Case Study : Google Cloud NEXT conference
Google it
What are the challenges of putting on a B2B event for a consumer giant ?
When it comes to big brands , it doesn ’ t get much bigger than Google .
Late last year , event production agency WONDER London won the pitch to put on seven Google Cloud NEXT conferences for the internet giant in EMEA in 2017 .
“ They were interactive events for the Google Cloud team ,” director Ben Turner tells Engage . “ The audience was made up of IT decision makers , developers , marketing people and sales people within the companies Google attracts with Google Cloud products .”
The events , unlike the main Google brand , were B2B through and through , which required WONDER to rethink and reimagine the iconic Google branding in a business context .
“ You can be a lot more flexible with the Google search engine brand ,” explains Turner . “ With Google Cloud it ’ s a corporate sector that they ’ re working in , but there ’ s still a bit of flexibility . There are just more guidelines for the logo positioning and things like that .”
The brief from Google was this : reimagine the flagship Google Cloud NEXT conference in San Francisco for an EMEA audience .
“ The San Francisco event is 12,000 people and takes place over three or four days , with a larger budget than the London event ,” says Turner . “ They made a creative and design for it and then it was our job to create our version of that event
suitable for the EMEA markets in terms of audience size , venues and budget .”
Against the clock
While some of the planning could be done in advance , the WONDER team had to wait until the San Francisco event in March to finalise the design and content of the EMEA events . Since the first EMEA event – London – was set to take place at the start of May , the timing was tight .
WONDER worked closely with audio visual production company Blitz by GES , which provided video , lighting and audio for the London event .
“ It was a great working relationship ,” recalls Turner . “ Some of our team had worked with Blitz on big jobs before and it was a really good relationship . When you ’ re doing such a big job like that , under such tight time constraints , it ’ s great to have a supplier that backs you up with everything you ’ re doing .”
The event that WONDER created had to be easy transportable , as it was required to travel round seven EMEA venues throughout the year .
“ Our job was to create a set of assets – stage sets , pods , exhibition stands – which could then go on tour ,” explains Turner . “ It ’ s logistically challenging doing all of those events , and not having visibility of all the locations and sizes at the start .”
WONDER London ’ s first task after receiving the brief from Google was to select seven venues around EMEA for the conferences to take place in .
ExCeL London was chosen as the UK venue for the event , as it had room for the large stages plus the numerous plenary
6 engage
Winter 2017 / 18 in association with GES