Yesterday, as part of our continuing Activate conference series, we hosted Activate Summit Europe in London. The in-person event brought together marketing professionals, product leaders, and more—all looking to gain new insights and tips for developing joyful experiences for their customers. The energy was high, and the networking was in full force. With our two tracks, “Marketing to the Modern Customer” and “Building a Better Customer Experience,” attendees heard from industry leaders about how to make memorable moments of lasting impact for their customers.
If you weren’t able to attend, don’t worry! This article will get you started in tapping into the insights we saw in person. To dive deeper, you can always sign up for the on demand sessions to see them in full. We’ll get into the takeaways soon, but first, here’s a recap from Iterable’s CMO Adri Gil Miner.
Morning Keynote with Iterable and Special Guest, Zoopla
The day kicked off with our morning keynote. Adri and Iterable’s SVP of Product, Bela Stepanova, kicked off Activate Summit Europe by talking about how brands need to focus on joyful experiences to stay ahead, and how to do this in Iterable. To close out, we heard a bit about what a joyful experience looks like in action from Zoopla’s CMO Gary Bramall.
Three key learnings from the keynote:
- Joy is a Powerful Emotion: People intrinsically seek joy, and joy connects people more powerfully than almost any other human experience.
- Iterable Builds Relationships: By bridging the gap between the data and customer activation, Iterable elicits customer joy and, as a result, strengthens relationships.
- “The best brands behave like the best people.” Gary caught everyone’s attention with this line, as everyone agrees the best brands these days build human connection.
After the morning keynote, our two tracks began, each loaded with information to continue your marketing team’s success. Let’s dive into some of the top takeaways from each.
Marketing to the Modern Customer
With external speakers in addition to customers and partners, this track offered outside perspectives to help spark inspiration.
Leverage CRM as a Hub for Strategic Customer Innovation
In this session, UNiDAYS’ VP of Data and Insights, Tamara Castelli, discussed the value of customer relationship management and how it can lead to new ways of marketing to your customers.
Takeaway: To redefine CRM you should challenge the status quo, evaluate KPIs, be data obsessed, and use agile delivery.
Getting Ahead: Harnessing AI to Improve the Customer Experience
Katie King, Author and CEO of AI in Business, shared thought-provoking insights about how AI is impacting the current state of business and the potential impact it may have in the future.
Takeaway: Katie’s presentation included a scoresheet, making it easy to evaluate where your team currently stands with AI while also getting a sense of where you may have some gaps to be filled. You can take a quick peek here, but we would really recommend checking out her whole session to see how to best utilize this sheet.
Katie King’s session included a scorecard, which can help you assess where your brand stands with the adoption of AI.
Humanising Your Brand for a Deeper Connection with Your Audience
Toucan’s CEO, Matt Crate, spoke about the human side of brands and how sharing your brand values and perspectives can create strong customer relationships.
Takeaway: The four pillars of humanising a brand are the foundation on which brands should build their human-centric strategy. The pillars are: Authenticity, Focus on Community, Foster Emotive Connections, and People Buy Visions.
Building a Better Customer Experience
The Building a Better Customer Experience track was a more tactical look at how our customers and partners develop and execute their marketing strategies.
Why Establishing a Customer Journey Matters
WeTransfer’s Senior Email Marketing Manager, Ornella Gallo, spoke about the customer journey and why it’s so relevant when it comes to personalisation.
Takeaway: Know your goal when designing journeys. Keep in mind that you’re building customer journeys to grow and nurture your customers with personalised and timely content that drives product adoption and moves them down the funnel.
Designing an Acquisition Journey to Encourage Retention
Indi Pollard, Growth Marketing Manager at Blockchain, then explored the relationship between acquisition and retention. She shared Blockchain’s own experience.
Takeaway: Test, Test, and Test some more. To get a better understanding of customer behavior, test different workflows. See if any patterns emerge. Do certain groups of customers interact with your brand in specific ways?
International Scaling: 5 Levers to Help You Grow Your Business Across Borders
Jen Lang, the Chief Customer Officer at Secret Escapes, covered five levers to help brands scale internationally.
Takeaway: The five levers for international scaling are: know what you can borrow, be deliberate about what you do, culture is like a family, build global tech, and adapt and grow.
Combining Data, Tech, and Processes for Successful CRM Marketing Automation
To talk about the relationship between data, technology, and processes, Wolt’s Head of Marketing Automation, Adrian Gray, took to the stage.
Takeaway: For data, map your objectives. Make it clear what you are solving, build your requirements, and prioritise. For tech, define your biggest headaches, decide what tech can solve, determine how it will impact the business, and think about how it will scale. And lastly, for processes, think about what currently isn’t working, create a working group, identify key next steps, and keep everything documented.
The Party Continues
Activate Summit Europe attendees were left with invaluable takeaways to help improve their marketing strategies. As you can see from this recap, there was a lot of information shared during Activate Summit Europe, and this is just the tip of the iceberg! There was so much more to learn from these sessions and the other sessions we didn’t even get a chance to cover in this space!
We were so happy to be back in-person. The experience created new networking opportunities and, of course, fantastic memories. If you’re interested in attending an Activate event, join us stateside in San Francisco for Activate Summit North America!
Don’t wait! Register for Activate Summit North America today.
