Tmw Blog Dmexco 2016 - The Year of Digital Transformation

Cologne, 15 September 2016. This year's occurrence of the often-subbed 'European SXSW', set a new record with 50,700 visitors and 1,013 exhibitors from all around the world to celebrate the digital economy. And this year it was clearer than ever that Dmexco is here to stay and it isn't just about making business in Germany anymore. The speaker line-up included leading personalities from the big international players of the industry: Hootsuite's CEO Ryan Holmes, Snapchat's CSO Imran Khan, AOL's CEO Tim Armstrong and Nestle's Head of Marketing and Consumer Communication, Tom Buday, were eager to demonstrate their interest in Europe. So, what are the takeaways from the conference? What does the future hold for the digiconomy in Europe, where we've seen a steep increase in AdBlock users (1 in 4 ads have been blocked last year) and data protection laws from Brussels cause massive headaches especially for companies from North America trying to enter the market? Storytelling Storytelling was among the hottest topics at Koelnmesse this year and it came to no surprise that besides dominating the booths, it also dominated the stages. Data was often mentioned in one sentence with storytelling. The big marketers are convinced; backing your content with data increases predictability of user-behaviour and brings us one step closer to the planned creation of the sought-after viral story. It was good to hear Ryan Holmes countering this, because data is not really everything and it takes more than data to achieve a level of newness to surprise and delight your audience. You have the data, you just need to be creative with it and come up with a compelling experience. Experience 'Make Experience your Business' was the headline of the highly-anticipated keynote with Adobe's Suresh Vittal and Redbull's Andy Gall. Vittal made a case for the (r)evolution of the customer journey and how we arrived in the 'Economy of Experience'. Every business is facing a generation of customers who aren't looking for the best product anymore, but rather looking for the brand who's delivering the best experience to them: Brands and their products need to enable experiences Seamless experiences gain importance Customers want to feel that they come first through delivering meaningful messages Bravery Frederico Roberto, Creative Director at VML London spoke about the redefinition of bravery and how only the bravest ideas lead to meaningful business results. Being brave doesn't mean you have to take a leap of faith into the unknown. He pointed out that by analysing data you can easily identify differentiators for your strategy to set you off the competition. And that's how the leap of faith becomes a hop of faith. Prophecies Now that we know the status quo of digital in Europe, but what does the future hold for us? Dmexco's closing conference talk was labelled "Prophet Session" where Sarah Wood from Unruly, AOL's Jim Norton and Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes spent five minutes each to tell about their predictions for the future: Polite ads will be the beginning of the end for invasive ads - Unruly Sustainability over hyper growth - the startup-hype is calming down and founders, as well as marketers learned that becoming a unicorn is a long journey - Hootsuite Engaging consumers on their own terms will hopefully bring an end to the meaningless bombarding of customers - AOL Scaling personalised customer journeys will improve workflows and responsiveness - Hootsuite Purposeful brands will rise over brands whose only purpose is keeping shareholders happy - Unruly Employee advocacy will amply the reach of companies with a large workforce and allow them to add credibility to their messages - Hootsuite Potential reach of McDonald's social channels v.s. potential reach of McDonald's workforce (source: Hootsuite) Digital transformation is at the heart of these topics; ensuring your business harness the power and influence of digital to truly resonate with customers by delivering a seamless and consistent experience. If you'd like to know more about Digital Transformation, get in touch!