What’s Happening:
The second edition of Advertising Week APAC (#AWAPAC) took place July 29 through August 1, 2019 in Sydney, Australia. The conference is aimed at marketing, advertising, media, technology and design professionals, bringing business and creative perspectives on key business trends and issues that shape today’s global industry, along with networking and socializing.
Why it Matters:
With more than 75 seminars and workshops, the content at #AWAPAC goes deep into topics, trends and of-the-moment issues that are critical to the Advertising Week audience. This year’s seminars covered the topics of: Storytelling, Data, Innovation, Content, Brand Purpose and Media & Entertainment. The AWLearn Workshop Stage also offered an intimate learning experience, including interaction with the speakers for key insights into creativity, technology and culture that attendees could take back to their workplaces.
Digging Deeper:
Some of the highlights included:
- Hundreds of attendees gathered for the Thursday morning fireside keynote chat with Antonio Lucio, Chief Marketing Officer at Facebook — considered by many to be one of the most challenging marketing roles in adland. Lucio shared his challenges, including a battle with depression in a high-pressure job, saying that he recognized that he needed to slow down and ask for help.
- Columnist and marketing professor Mark Ritson talked about effective branding, analyzing 6,000 Effie-winning campaigns over the last 50 years. Findings that resonated with the audience included: Research leads to more successful campaigns; longer campaigns outperform shorter ones; and more channels lead to better ROI in campaigns.
- Another big hit was the “Great Minds Think Unalike” presentation about positive social impact. Craig Foster of Human Rights Watch Australia Committee and Maya Hari, VP of APAC at Twitter, spoke about championing a cause for good on Twitter. The #SaveHakeem campaign swelled to a global movement, breaking geographic boundaries to trend in 81 cities around the world.
- Geoffrey Colon, head of Microsoft Advertising Brand Studio at Microsoft Advertising, spoke about emotional intelligence. Banning averages, understanding different types of intelligence and studying retro trends can help brands future proof themselves. “We’re missing a lot of marginalized groups and this is important in terms of understanding how personalization works,” he said.
- For the first time ever in Australia, LinkedIn managing director Matt Tindale revealed new econometric research on how best to drive growth in B2B. In a presentation called “The Long and the Short of It: Driving Growth for B2B Marketers,” Tindale spoke on the key principles driving growth, did some myth-busting in the argument around Brand vs Demand, and shared how to balance the budget in a B2B vs B2C environment.
The Bottom Line:
With some of the heaviest hitters in advertising and marketing, #AWAPAC is one of the most influential conferences in the industry. In future events Advertising Week plans to add AI, Mixed Reality, Voice Technology, and blurred business models to the topics under discussion.
