Meet The Shortlist: Brand Challenge Finalists Revealed
By Dan Brain, Co-founder + Content Director, MAD//Fest 03 Jul 2019
16 innovative start-ups and agencies will be putting themselves in the spotlight at MAD//Picnic on 10 July after being selected to answer briefs from Diageo, Missguided, Schuh and Not On The High St and pitch their ideas live.
Over 120 businesses of all shapes and sizes applied for the MAD//Picnic Brand Challenges, which cover brand experience, content marketing and storytelling, digital experience and loyalty/repeat purchases.
The challenges will be presented by Nick Bamber, Digital Marketing Director, Missguided, Penny Parnell, Creative Director, Not On The High St, Sean McKee, Marketing + Ecommerce Director, Schuh, Will Harvey, Digital Innovation Manager, Diageo and hosted by Co:Cubed’s Jeremy Basset and Laura Humphreys.
Here’s the list in full:
1135
Missguided: driving customer loyalty and orders in fast fashion
1220
Schuh: using technology and data to enhance the online brand/retail experience
1515
How can Diageo drive more engaging and effective interactions with consumers?
1600
Not On The High Street: content marketing + storytelling at scale
"What am I looking forward to most? Getting a whoosh of inspiration and fresh thinking,” said Parnell.
“As a curated online marketplace championing 5,000 of the UK's best small creative businesses, we're lucky enough to hear a wealth of moving, enigmatic and genuinely life-changing stories on a daily basis.
“We're passionate about sharing these stories with our customers far and wide, in a relevant fashion. The challenge is how we can do this at scale but in a way that still feels like 'us' - authentic, personal and thoughtful. I can't wait to hear people's ideas."
"Our Ecomm team spend most of the day working out how best to deploy innovation (whether that’s in optimising the platform or trading better) to drive tangible commercial advantage," added McKee.
"That always involves being prepared to think outside of the box, being open to the new, and sometimes just getting out of our own environment so we can be exposed to fresh approaches. That’s where MAD//Picnic comes in – brand challenge pitchers, take us out of our comfort zone please!"
Featuring over 600 attendees, 50 sponsors and the UK's only picnic for marketing, advertising and disruptive tech leaders, MAD//Picnic is now sold out. The event will also see keynotes from Not On The High St Co-founder Holly Tucker MBE, Amazon MD - Advertising Caleb Hill, Google Head of Conversation Design Advocacy + Education Wally Brill, Monzo Head of Marketing Tristan Thomas, Bulb CMO Russell Davies, Müller CMO Michael Inpong and My Dad Wrote A Porno Creator Jamie Morton.