Highlighting a Tech Revolution
A few of us from WE UK have just finished up day one at Web Summit in Lisbon, along with over 15,000 other people representing over 125 countries around the world. It’s been a fascinating show so far with a huge number and diversity of attendees representing what seems every type of industry. The topics prevalent in all discussions; AI, AR, Video and technology enabled innovation and data. We truly believe the presenters and participants this week represent the way in which technology itself has been democratised and is evolving the way we live our lives.
The conversation at the show this week highlights how, from the tiniest sensor to the largest supercomputer, technology is where creativity meets science, where data meets human insight and where the future of food, health, transportation, art and science are all enhanced. However, it doesn't replace the need for connection, it enhances it and today that was the red thread in the conversation through the PandaConf, just one of the 21 total conferences packed into the Web Summit monster.
Web Summit describe PandaConf as “the world's premier conference for 10,000 marketers and technologists where industry giants, global CMOs, leading brands, investors, agencies and AdTech start-ups meet”, and that’s exactly what it is.
Today we heard from some amazing brands including Just Eat, Oracle, Booking.com and Nestle who were interviewed by CNBC, Business Insider, Contently, Marketing Week and Ad Week on their marketing philosophies and big bets moving forward. Augmented Reality specialist Blippar talked about the massive opportunity with AR for brands and content generators Dubmash and Vidyard spoke eloquently about the need for every brand to develop a video marketing strategy for 2017 – this included key insight around length (ideally between 10-90 seconds) and time of day (a lot of people watch videos on their bathroom break – like it or not).
As communicators, we need to harness the potential in this transition, capitalizing on the technology transformation, using it to our benefits as a central part of our storytelling, ensuring it touches audiences across all platforms. Watch out for more from us at Web Summit over the next couple days – we’re excited to see what unfolds!
