Inside the ideas shaping the future of marketing at Digital Adelaide
Digital Adelaide returns with practical insights for marketers navigating AI, branding and business growth.
The digital world rarely stands still. Artificial intelligence is reshaping search, brands are rethinking how they connect with audiences, and marketers are constantly adapting to new technologies and consumer behaviours.
Against that backdrop, Digital Adelaide returns this year with a program designed to help business leaders and marketers cut through the hype and leave with practical ideas they can put to work immediately.
Held at Adelaide Oval, the conference has evolved from humble beginnings into South Australia’s largest marketing conference, bringing together local success stories, national perspectives and real-world case studies from across the digital landscape.
For organiser Ryan Jones, the event’s growth reflects both the strength of South Australia’s marketing community and the industry’s appetite for continuous learning.
“Digital Adelaide started as Social Media Day Adelaide, off the back of Mashable’s global Social Media Day,” Jones says.
“The first event was a series of Google Meet streams, the second was at a café in Prospect with around 50 people. It’s now grown into Adelaide’s largest marketing conference, with around 200 attendees every year.”
Today, the conference showcases marketers and organisations from across South Australia alongside interstate speakers, offering insights for professionals at every stage of their careers.
“It offers practical marketing experience, case studies and tips for marketers and business leaders at all levels, with Adelaide businesses of a range of sizes sharing projects and experiences, plus some interstate speakers adding an external perspective,” Jones says.
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This year’s program reflects the rapidly changing nature of digital marketing, covering everything from social media strategy and branding to e-commerce, business-to-business marketing and artificial intelligence.
Among the headline sessions will be Adelaide University’s decision to build its social media presence from scratch rather than merge the legacy university accounts, alongside a behind-the-scenes look at the Adelaide Festival Centre’s recent rebrand and strategies for building engaging B2B brands.
Artificial intelligence, unsurprisingly, will also feature prominently.
Jones believes AI has been the defining digital story of 2026.
“I think it’s hard not to pick AI,” he says. “One is the impact this is having on Google, with AI becoming the biggest threat to their search monopoly in probably 20 years. This turns a lot of marketers’ playbooks upside down. People need to think about how this impacts their SEO and Google Ads strategies, which is where a lot of businesses have focused.”
He also points to the US Government’s decision to suspend international access to Anthropic’s Claude Fable model as another significant development.
“This creates a dangerous precedent, particularly for a country like Australia that has few home-grown solutions to fall back on.”
While emerging technology continues to dominate industry conversations, Jones says Digital Adelaide is about more than simply chasing trends.
“We review attendee feedback and try to cover what they request, but also find speakers in new areas that will challenge them with different perspectives,” he says.
“The digital landscape is constantly changing, so we get the opportunity to showcase areas that Adelaide is truly leading in marketing and digital, and throw some new ideas out that people can take back to their day-to-day work.”
One of those fresh perspectives comes from keynote speaker Kirsty Chapman-Smith, founder and CEO of Partyrama Group, whose entrepreneurial journey is a story of persistence, growth and continual learning.
Chapman-Smith launched the business in 2008 from her lounge room. “I started the business hoping I might make a small income to contribute to the family,” she says.
“It grew out of an eBay side hustle that initially had no business plan or strategy. As the business grew, I grew with it and through determination and a lot of learning along the way, it now ships more than 250,000 orders a year across Australia and New Zealand.”
Today, Partyrama Group is home to Discount Party Supplies, Australia’s largest pure-play online party retailer.
Chapman-Smith says she was delighted to accept the invitation to speak at this year’s Digital Adelaide.
“The organisers reached out to me and said they’d had requests from attendees for a session on a female entrepreneur’s story and their success,” she says. “I was delighted to be asked and excited to share my story.”
Her keynote will explore not only the milestones behind the company’s growth but also the challenges encountered along the way and the leadership lessons she’s learned.
“I’ll be sharing how the business started and some of the ups and downs it’s experienced,” she says.
“I’ll also be talking about how I came to understand that certain values are really important in driving both a business and a team, and the role they’ve played in building a sustainable business.”
As a female founder in South Australia, Chapman-Smith says she’s benefited from a collaborative business community that continues to foster innovation and leadership.
“I find doing business in South Australia incredibly rewarding,” she says. “There’s such a wide range of groups, events and scholarships available that, if you take the time to get involved, it genuinely accelerates your learning.
“The collaboration and knowledge-sharing you develop with other business leaders is something you can’t put a price on, and it’s events like Digital Adelaide that bring those people together in a room to make those connections happen.”
For Jones, that’s exactly what the conference aims to achieve.
“I’m looking forward to Kirsty’s session because it’s something our audience asked for – more sessions from entrepreneurs sharing their journey,” he says.
“I’m also looking forward to the Adelaide Festival Centre session and a discussion on the cost of coping with our modern digital world and how high-performing marketers can look after themselves.”
With tickets selling fast for the 2026 event, Jones is already looking ahead to next year. “If you have a story you want to share, reach out about speaking in 2027,” he says.
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