The Digital Day England 2023 Review

Our The Digital Day England 2023 Rapporteur Supriya Dev-Purkaystha shares her key takeaways from the event.

My mind is still buzzing with the possibilities that the future holds for us all

The Marketing Society events always leave me with a mix of emotions, from stimulation and inspiration to discovery and confirmation. The Digital Day England event was no exception. We started the day with a quick networking task with the intention of meeting someone new and learning something new. It was a great way to push us to mingle, and let’s face it, networking is not everyone’s favourite task. If we’re honest, most of the time we’re looking for familiar faces in a crowd as opposed to new people to meet.

We spent the rest of the day hearing from thought leaders across the industry covering topics such as:

The importance of value exchange in networking and avoiding selling, but more importantly run a mile from ANTHONY's and sometimes the best connections are serendipitous.

We also discussed the use cases of AI and how individuals and organizations are embracing its power of scale and speed. However, there are also reactions of horror and fear of calamitous events resulting from AI. In reality, the developments in AI are being made to empower individuals to do more rather than replace people. In my session, I covered off the need for organizations embracing AI development to be intentional about why and how they intend to use it and start off with guiding principles and a framework within which they operate.

Purpose was a clear theme that ran across many sessions, with the conscious advertising network addressing the reality that diverse media is not benefiting from the Ad revenue it desperately needs due to stringent brand safety guardrails in place.

Purpose also showed up as a theme for product development. Microsoft’s 10-year digital transformation has been centred around a purpose - to empower every person and organization on the planet to do more. To achieve this goal, it is important to be client-obsessed, meet clients where they are, understand their needs and how they might evolve, and help fulfil them.

The same approach should be taken in marketing. We need to seek out our clients and show up in their world, either through influencers they follow or in video content through advertising or digital product placement or in their favourite games. It is important to do this authentically and stay true to your values. Let creators do what they do best - be creative!

The afternoon was broken up by Tech Acceleration workshops, educating us on topics such as Attention Metrics vs Viewability and Engagement. Creative first media buying and Digital Product Placement as a means for keeping products fresh, recent, and geographically relevant.

The final speaker of the day, Kamal Ahmed, moved us forward a decade, to think about Gen Alpha – the first generation born in the 21^st century and the most technologically savvy generation ever who have a deep sense of environmental and social awareness. They bring with them new challenges such as News avoidance. Content is king but authentic storytelling is the key, however, they won’t come to you, you need to show up in their world.

To continue to remain relevant, give your teams the permission to explore and create. Provide the psychological safety that allows them to bring their whole self to work and let them get creative within guardrails you are comfortable with.

The conversations that followed were just as stimulating, if not more, talking about developing products and solutions with a purpose and how the marketing strategy will follow. My mind is still buzzing with the possibilities that the future holds for us all, embrace it, it's gonna be good.