Reconnecting at DMEXCO

“Data-driven creativity will become the future.” 

-Sir Martin Sorrell

For a DMEXCO veteran like me, the event looked smaller compared to previous years; some big names were missing, fewer exhibitors and less attendees. But when speaking with colleagues attending it for the first time I was reminded what DMEXCO is: a very big event for an industry that sometimes feels like a small world. It’s an opportunity to speak about fascinating digital trends, breakthrough innovations coming from any corner of the “old Continent” plus newcomers, like VidMob in Europe.

Historically, brands attended DMEXCO to learn what’s new in the Wadvertising space (only to leave completely overwhelmed by the number of companies they saw and heard from). This year, it felt like the brands in attendance had a clear agenda with companies they wanted to speak with to better understand how to navigate the difficult months, and potentially years, ahead of us. 

The brands we spoke to know they have an enormous opportunity to adapt and show their agility. They want to understand how to spend smarter and better understand the Intelligent Creative movement. We all know now optimizing the media buy is not enough, brands need to look at their creative assets and use smart data to improve performance.

Our very own VP EMEA, Anthony Lamy, was on stage for a fireside chat with Shaun Lynch from Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev) and attendees were able to learn of AB’s inBev Intelligent Creative journey: what it is and isn’t (tv campaigns), how critical it is to optimize digital campaigns and how everything they tried to do for 6 months in-house manually VidMob was actually able to automate. I wasn’t surprised to see brands coming to our booth after the session to have a conversation usually starting with something like,“‘We know we can do better, we just don’t know how.”While one of the key hot topics at DMEXCO was the deprecation of third party cookies, Shaun pointed out how one of the benefits of the VidMob platform is the ability to collect new first party data: creative data. For AB InBev, it’s already accumulated 18 months of creative data they can break down per European market. A treasure trove not many brands can count on at the moment. He pointed out that the time is now to embark on the journey to intelligent creative (because it is undoubtedly a journey). You need time to collect the necessary insights but the prize is a competitive advantage you can build upon as a brand and be more strategic during times of turmoil (not unlike the one we’re living in). 

Finally, DMEXCO offered an incredible opportunity to (re)connect in-person with industry peers from across Europe. It worked as a great reminder, if needed, of why most of us work in the ad tech world – the pace of innovation, the challenges ahead, creativity at its core and above all is the people, old and new, that makes the long tiring two days fun, rewarding and inspiring.Learn more about all things Intelligent Creative in our Guide to Data-Driven Creative.