Even with current travel restrictions in place, we were able to sail into previously unchartered territory last week. From the comfort of our own home offices, we traveled to a bright, sunny city in the digital world for Episerver’s first virtual user conference – Ascend B2B 2020.
For two days, on August 25th and 26th, we navigated through a virtual expo center, complete with an auditorium where speaking sessions and workshops were held, a lounge, a help desk, and an exhibit hall, where our booth was set up and primed for visitors.
Of the 1,200 registrants, Digizuite’s team had about ten people attending, and between everyone, we were able to represent our booth and attend some enlightening discussions.
Below are our three key takeaways from Ascend B2B 2020.
1) Now is the time to commit fully to digital collaboration
While we missed everything that comes with being a part of in-person events, our experience at Ascend B2B 2020 showed us just how effective digital collaboration is.
The Episerver team used a digital platform to create an attractive, intuitive, space for everyone. It was simple for attendees to navigate through all options for collaboration: there was a general chat room, and then three chat rooms catered to specific industry topics – financial services, hi-tech, and manufacturing and distribution – for professionals to share focused insights much like they would at networking events that take place during traditional conferences.
Bottom line: The Episerver virtual conference provided avenues for attendees to have every kind of interaction imaginable. In the absence of physical events, virtual conferences definitely provide important opportunities for conversations that may not happen outside of an official gathering.
Digital collaboration is the way of the present and future, so it is more important than ever for organizations to invest in platforms that facilitate virtual collaboration at every level – just like Episerver did to make Ascend B2B 2020 happen.
The Digizuite virtual booth
Displaying our brand at Episerver Ascend B2B 2020 as a bronze sponsor
2) The world of B2B sales has changed for good
It’s time to stop thinking about this digital, remote way of life as temporary. Digital alternatives to the in-person way of doing things (virtual conferences, for example) are doing more than just keeping us productive as we wait to resume old routines.
Going into 2020, the world was already trending toward full-on digital, and COVID-19 likely just got us there more quickly. According to Forrester Research analyst Mary Shea during her presentation “The Changing Nature of B2B Sales,” the COVID-19 era will forever change how selling and buying happens for most businesses. The point in time we are in right now, she claims is a “watershed moment,” predicting that about 80% of B2B sales will be executed digitally, even when the crisis period is over.
Also in these times, Millennials are becoming a significant part of the workforce, projected to make up more than 50% of it within the year. And, this is a generation that expects to have fluid, personalized customer experiences online. They also expect everyone they converse with to be on the same page so that they aren’t repeating information themselves or listening to anything redundant themselves.
In order to be successful, business leaders must structure their revenue teams – marketers, inside and field sales representatives, customer success managers, and so on – so that they can reach every decision-maker digitally. It is also important to provide personalized customer experiences to every individual in the decision-making process.
Building a sales team that is equipped for success in today’s work involves focusing heavily on digital interactions. It involves empowering everyone on the revenue team with access to sales technology, so that they all have visibility into the sales cycle and the customer journey for everyone. It means building out digital customer experiences with personalized, relevant assets and information.
Really, it all boils down to embracing this next phase of digital transformation and taking advantage of all it has to offer to become fully customer-centric.
3) Business contingency plans require modern technology
Business contingency plans are like fire escape plans: you won’t know how effective they are (or realize how much you need one) until the time comes to enact them. And, COVID-19 gave us all a chance to see if our organizations had good business continuity plans in place.
Both panelists in the discussion, ‘‘How Financial Services Companies Serve Customers in Difficult Times” – Maria Mompoint, marketing technology executive leader for Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and Twilla Duvall, Central Bancompany’s Vice President of Internet Services – emphasized the importance of getting up and running online right away following an emergency situation (like COVID-19).
Financial services companies had just days before they had to be operating completely online, not only with their existing operations, but they also had to be fully functional online with new initiatives for their clients. They had to create completely virtual processes so that droves of people could secure a number of different loans through a number of different federal programs. And, in order to do so, these financial institutions needed to be able to create secure website forms for online applications and other client interactions.
Even in a crisis, Maria Mompoint noted the importance of prioritizing and investing in the customer experience. And, the only way to provide customers with the convenient, satisfying experiences they need is by using modern technologies.
Still, even as quickly and efficiently as Silicon Valley Bank executed their business continuity plan in response to the global pandemic, Mompoint said it was “all hands on deck,” and that her team had to rely on some manual processes to make everything happen, adding that “there is always room for improvement.” In other words, there is no room for settling when it comes to procuring the technology solutions that make it possible for your organization to be fully operational in any scenario.
In summary, Ascend B2B 2020 drove home the point that digital strategies provide us with invaluable opportunities to stay connected and to grow and future-proof so many industries and businesses.
Still, it must be said, that as productive as our first ever virtual conference experience was, we craved the energy, the networking dinners, the handshakes, the high-fives, and everything else that comes with being a part of in-person industry events.
We were happy to chat with some of our valued customers and partners through Ascend B2B’s chat features, but, there would have been nothing better than seeing them live, or clinking glasses with them to toast shared success. And, one member of our team said he especially missed tearing up the dance floor the way he would alongside some of his favorite customers at a typical annual Episerver conference.
For the time being, there is no virtual alternative to the dance floor. So, until there is a way to tango in cyberspace, we will continue to empower businesses as they execute their digital strategies. It will always be the Digizuite way to elevate the branding and marketing processes of our customers so that they will thrive in this post-pandemic digital world.
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