The Changemakers Impact Conference | Review | England

Reflecting on The Marketing Society 2024 Global Changemaker's Conference at the QE2 Centre in London, there were so many memorable and thought-provoking sessions that I’ve been struggling to keep my keywords to just 3.  But if pushed, they are SAUSAGES, EAST and EXPERIENCES.

With its focus on IMPACT, each of the sessions left me with many new things to test out – but for me, the highlights were:

Roisin Currie, CEO, Greggs

Who’d have thought that a truly British bakery sensation made famous for its vegan sausage roll would sell out of 1,000 gold charm bracelets featuring its most celebrated menu items in record time?  Or that a Greggs x Primark collab for loungewear would be so successful?  

This and the company’s other innovations including festival merch and a Nigella Lawson Christmas campaign tell us that consumers will give you huge permission for brand extensions if you can consistently demonstrate relevance.

Tessa Clark, Founder, Olio

Making an impact on the $1,000,000,000 food waste problem requires us all to change our consumption habits only a little.  Who knew that 1 kg of food waste is equivalent to the carbon emissions of 25,000 plastic bottles in landfill? Or that the Olio app saves carbon emissions equal to 750,000,000 car miles?

Changing consumer behaviour relies on some basic principles with the most memorable being the acronym EAST – make the change Easy, Attractive, Social and Timely.  Which reminds you of the profound influence we can have as consumers by making small changes.

As Tessa said during her talk, "It was billions of small actions that caused the climate crisis in the first place. And so by the very same logic, billions of small actions is what is going to get us out of the climate crisis."

Andrew McGuinness, Founder, Layered Reality

Having worked for years with some of the most established themed entertainment companies in LA, Cincinnati and London, I was keen to hear what Layered Reality does to create experiences that are impactful and memorable.

My favourite insight was Andrew’s 5 key elements that create impactful, memorable experiences: multi-sensory engagement, intensity of the experience, those that are shared, those which forge an emotional connection, one with unfamiliar or new elements and those that connect with us emotionally.  Key to delivering these are not only the venues that can provide the right spaces to bring these elements to life, but also having the tech, theatre and physical sensations in place.

Besides the company’s Elvis Evolution at the Excel Centre in east London, we can look forward to the Jetpack experience to fly over our cities of choice.

Which got me thinking: if The Marketing Society were to adopt these 5 principles, how would they look?  In fact, they’d be pretty much like this year’s Changemaker's Conference.

Authored by Allyson Stewart-Allen Chief Executive International Marketing Partners
Published on 27 November 2024