On the 29th of June 2017, the fourth ICORIA Doctoral colloquium was organized in Ghent, Belgium, as part of the 16th International Conference on Research in Advertising (ICORIA) 2017. Twenty doctoral candidates gathered in Ghent to join a series of interactive workshops, lectures and networking opportunities. This year’s colloquium welcomed a lot of participants from the Netherlands and Flanders, originating from Antwerp, Amsterdam, Ghent, Leuven etc. but also attracted an international audience with researchers coming from Hong Kong, Minnesota, Prague etc.

Before the colloquium started, a meet and greet lunch was organized in which the colloquium participants and speakers and the ICORIA 2017 organizers were given the opportunity to get to know one another. The official session started off with a warm welcome from the ICORIA 2017 organizers, Prof.dr. Liselot Hudders and Prof.dr. Verolien Cauberghe from Ghent University and the Doctoral colloquium organizer Dr. Guda van Noort (University of Amsterdam). Students immediately started off with an interesting and stimulating session on managing your Phd-supervisor, given by Dr. Hilde Voorveld (University of Amsterdam). Participants were next inspired by Prof.Dr. Jisu Huh (University of Minnesota) and Prof.Dr. Sandra Diehl (University of Klagenfurt) who discussed the possible strategies for research collaborations, talked about career planning and gave a lot of insider tips and career advice for the new young academics. The last session of the colloquium was a panel discussion in which Prof.Dr. Patrick De Pelsmacker (University of Antwerp), Prof.dr. Jisu Huh (University of Minnesota) and Prof.dr. Martin Eisend (European University Viadrina) presented some stimulating and interesting thought-provoking issues regarding the future of advertising. To conclude the day, participants were invited to the ICORIA conference welcome reception at the Faculty of Communication Sciences of Ghent University – which was held in a sunny and musical atmosphere in the authentic city of Ghent.

The colloquium was only the start of the ICORIA 2017 conference. During the conference, the colloquium participants also took on the responsibility to serve as a session chair in one of the conference tracks and did a splendid job! After three days filled with inspiring keynotes, talks and meeting opportunities, doctoral students hopefully went home with a lot of stimulating new insights and some simple, yet significant ideas, such as the fact that one should write like it matters … and it will!