Last Week at the Vivaldi Digital Darwinism Summit

Last week, on February 11th, Vivaldi hosted our annual Digital Darwinism Summit (DDS). Together with our partners Leaders We Love, SAP and Harvard Business Review, we hosted 300 marketing executives at the glamorous “Palmengarten” in Frankfurt. The Digital Darwinism Summit kicked off the Marketing & Innovation Forum Europe. Combined, it is one of the most exclusive gatherings of marketing experts and business leaders in Central Europe.

The Vivaldi Digital Darwinism Summit provides a spotlight on the challenges and opportunities of the increasing digitalization across industries and companies. Every industry, every company and every brand feels the disruptions in customer behavior and needs to adapt fast to survive in this environment. These focal topics are what make the DDS so relevant for a growing number of participants.

Here is a snapshot of what our wonderful keynote speakers had to share:

Maggie Fox, Senior Vice President Digital Marketing at SAP

“In a B2B environment we often forget that there are humans at the other end too”

Fox spoke on the changing role of marketers and data-driven analytics in managing future customer relationships. Successfully turning data into marketing action would require a blend of different skills that span across the traditional boundaries between Marketing, Technology and Data Science. Fox’s ideal breakdown for working with data is 15% data capture, 20% data reporting, 65% data analysis. As a result, marketing has an unprecedented opportunity to drive real business value.

Joseph Gross, Allianz SE’s Head of Group Market Management

“The Digital Transformation is 80% business model transformation and 20% marketing effort.”

Gross shared very real-life insights from the Digital Transformation taking place in the insurance industry and at Allianz across the globe. One of the largest challenges in digital transformation will be the seamless integration of all processes of the insurance business model to allow for a superior customer experience. Gross explained the “Digital revolution will impact the entire value chain. We will need to turn the customer experience upside down and roll out and adapt best practice learnings – country by country.”

Dominik Dommick, Managing Director of PAYBACK

“Leverage data the smart way: Better understand omnichannel consumers, make more relevant offers and refrain from “overfishing” them”

Dommick explained that retailers’ customer relationships today are becoming very much akin to the neighborhood shops of past, only with millions of customers. The key question for PAYBACK and others is how to create value from the knowledge (data) about these customers? Dommick explained that customers today are not digital, but multichannel, across mobile, online and classic brick-and-mortars. The key is to combine all data – the online and the offline – with full transparency to create true relevance for customers.

Erich Joachimsthaler, CEO and Founder of Vivaldi Partners Group

“The power of information at the hands of consumers is what makes the world so disruptive for marketing”

Joachimsthaler aptly put it that “Digital Darwinism does not affect a few industries, but all of us.” He clearly pointed out that it is not technology that disrupts the market space, but consumers and their changing behavior. The customer relationship is the main disruptive force – for example the disruptions we observe in the automotive industry which mainly build on changing customer relationships and new service models, not on car innovations. In his presentation, he also spoke about marketing to the consumer of the future, which can be glimpsed by understanding today’s Always-On Consumer. The Always-On Consumer already comprises 48% of the adult population currently, as shown in our Always-On Consumer Study.

Further posts about the speeches with more detailed information, videos and presentations will be shared shortly. Please check this blog for future updates from our Digital Darwinism Summit team and join the conversation online at Twitter (@VivaldiPartners) and LinkedIn.