Tag Archive for 'simefinland'

Success for first SIME event in Helsingfors

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 19, 2008

This post is about SIME News

Press release:

SIME, Scandinavian Interactive Media Event, the biggest digital business event in northern Europe expands from Sweden to neighboring Nordic countries. September 17th saw the first SIME Finland event in Helsinki, where 400 Finnish executives, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and media profiles spent the day in a bustling Swedish Theatre with 30 speakers from 10 countries.

“The Finnish digital business world has felt the need for a forum like SIME, and have embraced the event in a phenomenal way. Next year we need to book a venue twice the size”, says SIME CEO Christoffer Granfelt.

Microsoft, Kauppalehti (Finland’s leading business magazine), Soumi24 and International Herald Tribune were some of the sponsors that welcomed SIME to town.

Exciting young Finnish startups like Muxlim, the world’s largest online community for muslims, and Habbo Hotel who have created a pixelized hotel world loved by over 100 million kids around the globe presented their work at SIME Finland.

The next SIME event takes place in Copenhagen, Denmark on November 6th, and on November 12-13 the main two-day SIME08 conference with the yearly SIME Awards takes over Stockholm. Over 60 speakers share their insight at the event, including media veterans like Pelle Törnberg, with a background in executive positions at MTG and Metro, Michael Oreskes, chief editor of AP and ex chief editor of International Herald Tribune, Svenska Dagbladet editor in chief Lena K Samuelsson, author Michael J. Wolf with a background as global head of MTV and head of the McKinsey global entertainment practice, along with the hottest young entrepreneurial stars like Net Jacobsson of Facebook, biggest hit maker on Youtube Mia Rose and Joi Ito, one of the world’s most prominent Internet Profiles with ties to among others Creative Commons, Technorati, Six Apart and FON. In the audience top Nordic and European executives, entrepreneurs, media and aficionados will listen, connect and participate.

For more information and press access to the event, contact

Ola Ahlvarsson, SIME Chairman,  ola@result.com, phone: +46708984335
Christoffer Granfelt, SIME CEO,  christoffer@sime.nu, phone: +46733436035

Press images: http://www.sime.nu/module.asp?xmoduleid=24664

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SIME Finland wrap-up with pictures and quotes

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 19, 2008

This post is about SIME News

SIME Finland is over - for this time. SIME CEO Christoffer Granfelt says we’ll come back, and that we need a venue twice the size. Get inspired by some pictures from the bustling event at the Swedish Theatre in Helsinki, and see what people are saying about the event. A big thank you to everyone who came and made the event a great conference full of great people!

Some good quotes from and about the event:

“Numbers in start-ups is just another genre of science fiction” - Stefan Glaenzer in VC-panel

“I was personally very impressed by the excellent presentations and panel leadership from SIME’s Chairman Ola Ahlvarsson. This gentleman thoroughly knows how to take his audience and deliver a compelling presentation, as well as gently but firmly lead the panels into interesting discussions. Superb job Ola!” - Jussi Laakkonen

“SIME Finland that was held yesterday was really well organized and the atmosphere was great.” - Timo Paloheimo, Sombiz.net See also Timo’s photos from the event at his flickr page.

And some selected pictures from SIME Finland, see all of them at the SIME flickr page: SIME Finland pictures

Panel on social advertising

Hannu Ripatti and Dariush Ghatan networking during one of the breaks

First panel with presenting companies in full swing

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Stardoll and Muxlim - two companies that see explosive growth through word of mouth

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 17, 2008

This post is about SIME Companies

This afternoon at SIME Finland started off with presentations from Stardoll’s Henrik Torstensson and Muxlim’s Mohamed El-Fatatry. Both companies have grown through word of mouth by targeting a market no-one else was paying attention to.

Henrik shared some insights from the process of growing Stardoll, the paperdoll dressup site for girls:

Invest in making your product great and getting the best people rather than in marketing. This is not a question of either/or, but if you build the best product, people talk about it and are prepared to pay for using it. With an online property that dominates its market you become interesting for brand advertizers that usually don’t look at advertising with sites that are second or third on a local market even if the total number of users is larger than some local players.

Henrik says that having your tech team in the Nordics works well, and that going local globally has worked very well for Stardoll. Going global is more about scaling sales and support than scaling the tech team. Companies like Stardoll and Sulake (Habbo Hotel) have proved that a team in the Nordics can build websites that are liked and successful in many more markets.

Mohamed shared the story of Muxlim, the largest online muslim community, that grew organically from a small office at a university to a venture backed business trying to introduce the concept of the Muslim Lifestyle to the muslim community.

Muxlim tries to be a very open service that integrates other social services through Open Social and Facebook Connect. It wants to work as a complimentary service to other social spaces online.

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Rethink the box - Hannu Ripatti on online strategy

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 17, 2008

This post is about SIME Companies

Hannu Ripatti from Gyllene Skor gives us tips on how to make digital part of you company’s DNA rather than a disconnected add-on. By focusing on clear goals and creating ideas with a clear purpose, you can rethink one or several boxes instead of trying to think outside them.

Hannu points out customer focused design as a deprecated concept. Marketing in itself is not very customer focused, since the goal is to make people buy things they might not know about or know they need. The product and service you make needs to be customer focused, but strategies concerning both marketing and sales should avoid getting stuck in ideas about user focus and remember the business focus.

Gyllene Skor helps companies get a holistic grip on digital strategies and business opportunities.

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Sulake: Campaigns turn viral in the Habbo Hotel

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 17, 2008

This post is about SIME Companies

Emma Halmekoski, Director B2B Marketing at Sulake tells us about the “Habbo Iceberg” of campaign virality, where a few official advertising channels spark a multitude of activities among users. Habbo gives users a lot of outlets for showing off their relationship with a brand or product, like fan pages, themed groups and branded badges on their profile pages.

An important point that Emma makes is that for advertising to go viral like this, it has to be something that the users truly appreciate. Emma showed off some of the fabulous user created rooms in Habbo Hotel, and concludes her talk by saying that to get users to talk about a campaign, put it on their profiles and spread it to their friends it has to engage the audience and both respect and challenge their creativity.

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Schibstedt: We had the courage to cannibalize our own businesses to change into a modern media company

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 17, 2008

This post is about SIME Companies

SIME Finland is nowin full swing, and Karin Almers from Schibstedt leads off with a report on how Schibstedt has worked to change into a modern media company by sticking to their online expansion and strategies even if these initiatives have cannibalized on profitable businesses like classifieds in their media properties published on paper.

They are trying to create a culture of innovation and believe it takes courage to stand by ideas and projects that will work in the future even if they are not immediately profitable.

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SIME Finland tomorrow - if you can’t be there, follow the day here on the SIME Blog

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Published
by
Andie Nordgren
on September 16, 2008

This post is about SIME News

SIME Finland is a one-day conference about new business opportunities, in Helsinki. SIME Finland brings a day of brilliant speakers and change makers, and if you’re can’t be there you can follow the event here on the SIME Blog. Check out the agenda for the day here.

Stay tuned for posts from SIME Finland tomorrow, and if you are not subscribed to the SIME Blog already, now is a good time. Get new blogposts delivered via email or through our RSS feed.

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