B. Listening: Creating Your Own Industry Event Series

Podcast episodes
2 minute read 27 Aug 2024
Events can be a powerful tool to foster connections, facilitate the exchange of ideas and find inspiration in your niche. Often there is a gap in an industry where professionals have a need to connect and learn from others. This is what Kim identified when setting up the Legal BD Futures Forum. She joins us on our podcast to share how she founded her own industry event series and grew it from a post on LinkedIn to a network of over 100 members. 

“Having a ready-made professional network was a huge privilege that some people had and other people found it really inaccessible to build and it’s not really easy to know where to start”.

With the goal to provide the opportunity for everyone in the Legal BD niche to build a professional network, no matter their background, Kim has successfully grew the Futures Forum from networking gatherings to sponsored content led panels. 


In this episode she shares the ins and outs of planning the event and building a positive community such as: 


- Marketing an event using LinkedIn 

- Working with a limited budget

- Putting yourself out there and overcoming the fear of nobody showing up

- Finding speakers for your industry event

- Utilising attendee feedback to grow your event


Listen below or on Spotify.

About the guest

Kim Tolkien is the Business Development lead for the Global Intellectual Property team at Clifford Chance, working with lawyers on their client relationships, promotion and strategy for all things IP. 

Outside of her day job, she is also the founder of a network called the Legal BD Futures Forum which arranges free networking events in her industry. The aim of this network is to foster connections among legal marketing and BD professionals, facilitate the exchange of ideas and learn from each other. She has a strong interest in social diversity and ensuring that individuals from all backgrounds have the opportunity to build their own professional networks. 

About the host

Broadsword is a global event communications agency specialising in event production that ranges across virtual and live corporate events around the world. Based in London, Hong Kong, and New York, we are a trusted partner to global clients like HSBC and inspirational organisations such as Thomson Reuter’s Foundation.