Building accountability back into your business from day one