Marketing Conference Review: Hoy es Marketing Valencia (HEM)

In Valencia, marketers get few chances to attend conference events catered directly to marketers. Yesterday, the "Palace of Congresses" was packed with eager marketers for the marketing conference Hoy es Marketing.

The conference had a basic format. Eight speakers, sponsor booths, and a complementary cocktail afterward. No Q&A and no interactive function, which was a huge downer, but it was offset by great speakers and a wealth of information.

Javier Rovira started the show with a presentation of his latest read, "Consumering", which I found very similar to other publications by other American authors I wont name here. However, Mr. Rovira has his own way of explaining how marketing has changed from product-centric planning to customer-centric planning. He explained that marketing is about generating demand from your clients needs. He found that there are 4 elements to Consumering - Identity, Performance, Intensity, and Freedom. These 4 elements relate respectively to branding, need marketing, experience marketing, and marketing FOR the consumer. The latter carries the most importance, hence the name of the book. You can find Javier's publication here and here. I didn't take interest in buying the book, but if you would like a good read from a Spanish marketing stand-point, I would imagine that this would be a great choice.

After Javier Rovira's presentation, HEM took it up a notch and presented Google's marketing manager for Spain and Portugal, Laurence Fontinoy, BAM! With a strong accent that I couldn't place (by the name I would say French) and true to google culture, she gave us some real, data driven information with Youtube videos and applicable examples. She started off by showing us some relevant numbers like ..."51% of Spaniards have wide band Internet"..."22 million Spaniards online"..."Spain is the 2nd largest community using Blogger"...Cool stuff! Then she got into the first part of her presentation which showed the audience how companies are partnering with google and youtube to make cutting edge stuff. She exhibited some of google's work with the Prado museum as seen here. Also, she presented google's work with the "Orquesta Sinfonia" and "Mass Communication to One" (I didn't have time to jot down the links, sorry). The examples led to the conclusion that branding has been reinvented, implying digital marketing's role in the branding function. So with some good examples and the audience captured, Ms. Fontinoy began to talk about some solutions that google offers in the economic crisis. She gave us a great comparison of the Euribor and Web search, saying that if web search was the Euribor, we would have an increase of 170%. A smile came to my face as she hit home pointing to an impressive line graph showing the 170% increase in the last YEAR!!! If that doesn't get digital marketers in Spain excited, I don't know what will. She said that within this increase, trends show that eco-friendly searches are the most prominent. She used this example to tell the audience that it is time to redirect marketing online and ask yourself, "What are my users looking for?". Then build agility and efficiency around that vision using some of Google's tools like adwords and analytics. She put the whole digital movement into perspective. She also named some factors of success used in the Prado example, but I think they apply to virtually any project: innovation, access to information, speed, partnership, and public relations. Great presentation by Ms. Fontinoy!

Moving on, the conference then went through a very dull moment with presentations by Director of Aviva, Jose Fuentes Soriano and Telefonica's Director of Client Relations, Jesus Angel Pastor. I wont say too much about these particular presentations because they didn't present information very relevant to the audience. Mr. Fuentes Soriano spoke about his business and how its structured to position itself as a leader in the "bancaseguros" industry. I almost fell asleep. Mr. Pastor gave more data and information for the audience but related that data to Telefonica's products. I do have to say that Telefonica is offering something much different from other telecommunications companies, check it out here. Its sort of a customized communications pack for small business owners, an all-in-one bill. Not bad.

I managed to stay awake and alert for a true rock star in the Spanish market, Pedro Valdes, Director of Daemon Quest Spain. This was a no-BS kind of guy. Straight to the point and vulgar. Yeah, he slipped some questionable comments during the presentation (eg. "currar como un negro" or "como cono...?") but gave the audience the best information of the afternoon. He went through his 5 rules of survival. I'll go ahead and jot them out here.

1. Create new sources of income
2. Specialize in few segments
3. Reinvent the advertising budget
4. Reinvent the buying experience
5. Create an online strategy
6. Sell!

He went through each rule with very creative examples such as showing us how a outdoor equipment store has reinvented the buying experience by turning the store into a test area, letting customers test jackets with falling water and test sleeping bags on blocks of ice. He made his presentation super relevant and entertaining. He didn't sell Daemon Quest. He just showed that he was the bad-ass in the marketplace and proved himself a thought leader in the industry. Meanwhile he related back to a basic equation in marketing: clients+innovation=growth. Cool presentation Mr. Valdes pero no hace falta los comentarios tan chulos.

We had a short break, then we were back in the conference hall for the last part of the afternoon focused on experience marketing. This portion of the conference was opened up by a charismatic professor from ESIC, Jose Luis Pastor. He showed us how marketing the customer's experiences makes an invisible difference. He used examples such as Haagen Das' "Peace" icecream in Libano, Nespresso's elegant coffee experience, and Nike/Apple collaboration using software in shoes. It was a motivating segment that came to the conclusion that brands will end up telling the story of the product, transforming the brand into an experience.

The ESIC professor set up Vueling's CMO, Vicenc Marti. For those who aren't familiar with Vueling, you could compare it to Southwest Airline's culture. Vueling is an airline with an experience and Mr. Marti has help position Vueling as one of the top airline companies in Europe. He spoke extremely fast and provided an impossible amount of information about the company and its innovative marketing system. He showed us examples of how Vueling creates experiences in a boring flight by hiring world-class DJs for in flight parties to Ibiza, or in flight quartet concerts, or in flight fashion shows. Vueling has spend lots of money in using customer experiences to positioning its brand. Mr. Marti finished up his presentation by saying that the most important aspect of branding Vueling today is managing the efficient balance using online and offline channels. Even though Marti's presentation was focused around Vueling instead of the audience, he made his presentation relevant to experience marketing for all of us to learn from.

The last speaker of the day was a wine marketer, Javier Gandia, the marketing director for Bodegas Gandia. He showed us how his corporate communication plan is based in experiences. He relates his family wines to art, dining out, sporting events, and the movie theater - all very common experiences. His wines relate to each experience by positioning different product lines to the experience. A very interesting and creative approach to marketing a winery. He even told us that the industry shunned his ideas a few year ago, but now his work has paid off and reaps success in almost all product lines. Thanks to Mr. Gandia's work, Valencian wines are now greatly respected in the wine industry.

The conference concluded with a few glasses of wine and food over a light conversation between old colleagues. I greatly enjoyed the afternoon. If you were at the event and would like to share your experience, leave a comment!