Teradata PARTNERS Conference
Challenge
Throwing a massive business conference with thousands of attendees isn’t an endeavor for the faint of heart, but it’s a project that we at Wilson tackle every year for our client, Teradata. After running the conference for many years, Teradata sought to expand its core event audience in 2012. The event had traditionally served the technical and data professional set for many years. But the organization saw an opportunity to draw a more general business audience. What they needed was a creative partner who could make that happen. An agency like Wilson!
Solution
We collaborated with Teradata to develop, plan, build and run the Teradata PARTNERS Conference with a fresh angle for business audiences. This included creating a fresh face for the conference with new creative messaging, which we then deployed via digital, social, and email marketing channels. We also handle site management, signage, and theme development. Today, the conference brings together thousands of leaders and practitioners in the technology and business space at a number of different venues across the United States. To grow the event’s audience, we engaged in rigorous research into successful conferences across the country. We brought back what we learned and engaged our creative team to create powerful new visuals and themes that worked for multiple audiences, as well as develop new messaging that would appeal to business, data, and technical professionals. Theme Creation Creating a conference theme unifies the overall purpose and direction of corporate events. Each year, our team examines industry trends, pores over conference programming, and works with the Teradata team to craft a compelling message, look, and feel to the event. MARKETING CAMPAIGN One of our goals is to increase conference attendance year-over-year, in particular among business professionals. To achieve this, we create powerful, engaging communications for target attendees for the Teradata PARTNERS Conference. This involves the creation of segmented email and direct mail campaigns, a robust website, video and multimedia content, and more. SIGNAGE PLANNING AND DESIGN Event signage is key to reinforcing conference messages and establishing the look and feel of the event in the context of the venue. We develop the year’s theme into creative messages for signage types ranging from elevator wraps and badge holders to banners and booth graphics. INTERACTIVE DISPLAYS AND EXPERIENTIAL ENVIRONMENTS The conference Buzz Lounge is a space created for attendees to sit back, relax, and interact with new technology. From VR racing games and touch screen games to personalized RFID experiences and digital portraits, we build new and exciting experiences every year using innovative technology. WEBSITE DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT Our team establishes a fresh digital presence for the conference each year at partners.teradata.com. We handle design, development, and site maintenance, as well as social media integration and continuous updates leading to and during the event. ONSITE PROJECT MANAGEMENT We provide onsite project management services to ensure the entire event runs smoothly from start to finish. VIRTUAL CONFERENCE Serving remote conference audiences through digital platforms has become an integral part of planning cutting-edge events. We developed a virtual conference for PARTNERS, which had over 1,000 attendees in 2016 alone. We curate the programming, identify interviewees, film segments, and provide project management services to ensure the virtual conference is hosted and delivered successfully. EXECUTIVE FORUM Our client needed to connect with movers and shakers in the business, big data, and tech communities. We understood that often the decision makers they wanted to reach were C-suite level executives and their direct reports. This audience is highly differentiated from general conference goers. That’s why we created the Teradata Executive Forum, a one-day event held in concert with the PARTNERS conference, which has been designed and developed with content and creative messages specifically for this audience.
Results
Since 2012, attendance at the Teradata PARTNERS Conference has grown, on average, by over 60%. Website impressions have skyrocketed. The conference’s social media presence is now established on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram, with steady year-over-year growth in followers, engagement and impressions. In 2016 the conference generating 46M+ social impressions overall and reached approximately 3M people through social channels during the conference.
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