Interactions EMEA 2019 – from the Outside-In

Event planning is an amazing career path filled with numerous ups and downs. It is something that not everyone can handle; this job definitely puts your organisation, time management, creativity and problem-solving skills to the test! The ups and downs and the adrenaline rushes are something that all event professionals, like me, LOVE!

As an events manager it is always strange being in the shoes of the person attending the events, rather than managing them. If you have done this, you’ll know that you experience an event with two personalities - you notice the details, planning and the all the effort that makes the event run smoothly and seamlessly, but at the same time enjoy the day, content and networking… as well as the complimentary glass of wine without the guilt! I experienced this when I attended Interactions EMEA 2019 #NICEi19London. Before joining NICE, I wanted to attend their customer conference to see how NICE ‘does’ hosted events.

Interactions EMEA 2019 offered two days of networking surrounded by leading technologies. Set in The O2 Cineworld in Greenwich, it certainly did provide the audience with something to talk about! Huge digital screens, partners showcasing their offerings, NICE demos, a whopping 66 breakout sessions, Customer Excellence award ceremony and a keynote from an inspirational sensation – and British icon - Stephen Fry.  

I wasn’t disappointed - here’s a few thoughts…

Content

At each stage of an event, content marketing is essential. This includes pre & post-event marketing to drive home the message, whether that's email, social or physical - like the marketing on the black taxis - each touch point is important. During the event, the content serves a specific purpose, the goal of the organisers is to keep the audience tuned in, to simplify connection building and to provide comprehensive directions in real time. Keeping conversations alive around your event, long after it has happened, is a true art.

Event presentations can feel overwhelming as you juggle the story, speaker’s personality, audience perspective, screen, lighting, timing and the list goes on...

The best thing is, NICE doesn’t need to stand on stage and preach how good their software is. As a leader in their sector, NICE had over 38 customers, partners and analysts presenting on stage and providing testimonials to tell you why they are the best.

Customers, such as Metro Bank, HM Revenue & Customs, MoneyGram, Orange, Sitel, Teleperformance, Thomas Cook and BT, shared their stories about how they are evolving their businesses, delivering impactful results and most importantly about how they are making their end-customers' experiences richer by embracing cloud technology and analytics, compliance and AI solutions.

Customer stories are the best way for guests to understand the challenges other businesses are facing, understand how other organisations are using the software to solve those problems and engage to take that experience on board.

Tech Tech and More Tech...

The event industry is fast paced and as a tech company we are always looking for new ways to engage and wow attendees.

NICE hosted a one-day partner and two-day customer event at the O2 Cineworld, London, an unconventional events space with a huge and unique branding opportunity. I really appreciated the digital branding – see for yourself!

The plenary session boasted Dolby sound and Barco laser projection technology, which added to the cinema’s already impressive innovation-packed line-up including a wall-to-wall, ceiling high Superscreen and 270° viewing experience – the largest screen in the UK.

Connections

Interacting with people is essential for my role and something that I completely adore! I believe communication and conversation solve most problems. Meeting new and interesting people and creating connections is something that I love, whether it is between attendees, colleagues or in my personal life.

Interactions brings together the biggest brands globally for honest discussions around digital transformation and revolutionising customer engagement. With a dramatic increase in attendees from 2018 there were many new faces attending the show. Not everyone finds networking and talking to new people easy. This is a huge challenge that you need to overcome when planning an event and Interactions did this very well. The Solutions Showcase provided the perfect environment to do both whilst discovering the latest solutions via demos and engaging with solutions experts!

In addition they took a fantastic feature of their technology and brought it to life. AI-powered smart routing pairs customers with agents best equipped to handle their personality style, resulting in more productive and positive call outcomes. Predictive Behavioural Routing is proven to provide improved business outcomes, and at the event, guests had the opportunity to use one of twelve on-site kiosks to complete a personality survey.

After completing the survey they can take a coloured wrist band indicating their personality type, a great ice breaker during networking sessions.

Creativity

As an event manager, you are the one in charge of creating a vision and making it real. You have to brainstorm and strategise on how the event will be brought to life in the best possible way. It takes a lot of work, energy and creativity to think and conceive these ideas. I find this one of the best parts of the job!

You need to make sure the events are fun, interactive and entertaining, whilst still getting the message across.

This was not only achieved with the branding and demos, but Interactions also offered an array of activities including an executive dinner, partner day, VIP lounge, photo booth, popcorn (it is a cinema after all) and cinematic icon impersonators to build on the Cinematic theme. 

Conclusion

As an event manager, you are constantly working at bringing events to life. You feel a immense satisfaction when an event is successfully completed. The sense of pride you feel when you reflect on all the challenges that went through to attain the objectives and expectations, is incredibly rewarding. Interactions EMEA 2019 is certainly something for the team to feel proud about.

It looks like I have my work cut out to live up to the success of this event and it's a challenge I am eager to accept. See you at Interactions 2020!

Learn More:

Highlight video is coming soon!

Register your interest for 2020 here: https://www.nice.com/Interactions2019London/index.html

Find out how NICE can orchestrate all of your channels to provide a consistent customer experience: https://www.nice.com/

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