At the end of 2017 I made the decision to try to interact with as many people in the Diabetes community in-person as possible. I felt that face-to-face interactions were much more impactful than podcasts or social media content, so I pursued the only route I knew at the time to meet as many people with Diabetes as possible: JDRF Type One Nation Summits.

Since February 2018, I’ve visited 15 chapters from St. Louis to Seattle, to Raleigh to Detroit and many more, as well as getting involved in my home chapter’s planning committee in Dallas. Type One Nation Summits are incredibly valuable for attendees of all kinds, and provide a single-day one stop shop of education, community and inspiration for people with Diabetes and their caretakers/friends.

After my last trip in 2019 to Minneapolis (my 22nd summit) I realized my experience from visiting so many events may be beneficial to the people behind the scenes, so I decided to put together this page with some of my insights to help inspire you to continue to do amazing work in the Diabetes community.

So here they are, six insights from over 20 Type One Nation Summits, distilled in no particular order by your favorite Diabetes marketing guru speaker podcaster friend.

Enjoy! And hopefully I’ll see you all again soon

#1 Know Your Audience

This is without a doubt the most important part of any programming for Type One Nation Summits but it requires a bit of background information in order to get started. Let’s start with the basics: Chapter Size and Demographics. Not all JDRF chapters are created equal, and most of that is dictated by location (major metro areas vs larger territories with less population density) and staff tenure. Chapters with consistent leadership at the Executive Director and Outreach Manager positions typically have more engaged chapters. This is especially important when making an effort to reach Young Adults, as smaller chapters typically do not have the resources to engage a formal YLC chapter, and rely heavily on volunteers. The third attribute to consider is time with Diabetes. Type One Nation’s are often the only formal educational event for chapters, so you will often see a lot of newly diagnosed families (Parents & children) as well as very engaged chapter members who have been involved for a long time. Depending on where you are, your audience may have limited to zero knowledge of the Diabetes Online Community, so when booking speakers (like me) who are prominent online and come from out of town it’s important to work on the titles for the sessions so attendees know what to expect. A personal example, I spoke at the Seattle Type One Nation and the Southwest Ohio Type One Nation on back to back days this year, and while the title of my talk was the same, the audiences familiarity with the material varied greatly. In hindsight, I would’ve restructured my conversation in Southwest Ohio to give more background on my story and an introduction to the Diabetes Online Community, compared to Seattle, where the attendees seemed to be more active online.

#2 Create Safe Spaces for Newly Diagnosed Attendees

Type One Nation Summits are an excellent resource for in-depth research, exercise and lifestyle sessions about Diabetes, but for patients and families who have been recently diagnosed (<12 months), the summits can feel like information overload. In Dallas, our committee created a pre-conference session for newly Diagnosed families called “Diabetes 101” where an Endocrinologist, Diabetes educator and JDRF Outreach Volunteer provide 10 minutes of quick lessons on Diabetes terminology that attendees may hear throughout the day (eg. CGM = continuous glucose monitor, DKA = diabetic ketoacedosis, “What is looping?” etc.) followed by an open forum Q&A to help attendees get their most important questions addressed before the conference starts. This is also a good opportunity to explain the programming and make recommendations for which sessions newly diagnosed conference goers should attend.

#3 Homogenous Programming = Homogenous Attendees

No matter the chapter, no matter the geography, all the JDRF Summits I have attended have homogenous attendees. In my conversations with chapter leadership about diversity, at a high-level, all chapters have a focus on making the events more inclusive, so here are some ways I have seen other events successfully create inclusive spaces for their attendees

Formal Safe Spaces - these typically manifest in pre-conference “meetups” either on site in a breakout room, or at a local restaurant or coffee shop near to the event venue. These are called out in the marketing materials and event agenda, and have a volunteer leader as a coordinator. These are also good opportunities to get sponsors involved, to do a free breakfast/coffee or gift bag. Here are some examples of safe spaces I have seen:
- POC with Diabetes Meetup -a People of Color with Diabetes meetup took place in the hotel lobby of an event, just to make friends and connect before the conference.
- Diabetes 30+ club - people who had lived with Diabetes for over 30 years sat down at round tables before the event and connected and shared stories
- YLC happy hour - post conference, a local chapter YLC met up at a local brewery for Happy Hour
- Type One Run pre-conference fun run - Diabetes running group held a 5k fun run prior to the event with one of the event speakers
Diversity Programming - in order to have an environment of inclusion, you must curate an inclusive environment. Take a look at your panels and sessions and ask yourself if you feel they are inclusive and represent people with Diabetes. While the demographics in the United States skew heavily in the favor of White/Caucasian, the HgA1c outcomes of people of color with T1D are often higher than their white/caucasian peers. A good barometer is to compare the demographics of your speaker presenters with the JDRF Fact Sheet showing the demographic breakdown in the US, and ensure your ratios are on par with age, race and socioeconomic status.
Everest vs. Everyday - we have some amazing people living with T1D. Olympians, Ultramarathoners, Influencers, but for most people, just getting the kids to school on time or making it to the gym without a low blood sugar are much more relatable than someone climbing Mt. Everest. Make sure your programming are not all mountaintop experiences, and also tell the story of the everyday victories of people with Diabetes and how to celebrate them.

#4 Add more lifestyle brands to Resource Row

There is a prescriptive model to Resource Row. Device Companies with local reps, one or two Pharma companies, the occasional guest speaker selling merchandise or books and a JDRF table with information on how to get involved. A good opportunity for chapters to increase their table sales and create relationships with top Diabetes lifestyle and tertiary brands is to take a look at the brands who are active within the Diabetes social media space. For example:

From a sponsorship perspective, Type One Nation Summits are WIDE OPEN for a brand to take their event presence to the next level. No single brand has a formula that makes them innovative, event tables are very much status quo. Could your chapter or brand be the one that breaks through?

#5 Panels should have a maximum of 3 people

Panels are an incredibly valuable way for attendees to hear from multiple people about various topics, but in a 50 minute session, there simply isn’t enough time for most panelists to add their maximum value if there are more than 3 people on the panel. Panels are often the place where attendees feel most confident asking difficult or complex questions, so ensuring the panelists have ample time to give their answers will drastically improve the experience for panelists and audience members alike.

#6 Utilize guest speakers for meet ups!

One of the major benefits of booking a Diabetes social media influencer/personality at a Type One Nation Summit is the opportunity for casual meetups. These often take place the night before the event, and can be as simple as a happy hour or dinner. This is also a great way to meet people with Diabetes in your area who may not be connected to the chapter. These meetups tend to skew towards young adults (22-35), so if you are looking for more ways to activate your YLC chapter, this would be a great place to start. Meetups vary in attendance, but generally you can expect an out of town Diabetes influencer with around 10,000 followers to bring 8-10 people.

This is also a great way to activate sponsors, as many medical device brands and diabetes lifestyle brands have put together gift bags or purchased food/drink for attendees at meetups across the country.

JDRF reports that nearly 70,000 people attend Type One Nation Summits every year, and while I think that number is inflated, these are still the most impactful events to interact directly with chapter members and discuss Diabetes care, lifestyle and get connected to the latest on research, technology and online communities. The work that JDRF Chapters put into these events really makes a difference, and my best days of the last 2 years are the days where I can interact face to face with people with Diabetes.

Thank you for taking the time to review this, and if you have any questions, feel free to contact me via the form below and we can talk more about how I can help your next chapter event.

Here’s to a great 2020 and 50th anniversary of JDRF

Rob