SIME 09: Highlights

Relive the SIME Magic, the SIME Inspiration through some recorded footage and pictures

SIME 09 was all about the 4 dimensions of digital opportunities: business, knowledge, inspiration and fun, the 4 pillars or the corner stones for this year’s SIME. And we took every step to make sure during the 2 days you got your best business opportunities, learnt as much from the sessions, workshops, drew inspiration from the speakers and the participants and, most importantly had riveting fun before, during and after the conference.

Looking back, we did quite much shake the SIME cover. From coming up with a new format, an agenda that boasts of covering most verticals within the digital landscape, and a revised Awards format, we did have quite an uphill task to package them the best and add the SIME touch at the end. At the end, if you had as much fun at SIME as we had arranging it, we think it’s a job well done

The Highlights section is here

Some very good footage from the whole show is here

Interviews with SIME speakers and Participants here and here (thanks folks from 23business, Germany).

Pictures from Tom Solo (SIME’s “legend behind the lens”)

SIME Pool at Flickr (user uploaded)

And stay tuned for the year ahead. SIME is going even more international, so get ready to welcome SIME to your city!

29K unique web views last week, that was cool!

So the small showers of glitz and glory do come from unexpected corners.

First, the second most tweeted word in Scandinavia during the event day (the first was #googlewave, second was #sime09 followed by #youtube).

Second, we had more than 35K web views, of which 29K were unique, last week alone. We slowly noticed the web traffic taking off right from September, October but never did we realize that it would snowball into something of such sort. And last year, we had 1200 average web views during the conference too, again, testimony to the effort gone in this year to give you all the best we can.

Again, we are quite proud for all the effort that went in to the site design, the maintenance, the blog etc. We think the SIME juggernaut has just started, and the journey has not ended, it has begun. We are very eager to see what we can do for the year ahead of us.

Truly thanking all the readers and well-wishers, you are great

[UPDATED] A big thanks to SIME's Technology and Design Partners

With the most successful and ambitious SIME behind us, we thought it’s time to take a step back, and look back at the people who made the show possible. And as we look at the way the best SIME of all time shaped up, we realize that the art after all was made of small jigsaws without which the SIME experience would have never been the same. This post aims to introduce 2 such partners who have been the backbone, the nervous system on which the SIME crew has been running on.

[Updated with some free trial links from Active Events]

Active Events – Technology meets service

SIME started working together with Active Events right from the summer, and the service delivery has been right up the quality alley. From an extremely intuitive user interface to super cool new media integration, the platform has been top notch. And looking at the company growth this year,  there are very few companies in the marketing and event technology industry that  have grown over the last year, and those that have  must be offering something very special! Over the last year the guys at Active Events  have doubled their revenue in EMEA.

Below is a quick interview with the Biz. Dev. Head of Active Events, Anthony Miller from the UK.

SIME (S): Tell us briefly about Active Events

Anthony (A): Part of the Active Network, Active Events offer a range of solutions from an easy to use online registration system to enterprise wide event management, marketing and planning solutions. We supplement our technology with marketing and events experts who help our clients to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the event programs they run. Since opening our doors last year Active Events EMEA has grown to have over 800 clients in Europe, including Cisco, Deloiitte, HP, the NHS, and Cambridge University.

S: In a recession hit market, the first cut is usually in the conference goers segment. How did you manage to sustain and outperform your competitors?

A: There are many companies out there that provide online registration and various elements of event management technology and do a pretty good job. We think people need more than that, especially now. We help our clients to apply innovative technology to manage the logistics of their events and gather intelligence that can be used to provide sales teams with leads, procurement teams with spend control, and event teams with automation and easy reporting to make their lives easier. We provide solutions that integrate all those needs.

We highly recommend Active Events to manage your event back-end well.

You can take a tour of RegOnline by clicking here:
http://www.regonline.com/marketing/event/tour/flash.aspx

You can try RegOnline for FREE by clicking here:
https://www.regonline.com/marketing/event/getstarted.aspx

Or you can contact Anthony Miller, their Head of Business Development, to discuss their range of products and services: anthony[dot]miller[at]wingateweb.com

AD&D – design meets business

When design meets business, when ideas meet innovation, you know the guys are special. SIME had the opportunity to be working with these very cool folks from AD&D for some time now, and this year, they were just about perfect. Delivering visually scintillating frames and wires for our Mr. Fix it Joakim Nystrom to add the SIME component to it. From the coverflow for the Mighty 36, to integrating real time live back channels and video solutions into a very robust back end CRM, the guys were great.

You can get in touch with AD&D through  Fredrik Wetterholm at wetterholm[at]adnd[dot]se. Check them out at http://adnd.se

Thanks folks, you both are awesome.

SIME Awards: Published the Draft Edition

Just a quick note to say, sorry, we stand digitally corrected.

We realized that we published the draft or earlier version of the Mighty 36 order yesterday, a mistake that makes few companies go up and down the list, not giving you the final numbers of what the entire jury agreed on.  And we realized it today (yes the after-party helped us), and we have corrected it. So if you were in the Mighty 36 and wondered why your rankings differed so drastically as compared to yesterday, we are sorry.

The final ranking can be found here.

Congrats folks, you are all stars of the Nordics!

We have 3 words for you!

You are great.

Yes, you know it, we know it, you are great. So here is a note from the SIME Team to say a quick thank you for helping us put together the best SIME of all time. It was great looking at opportunities being executed and businesses being created, and that truly is the pulse of SIME, bringing the best of people under one roof to inspire digital opportunities. We hope you enjoyed the journey as much as we loved paving it for you.

We have some great video footage, thanks to a Dutch Journalist 2.0 named Ayman Van Bregt who runs the marketingfacts.nl initiative. Big thanks Ayman.

Watch some of the footage

Flickr Pictures [the legend behind the lens and SIME's official photographer, Tom Solo will come up with his mind blowing SIME shots soon]

Oh yes, #sime09 was the second most tweeted word in Scandinavia yesterday, beat by #googlewave, but going a notch above #youtube

And the show begins.

Ola is on stage with his cherubic smile, and that during this time of the year could just mean 1 thing – the SIME party has begun.  And this time, SIME will also be on screens at Stockholm city, a first for SIME.

[I am trying to live blog apart from running around doing a lot of things for the workshops and match-making. So I will try my best to summarize and of course will read them again end of the day to go through erroneous links]

09.00 We’ve got news for you!

News from the SIME stable, updates over the last year with the introduction of SIME Academy, SIME Networking Bazaar and Workshops. Some things change, some things just don’t! And the core of SIME is always the same, and so will be the face of SIME on stage, Ola Ahlvarsson!

09.10 The age of the unthinkable

We live in turbulent times

But that’s so boring, we have been hearing this story over and over again. But the online landscape is doing good, the platform is getting stronger though the market is shit. Branding might be dead, but originality has never been so important in history. Media companies are changing and the traditional model is not working. They are buying verticals front, right and center, adding their marketing firepower and making it into a business that works and adds value. Advertising has become the fuel, it’s not the engine anymore. Content is.

With that introduction, we move on to the first keynote!

09.30 The transformers – companies going from offline to online with a smile

Some traditional companies embrace digital opportunities and make digital part of their DNA while most fail miserably and see new entrants disrupt the old playing field.

Keynote by: Jesper Kärrbrink, CEO of Eniro, one of Europe’s most progressive classifieds companies, former CEO of Svenska Spel and author of criminal novels.

Key Takeaways:

• Transforming is painful. 5.5B SEK of Eniro is being transferred in tune with the new environment.
• And during transforming we always start from within the box instead of starting from outside
• The consumption has got bigger, just that the medium of consumption has changed.

Panel: Sara Öhrvall, Head of Bonnier R&D (Sweden), Jesper Kärrbrink, CEO Eniro (Sweden) and Claudia Gonzalez, United Nations expert on social marketing and the former marketing director of the World Economic forum (US).

The panel focused on amongst many things, the way to handle change within an organization, how to tap grass root level innovations, pursuing your change strategy against all the mentally blind folks who are waiting for a chance to bring you down and stop you from your path on change. Sara Ohrvall has a great piece on the SIME Blog about 5 key media trends, personalization, the quantified self, augmented reality amongst others. You can read the piece here

And we go for break.

10.30 Coffee tea you and me

11.00 May I have your attention please?

A thought provoking journey into your attention span and how new technologies create new (a)social behavior.

Keynote by: Linda Stone, author and thought leader with a background as VP at Microsoft and long time executive with Apple who coined the term “continuous partial attention”.

The panel was interesting although most of the speakers agreed on most of the points, yet, the discussions was well steered to a point where you realize that advertising has such a long developmental spiral to go. It is at its infancy, and there is much to be discovered.

On that note, we break for lunch. We should get back in an hour with more updates.

Check our flickr stream in the meanwhile - http://www.flickr.com/groups/1123671@N23/

13.00 A hacker’s view on innovation and the future

Keynote: Paul “Pablos” Holman. Pablos is a futurist, IT security expert, and a notorious hacker with a unique view into both breaking and building new technologies. His projects at the Intellectual Ventures Lab are among the most futuristic in the world. He will show how the mindset of hackers is optimized for invention and share some of the projects from his lab.

No words can capture the presentation. From live hacking to turning it into a good cause, it was simply fascinating. I am going to try to get the recorded version of the talk.

13.45 New! Mobile opportunities

Interesting:

At any moment, there are 9M phone calls between Nokia Phones. Everything is not mobile. Things that have backward mobility can become mobile . The smartest thing to do is to build the ecosystem around the mobile phone, and build more intelligence around it. Nokia is all about people and places. And that explains the reasons for the recent acquisitions by Nokia – Dopplr, Plazes amongst others. And they are gunning for the people network too, think that’s a smart positioning move.

The keynote is now followed by the panel on the mobile innovations.

14.00 The Masters of Mobile

With Billions of phones carrying Billions of apps the era of the mobile has gone from vision to in your ear- and face user experiences offering a plethora of opportunities never seen before.

Panel: Pekka Pohjakallio, Vice President Concepting & Innovation, Nokia (Finland), Dan Olschwang, President and CEO of Jumtap one of the world’s leading mobile marketing and technology companies (US) and surprise guest.

Key take aways

• 3 is looking at interesting concepts and verticals that they want to launch and make use of the billing relationship better.
• Nokia is positioning itself as a service / entertainment company than a pure hardware company.
• Mobile Marketing is interesting and companies and agencies have slowly started allocating budgets for mobile marketing. The barrier level has never been so low for companies to enter mobile marketing.
• Touch is interesting, but that’s not the next wow. The next ‘wow’ is not touch, but being intelligent and relevant without having to touch – Pekka.

The discussion start end here and continue at the workshops Everything Mobile at 1615 Rigoletto 4, “Meet the 6 mobile innovators” tomorrow. The workshop schedule is at http://sime.nu/09/stockholm/agenda

[Rushing to workshops and match making desks. WIll come back for the post-coverage again]

Lights Camera Action! SIME is set to take off.

At Rigoletto, and the stage is perfect. The ambience music is in, people are slowly trickling in with their “FIKA” and “Kannelbulle”, the speakers are all gung-ho, the workshops and match-making desks are screaming to your senses, the lovely ladies with interesting “SMS Me” T-Shirts are everywhere taking interaction with them (and quite good number of followers, yes all men, some even thinking it’s their number), it’s time of that year where it’s a whole new world with SIME. The journey is about to begin in minutes.

Some relevant links before we begin:

Agenda: http://sime.nu/09/stockholm/agenda

Speaker Profiles: http://sime.nu/09/stockholm/speakers

SIME Live!: http://sime.nu/live

And it’s rare 2 days where the Scandinavians are forced to rig off the shyness, and talk to the camera, it’s not an option, it’s an order. So be ready to be filmed, flashed till your eyes bleed with photos, and make sure you suck the juice out of SIME by meeting people.

SIME is set to take off. Tighten your seat belts, it’s going to be  journey of inspiration, knowledge, business and fun.

Lights, Camera, Action! SIME is set to take off.

At Rigoletto, and the stage is perfect. The ambience music is in, people are slowly trickling in with their “FIKA” and “Kannelbulle”, the speakers are all gung-ho, the workshops and match-making desks are screaming to your senses, the lovely ladies with interesting “SMS Me” T-Shirts are everywhere taking interaction with them (and quite good number of followers, yes all men, some even thinking it’s their number), it’s time of that year where it’s a whole new world with SIME. The journey is about to begin in minutes.

Some relevant links before we begin:

Agenda: http://sime.nu/09/stockholm/agenda

Speaker Profiles: http://sime.nu/09/stockholm/speakers

SIME Live!: http://sime.nu/live

And it’s rare 2 days where the Scandinavians are forced to rig off the shyness, and talk to the camera, it’s not an option, it’s an order. So be ready to be filmed, flashed till your eyes bleed with photos, and make sure you suck the juice out of SIME by meeting people.

SIME is set to take off. Tighten your seat belts, it’s going to be  journey of inspiration, knowledge, business and fun.

SIME – the inspiration has finally arrived. And the hash is #sime09 among other things!

SIME is here. It is 0200 in the morning, and this is no one day wonder. We have had sleepless days trying to fit the last bits and pieces to make sure we put up the best SIME of the year and boy its been one helluva journey. We think we have the secret recipe to make this year’s SIME memorable and up the ante for the coming years.

Anyways, through this blog I aim to introduce the tagging, live channels that we plan to use.

The official hash tag for this year at SIME is #SIME09.

So anything, just hash tag it with #SIME09 – be it twitter, facebook or adding it to the header of your liveblog.

Pictures on Flickr are recommended to be on Creative Commons (CC) (Founder of CC, Joi Ito is a SIME’ite and was in Stockholm last year). Videos, hashtag is too with #sime09. So anything at all you plan to do at SIME tomorrow, have the hash in the head.

We have set up a live channel at http://sime.nu/live powered by Twingly, where you can monitor both tweets with the hashtag #SIME09 and text messages that are sent to 72401 and begun with SIME.

And finally, bring your laptop, your open minds and ears for some inspiration SIME style. And for the strong and mighty hearted, be ready to rock the Stockholm city with our crazy parties at the end.

Stockholm, are you ready?

Read up about the Mighty 36 and the nominees!

We have collected all the Mighty 36 profiles for the SIME Awards at http://sime.nu/tag/nominee-of-the-day

This has all the info about the company (bio), country, web, snapshot, jury motivation to pick them and in some cases details about the founder, online footprints etc. These companies represent Scandinavian entrepreneurship truly the way it should be represented, carrying the flags high.

Our heartfelt congratulations to them for coming this far! And good luck with the awards on 12th at Cafe Opera beginning 1900. And as in any sport, may the best company win!

Good luck from the SIME Crew.