Human-first as a strategy requires a vantage point; a birds eye view.
Our 2020 Global theme for all Social Media Week Conferences this year is Human.x - The Future of Marketing will be human-first and Experience Driven. You can read more about the theme here.
My visual representation of this year's theme across all of our digital marketing efforts - including physical signage at our conferences - builds upon the look I established last year.
One significant change this year is that I've come full circle in representing each of our cities with panoramic landmark photography. In particular - birds-eye view shots that symbolize us reflecting on and coming to understand Humanity from a wider vantage point in order to strive for a Human-first approach to marketing.
Sponsorship Decks, Presentation Collateral
This year, I've dug a bit deeper by re-branding and re-designing our Sponsorship Decks and Presentation collateral that are distributed to sponsors, attendees, and speakers. These materials were additionally distributed to our 20+ International cities that run their conferences independently of ours. I really wanted to make sure that the visual representation of everything we present and distribute is infused with the vibrance of the new theme. Likewise, it was imperative that all of the Social Media Week cities had a good head start in visualizing their own conferences.
Two is better then One
Crowdcentric, the parent company that owns and operates SMW, hired Lauren Astor, a fellow creative. Lauren has been instrumental in not only executing my creative strategy for the year, but also running with it and creating and establishing a style of her own within its framework.
Lauren's creative energy, her ability to not only take direction but also build upon it, has enabled me to focus on some of the other web development needs that that were needed at the start of the year. It's been a long-time coming to have another creative who's just as passionate as well as versed in the creative process as I am.
Work continues
The first physical execution of the 2020 Global Theme will occur at #SMWNYC in May. In the meantime, several of our Independent cities have already applied the creative strategy of the theme and made it their own, including SMW Lagos, SMW Hamburg, and SMW Austin.
I've also developed several key updates to the multiple platforms that power Social Media Week based on this look. I'll publish a future piece about some of the Dev work I've been working on as well as update this piece with some live executions of the 2020 look and feel.
