Apart from a few technical difficulties - wrong zoom passwords and, well, it took a while to find our way around in the pixel world - it was a great experience again and showed us that such a series of events also works virtually.
Internet of Things and B2B Campaigns
It started for us on July 14th with the lecture “Internet of Things - what opportunities does this technology give us?”. Lisa Knab from Nürnberger Versicherung explained the potential of the Internet of Things in relation to Industry 4.0, mobility, health management and SmartHome. The latter in particular was explained in detail, also in relation to the insurance industry. For example, if I receive door, window and water sensors when I take out household insurance and can thus reduce or, at best, even avoid damage, both the policyholder and the insurance company benefit in the end. We are excited to see what will happen in this field in the next few years.
In the afternoon, Theresa Steinbauer and Hanna Rose Matheis from UCS took us step by step into B2B campaign hell in their ironic-sarcastic lecture “Don't burn your customer’s customers - A B2B use case” full of memes (we love memes!). Fortunately, not only was it explained how not to do it, but there were some good tips and we were able to take a few things with us for our work.
The eCommerce Day
On Thursday, July 15th it was time for the eCommerce Day! A whole day around one of our favorite topics, which has meanwhile become a permanent fixture at the Digital Festival. In his keynote at the beginning, Stefan Peter Roos pointed out the current difficulties: “Whoever has the goods has won”, because almost the entire industry is affected by delivery problems, delays and increased logistics costs. He recommended that the audience should now take the chance and put everything to the test. Does the range still fit? Is the supply chain running? What about pricing and competition? This also includes increasing the IT competence in the team and checking the process agility in order to digitize as much as possible and make everything more flexible. In consequence, that means a lot of work for an industry that is benefiting for the most part from the Corona crisis, but is also facing new challenges at the same time.
The eCommerce Day then continued with Oliver Frings from Nexum AG and the exciting topic “Adieu Sales Funnel: How the path to the purchase decision is becoming more and more complex and how we can react to it”. In a very engaging way, Oliver told how he wanted to buy a new bike and during his research was so overwhelmed by the huge selection of styles and brands that it was not easy for him to make a decision. Something that everyone of us knows well, not only when it comes to bicycles. He then explained which elements, such as social confirmation, expert judgments or availability, positively influence the purchase decision and how it can be possible to avoid giving customers an opportunity to look for alternatives during the purchase process. Namely by means of a learning AI, which on the one hand calculates at which point in the purchase decision the customer is, but on the other hand also uses previous behavior to determine whether a customer has a lot or a few e-mail reads and accordingly automatically sends e-mails with information or purchase incentives. A really interesting option for eCommerce that will certainly be further developed in the future.
This was followed by Anja Buchner from mr. pixel KG with the emotional topic "Emotional Commerce - Emotions in E-Commerce". She emphasized that there are no rational purchasing decisions and advocated using the ESP (Emotional Selling Proposition) instead of the somewhat outdated USP in future, that is, the emotional added value that a product offers. Because people actively look for good feelings and avoid negative, the emotional always take precedence over rational decisions. Anja recommended immersing the customer, asking what needs they have and what his/her values are.
Since the SEO lecture in the afternoon was unfortunately canceled, we heard Stefan Wacker's and Janine Kreienbrink's (CXdoing) lecture “Customer Experience: Everyone talks about customer centricity - and it sticks with you!”. They emphasized the topic of customer centricity and how important it is that the customer journey connects all departments. Because every contact that customers have with a company counts and everything has to work smoothly, even small things such as a change of address. One-off activism does not help, rather it is important to continuously stick to topics, which is why they rely on the CX-Loop. The aim is to find allies, because customer experience is not thought up in secret, providing hard facts (key figures), integrating customer experience into all processes and decisions, and making the customer experience visible and tangible for everyone. If all employees of a company are on board and work together to offer customers the best possible experience, the corporate culture will also change for the better in the long term.
At the last lecture on eCommerce Day for us, mr. pixel KG asked the question "eCommerce - will that catch on?". In an interesting, sometimes almost funny way, the two discussed the differences and similarities between online and offline retail. They also dealt with the opportunities and risks that eCommerce brings with it, for example by tracking customers using cookies. A successful end to this enlightening day.
New work and social sustainability
Between all the topics related to eCommerce, on Thursday there was also a lecture by Marilena Bluhm and Rainer Schubert, who are responsible for the development of new working environments at DATEV EG. Topic: "Work from anywhere - How will we work in the "New Normal" in the future?". It was very interesting to see how a company like DATEV deals with topics such as home office, coworking spaces, etc. - some of which are also available at spo-comm and not only due to the pandemic. We are curious to see how it will develop for us. One thing is certain: We would also like to have a colleague who invites us all to work from home and have lunch on her farm!
On Monday, July 19 we engaged in a completely different topic, when Claudia Lazai and Carolin Mehnert from DATEV EG reported on “Social sustainability as a corporate strategy”. They told what priorities the company set in terms of diversity and sustainability and how these topics are conveyed to employees, for example through campaign weeks. It was particularly interesting to see what goals they set themselves and where there is still an urgent need for action, such as further promoting diversity in management positions or drawing up their own inclusion agreement. They also emphasized how important it is for managers to act as multipliers and role models at various levels by using and communicating the offers themselves. All in all, a really exciting topic from which we, as a medium-sized company, were also able to get some suggestions.
