Caroline Watson | EMEAR Event Manager
April 23 – 27 saw Cisco at Hannover Messe in Hannover, Germany. This event is the world’s largest industrial fair with over 230,000 visitors and over 6,500 companies exhibiting.
Cisco were in a prime location in Hall 6, where we showed the manufacturing and IoT world that we have arrived and are a force to be reckoned with!
Cisco’s impressive presence in Hannover was only possible with the close cooperation and dedication of the events, engineering, sales and marketing teams. It was truly a group effort to pull this huge show together. Check out our final wrap-up video below which summarizes the event or the event Jive site for more info.
Alpa Mehta | Customer Advocacy Marketing Manager
Check out what’s been happening in the world of customer advocacy!
Cisco Connect Croatia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Finland, Denmark, Russia and Hannover Messe, Amsterdam - it’s been an event-full quarter! Valerio has recruited 651 advocates into The Gateway and we have had 4,457 acts of advocacy in total, across all these events. Next stop, Zurich on 30 May - stay tuned!
Customer concerns to building a stronger security culture Carolina Marino Sargeant, EMEAR Marketing recently ran an open forum with Cisco customers, listening to their concerns about how to build a stronger security culture in their organisations. Check out the learnings!
- NEW University Of Northampton - Teaser - Innalabs - Danieli - Ala - WorldHotel Wings - Radius payment solutions - Inspiring user generated Upshot stories await. Why not include these in your campaigns? Video stories in pipeline: - Natural History Museum (UK) - Web Summit (Portugal) - University Of South Wales (UK) - Italtel (Italy) - IInnelabs (Ireland) - National Trust (UK).
We are really excited to be launching The Gateway in America at Cisco Live, US, 10-14 June! Preparations are in full swing - The Gateway will be situated in the World of Solutions and we will have a specific ‘Road To Cisco Live’ Experience for our US customers. Our EMEAR Gatewayers are excited too – we have some eager Gatewayers waiting to buddy up with new advocates joining at CLUS to share their experiences and welcome them on-board The Gateway.
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram to keep up with the latest from Customer Advocacy. Questions? Contact the team
What our advocates are saying
Thank you to you… The Gateway is very interesting. To be honest, I’m learning new things on a daily basis and the way you present the challenges is very stimulating. Good job Mariella Mancini | Data Analyst at T.T. Tecnosistemi spa, Italy
Tejal Patel | Digital Marketing Director
Summary & key take-aways – March 21st 2018
This is the first time we got the Engagement Manager community together since the roles were changed. It was a great opportunity to come together and reenergise as one team, realign on our priorities and remind ourselves that we are only half way through in our digital transformation journey. We also used our time together to go more in-depth on some of our key marketing focus areas, such as optimisation, SEO, brand and paid media. We got some great inputs and ideas, many of which are already being implemented, such as working closer with partners to leverage paid media better, optimisation strategy for SMB and accelerating our SEO efforts in countries. To close off our time together, we had some guest speakers who inspired us and left us with food for thought. Especially from Paul Boag, a User Experience specialist blogger. He reminded us that before doing anything to change a digital experience, we should test first. Which links nicely to our increasing efforts around testing & optimisation. More news on the progress with that in the next issue.
Sekna Khanafer, Country Marketing Manager, East Region Middle East
Cisco recently participated in two leading IT exhibitions in the Middle East to establish Cisco as an IT leader in the region and showcase our latest solutions in Oman and the UAE.
As the lead sponsor of COMEX 2018, Cisco supported Oman’s efforts to transition to a knowledge-based economy in line with economic Vision 2020 and Vision 2040. Cisco showcased its key architectures and technology solutions including its Enterprise Networking, Cybersecurity, Digital Network Architecture, Data Center and Cloud, Collaboration, IoT and Digitization for Smart Cities
We also had a speaking slot at the Smart Cities and Industry 4.0 on the topic of how businesses can ‘Unlock the Value of Data with Cisco IoT’.
“As part of its Vision 2020, the Omani government is working towards a sustainable and diversified economy, with a focus on driving digital initiatives that improve quality of life, citizen services and business outcomes” | Ali Al Lawati, General Manager, Oman, Cisco Middle East.
Cisco also participated at the Gulf Information Security Expo & Conference, GISEC in Dubai.
Cisco highlighted how attackers are evolving their approaches to exploit new technology security gaps under the theme ‘Security Above Everything’. As a Platinum Partner, Cisco addressed why securing networks and IT infrastructure is mission-critical for businesses to succeed today and build for tomorrow and discussed the evolving role of security.
“Today, nearly half of all legitimate security alerts are not remediated, and it’s clear that a more cohesive approach is required. Cisco’s deep and broad view of threat data across endpoint, network and cloud, through email, web, and applications means that we know more about what is trying to attack our customers and therefore how to stop it from succeeding.” Scott Manson, Cybersecurity Lead, Middle East & Africa.
Emma Weston | Engagement Manager, Middle East Region Gulben Kovanlik Argeso | Country Marketing Manager, Turkey
Cisco recently launched its Innovation Center in the heart of Istanbul, Turkey.
The latest addition to Cisco’s global network of Innovation Centers will serve as a hub for open, creative collaboration and is designed to accelerate the pace of digital innovation in Turkey.
The Cisco Istanbul Innovation Center will focus on innovations in country digitization and IoT solutions for logistics, transportation and manufacturing. It will bring together customers, partners, startups, government entities, and the academic community in a vibrant innovation ecosystem.
Establishing the Innovation Center in Istanbul is a testament not only to the city’s strategic status as a dynamic metropolis and a bridge between Asia and Europe, but also to Cisco’s confidence in the immense potential that the Turkish technology landscape holds.
The center is located in Istanbul Technical University's (İTÜ) Arı Teknokent, a leading Turkish technology park affiliated with the university. It includes solution demonstration areas, research labs, flexible collaboration spaces, and software and hardware development spaces, where new ideas and concepts can be co-created and tested.
Rachel Henley | Network Buyer UKI Audience Expert & EMEAR Content Lead Ian Chard | EMEAR Data Centre Audience Expert
Following the excellent success of IP Expo London, the team went regional and duplicated efforts in Manchester. It was a great cross-architectural effort between the UK data centre and enterprise networking teams.
With 270 potential leads and 120 attendees to our two keynote sessions it was a good win for the UK team.
Cécile Bellarosa | Audience Security Expert, France
On April 10th, the Security marketing team in France organized a first-of-its-kind event: the Cybersecurity Day. The idea was to invite around 50 CISOs customers to talk about cybersecurity’s future and share insights on the current landscape of threats with distinguished speakers from Cisco and the French Government.
Location: We picked something original, yet fancy and accessible: the new Museum of Perfume, based in the center of Paris.
Conference Program: It was a full day event with many speaking slots embedding those main themes: - The Cisco DNA vision - Talos and the story of threats in the last decades with a vision on next challenges - Building an efficient partenrhsip between private and public organisations to defend our country and companies.
Demos: We had 6 demo pods to present Cisco Solutions ‘AMP, Umbrella, Stealthwatch) and 3 partners (Thales – Threat Intelligence, Sentryo – IoT security, Radware – Cloud WAF for applications security)
Attendance: Full room, with over 50 customers attending.
Learnings: - Customers are eager to learn more about cybersecurity and they value direct interactions with security experts in such a framework. The size of the event made it personal and impactfull - Crossed Insights from public and defense sectors were much appreciated - Live sketching animation has been much appreciated by our attendees. The artist was capturing the best moment of the day.
Results: - Satisfaction: 90% of attendees were satisfied from our satisfaction survey - Most appreciated speakers have been : Martin Lee from Talos and the - - Roundtable speakers mixing CIO of the Ministere des Armées, Philippe Roggeband, Fayce Mouhieddine and Mapwize CEO (start-up in geolocalisation). - Leads : 12 MQLs for a total opportunity amount of $685k
Diane Amplett | UKI Public Sector Audience Expert
Embracing the digital opportunity for UK museums Digital is transforming culture at a rate we’ve never seen before, resulting in an interesting time for the UK’s 2,500 museums as technology and tradition collide and institutions adapt to the expectations of today’s digital-savvy consumer. Cisco supports the UK museums sector through our Country Digital Acceleration programme. Last week, we celebrated their work - which is of huge historic, cultural and scientific value – alongside our vision of the digital museum, by launching our latest white paper at the Natural History Museum (NHM) in London.
Embracing digital Representatives from the UK’s libraries, theatres and museums and Cisco team members mingled, while our customers NHM and the Science Museum Group explained how they have embraced digital - and are already experiencing the benefits. Later in the evening, guests had the opportunity to see digital in action as part of a series of demonstrations. And if that wasn’t enough, they were also lucky enough to take part in a special viewing of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition exhibition.
Safeguarding our heritage through technology Digital offers benefits to museums and other cultural institutions across four main areas: 1) Collections 2) Sustainable growth 3) Income generation 4) Operational excellence Museums & Culture – where tradition meets technology UK page Recent press available here
Integrating mobile experiences with CRM is massive game changer for us. Optimising a visitor’s digital content for their interests changes everything and that’s for the long-term rather than just one-off visits. Dave Thomas, Chief Information and Technology Officer - Natural History Museum
Sandip Amlani | Cisco.com Manager
Back in March, I attended CXL Live in Austin, Texas – one of the CRO industry’s biggest events for CRO practitioners. The three day even, set in a beautiful resort just outside the city, was attended by 400 fellow growth and conversion specialists from around the world, and provided a great networking opportunity to share ideas, get practical advice and learn from some of the best in the business.
One of the great things about this event was how well it was organised (they’d clearly optimised the event year on year!);
Firstly, it was a single track event, so delegates could see all speakers - all of which were excellent – with each one sharing their own experiences, from building an optimisation culture in their company to avoiding statistical pitfalls when A/B testing.
Secondly, they had someone taking notes throughout the three days, so we could just sit back and absorb what was being said.
Thirdly, having everyone together all in the same place outside the distractions of a city was a great idea; it really allowed us to learn, work and socialise together (Kayaking on the Colorado river was a highlight!). This created a real bond between everyone and provided a great platform for networking and making new friends.
You can see the notes, the slides from each speaker, and some pictures from the event here
Nicolina Stefansson | Events Manager, Sweden
Security Everywhere is a roadshow event visiting three Swedish cities in three days. Delivering a full day of security sessions for a total of 232 attendees, both customers and partners. This is the third year we do this roadshow and it’s grown and evolved to be one of the best events in its class. This is how we’ve done that:
The goal was to be the leading security company in Sweden and to do that we had to listen to what our customers wanted. We went through last year’s evaluation for Security Everywhere and it showed that our attendees wanted a better coherence between the sessions. We took this to our hearts and the Swedish security team designed the session as a customer journey, which made all our different solutions come together in a seamless way.
This resulted in numerous of positive feedback on site saying that this was the best security event they ever attended and also in the post event evaluation where the overall score was 4,4 out of 5.
Feedback from the evaluation: “Very good. All parts are related, including processes and education, to increase the security budget. Now, I think Cisco is a real security company, maybe the leading security company.”
David Jux | Customer Interaction Centre Strategy and Execution Global Customer Marketing Engagement
Last month John Donavon and Jeremy Bevan arrived in Dublin to visit the new EMEAR Customer Interaction Centre (CIC) , launched earlier this quarter, to meet the Marketing Frontline team!
What is special and exciting about this CIC is that it goes way beyond Marketing!
For the 1st time the Marketing qualification team and SMB sellers are sharing the same location, soon processes and in time we hope many of the same platforms as we have set up one Sales and Marketing Team in a joint operation with the SMB sellers.
During H2 we will be looking to build on the good work already done and continuously look to adapt and improve our processes, to ultimately create an operation that provides a seamless experience in our conversations with our customers. This is basically a warm lead hand-off and an efficient routing between the teams, so no customer is left behind.
The end result for :
Halvor Garaas | Next Gen Analytics, Global Customer Marketing Engagement.
Germany, with historical roots and a culture of amazing industrialization and engineering, is also a major transformation hub and according to this report, currently sits at number 2 in the Automation Readiness Index taken across the globe.
So, the Munich Data Festival, in April, was a perfect setting for over 200 of the best technical minds across a variety of industries to hear from thought leaders working on the cusp between technology and business.
The Festival is a gathering of like-minded peers to share insights, challenges, and learnings on topics of Data Science, Machine Learning, Predictive analytics, and Decision automation to name a few. The presenters came from several major brands like Volkswagen group, Lufthansa, BMW, Zalando, Lilly, Allianz, Adidas, Telefonica and of course Cisco.
Next Best Action (NBA) generated huge interest and put Cisco on the map in Europe for innovative uses of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning in Marketing, as we explained how NBA helps us find the right time and moment, to provide the right information to our customers, when they might want to buy or prefer Cisco!
What did we learn at the festival?
NBA is a truly innovative concept with a rock-solid story of marketing automation and decision making which has never been done before in the industry at the scale Cisco is up against. There is no clear roadmap to success, but it starts at the executive level to take the risk to build future rewards, that may challenge and shift the way we think and work.
Why should you care?
Have confidence that when you help test NBA, you are part of building a cutting-edge product that will make yours and others work better and easier. There might be pitfalls on the way, but the long-term benefits are unquestionable.
The biggest risk is to not take any.
