The third edition of Magneds Sessions was based entirely around Wally. The world-famous children’s book character symbolizes consumers today: unique, always on the move, and very hard to reach. Where is Wally and – not unimportantly – how do you engage him with your brand? Magneds promised their invited customers and partners to provide an answer to that very question.
A beautiful room in the sun-drenched Restaurant Eve (Tilburg) was the perfect setting for a session that was filled with inspiration, experience and dialogue. Under the guidance of host Wilco de Bie, the guests were introduced to four speakers, and were able to experience different applications of Magneds’ technique with different ‘customer-experiences’ from companies such as Texaco, FrieslandCamping and Heineken.
After a warm welcome and an exciting kick-off by Wilco de Bie, first speaker Jurgen Swaans (CEO Magneds) starts the day with a brief introduction on the history of Magneds and lessons on successfully activating the consumer. Special attention was given to data collection, GDPR legislation and handling personal data carefully (safety first!). But everything starts with identification. Only when you know who a person is, or by learning to know someone, you will learn what you can do for them. Only then you will know how to move (individual) consumers.
Second speaker Koen van Beurden, CRM manager Texaco BENELUX, endorses this statement. In their previous loyalty programme, Texaco Rocks, ‘Wally’ remained a stranger. But with their new loyalty programme, Texaco Stars, the brand knows who they’re dealing with. And it’s paying off: the amount of active participants is on the rise, campaign results are better than ever and collected data leads to insights that are beneficial to the entire business. A business that, according to Koen, has been about more than just oil for some time now.
What followed was a special marketing lecture delivered by Bram Alkema, also known as the Seth Godin of The Low Countries. His number one advice? Be the first to do something, for example, the first to digitalise consumers and all their touchpoints, and loyalty will follow automatically. Through different marketing models, he explains why the formula of Magneds is so effective. He even suggests that the formula could be applied to a wider field than just consumers. For human beings are more than that. The audience had the honour to put this theory into practice right away. Who is able to come up with a new loyalty concept in a short time, that isn’t focussed on consumers? Creative ideas were literally tossed around with the Catchbox (a microphone).
Finally, Trend watcher Sander Duivestein uses appealing examples to take us on a journey through time. We can’t ignore him: technological innovation goes faster than light, and possibilities seem unlimited. And the consumers? They can barely keep up. Fortunately there is one group of the population who can keep up: children. Therefore, Bram’s aforementioned proposal to invite a child to every board meeting in the business sector might not be such a bad idea at all.
Host Wilco de Bie concludes by saying that with the right knowledge and technique, finding Wally becomes a piece of cake. Which is a good thing, because it leaves plenty of time to get to know Wally better: who is he, what does he want and how does he behave (online)? Magneds technology allows you to find and engage Wally. Searching is no longer necessary.
