Hubb’s Successful Pivot
By: Dan Stein
Tags: Startup Life, Startup, Founder Interview, Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneur

Interview with Allie Magyar, Founder and CEO of Hubb

Interview with Allie Magyar, Founder and CEO of Hubb

Tell us about your business. What do you do?

Hubb is the leader in event management, an often overlooked yet enormously integral part of the MarTech stack.

What is your startup’s origin story?

Allie is serial entrepreneur and technology maven with over 15 years’ experience driving technology enabled service companies. As President and CEO of Dynamic Events for over a decade, Allie traveled around the world producing events for some of the biggest names in technology. Seeing the need for a tool to organize and manage the events she and her team were producing, she created Hubb in 2012 and rolled it out to the wider world in 2015. In 2016, Allie helped Hubb raise $4 million in venture funding and win the Bend Venture and Seattle Angel conferences. Allie is passionate about driving positive corporate culture and her companies have won several regional awards such as “Healthiest Workplace” and “Most Philanthropic”. Allison combines her real world experience in marketing, sales, partner relationship building, and show production with a strong vision for the technology-enabled future of event management. She is CMP certified, a member of Vistage, a two-time Inc. 5000 award winner, and was also listed as one of the 2013 Collaborate 40 under 40 in the meetings industry.

Had you been involved in the industry before this startup? What is your background?

Yes, Allie is a seasoned expert in the events and meetings industry, having founded two leaders in the space.

What’s unique about your company? What are the key differentiators between you and other players?

When covid-19 struck, companies and conference teams large and small were thrown for a loop with events of all sizes, including major conferences like SXSW, being canceled. Event planners were suddenly faced with figuring out what to do, how to survive and where the industry was headed. The downstream effects on the event industry hit hard, including event tech, much of which is focused on the onsite experience. Hubb’s clients were canceling events and coming to them for help on what to do. At the same time, with the massive event cancellations happening Hubb itself was at risk. Powerhouses like CES and BIO.org had to quickly decide on a solution for their international audience as virtual events, once the red headed stepchild of the events industry, became the hottest essential.

As someone with an event planning background herself, Allie took charge and met with industry colleagues to form partnerships that enabled live-streaming. She drove her engineering team to tweak some of the previously lesser-used parts of the platform to meet the current demand for virtual events. As an experienced events industry leader, Allie led Hubb with resiliency and success to pivot the business in a way that served the changing needs of an industry brought to its knees. Events and digital experiences, whether virtual or hybrid, need the right tools to run as key elements of the MarTech stack — which Hubb was able to provide in a way that was more versatile and user-friendly than what was currently on the market.

After a bumpy initial Q2 due to covid-19 cancellations, Hubb didn’t go under, but is instead thriving due to its robust virtual event capabilities. Q2 & Q3 sales and pipeline crushed expectations- meeting the entire year’s goal in a matter of 60 days. Allie’s deft handling of the situation not only saved the company from collapse, but is leading Hubb into the second half of the year with strong revenue and a renewed company mission. In May, Hubb took it a step further by giving back with Untethered, a virtual summit for the events industry that raised $17,500 for The Meetings Industry Fund, as part of a charitable partnership for industry professionals in need.

Take us through a day in your life. What does the typical day look like?

When running a company, I feel like interesting stories happen every day! But one of the most poignant memories for me was the realization of inequality, that I was not used to in my own personal bubble, as I went to raise venture capital for the first time. I quickly understood that the world I live in is different from many others in our world and that it’s important to demand equity and inclusion, especially in the tech and software industry. Experiencing the challenges of trying to raise funds for a company as a woman leader and woman in tech introduced me to various issues pertaining to women and diversity that exist today. I hope to be a catalyst for change and support efforts that focus on inclusion and diversity in my industry and the tech ecosystem as a whole.

What has been the most challenging part of growing your company?

Hubb is re-imagining the future of events and we’re excited to lead our industry during this time of change. We’re helping to merge virtual and in person events in a very compelling way, creating value for attendees worldwide in our marketing portfolios. Our leading edge technology will help marketers worldwide because with a solution that brings a sense of brand purpose, engages attendees in a meaningful way and creates connections for a remote audience.

One recent project that I’m proud of was an event we pulled together in less than 6 weeks, to help inspire the meetings industry of what is possible with virtual events, called Untethered. This event was part of a charitable partnership for industry professionals in need. The goal of Untethered was to educate and connect event professionals during this time of profound change with a mission to educate, inspire and innovate them. We raised over 17,000 dollars for a mission driven non-profit and gained so much from the collaboration and networking we did together during this community led effort.

What apps do you use that you would recommend to others?

Asana

Do you have a book, podcast, or Youtube channel you would recommend to other Entrepreneurs?

Podcast- Adam Parry’s https://www.eventindustrynews.com/category/podcasts

If you could go back in time to the day you founded your company, what advice would you give yourself?

Focus on what’s in front of you.

I try to help the world right in front of me and find the good in people around me, rather than focusing on the negative or how they may have wronged me. This type of mindset helps inform your life, so that you can look for ways to find inspiration rather than something negative about someone or something. This is an intentional practice that I keep in my daily life and I choose this mindset each day.

What’s something you’ve learned from building your business that someone else can learn from?

One quote that I love is “Life is a journey,” and it means that you can’t feel the good without the bad and the need to overcome adversity sometimes, which is what we are living in today.