by idartiguenave | Feb 8, 2017 | Uncategorized
Over the last few months, we got the chance to slow down a little bit and take the time to think about the value of our events. 2016 was an exciting year for us, and especially for Lisbon. We met a lot of new people, from all over the world, including some really interesting figures who made us rethink the way we work. We took advantage of the end of the year to take a step back and reflect on what we really want to achieve in 2017.
We had a few things in mind: to better envision what to create, decide on what to focus and how to make it work.
Getting out of the building
To better understand what is required from our events, how we can improve and what’s missing in the Lisbon startup scene, we talked to a lot of people. We spoke to many different entrepreneurs such as Gil Belford from Hole19, Bárbara Fernandes from Aptoide or Matthew Carrozo from Unbabel, to understand their goals and how we could support the growth of their business. We talked to the organisers of events such as SXSW, Pirates Summit, South Summit, Vivatech, Factory, Web Summit and many others to dive deeper into the value events can deliver. We looked at different kinds of tech events and attended some of them, such as Leade.rs in Paris, which is experimenting new formats to ensure high quality content and connections.
Looking in the mirror and practicing what we preach
As everyone was wrapping up the 2016 and planning for 2017, we had lots of internal discussions to fully understand the direction we were taking. With so many new projects and we felt the need to think things through. Our goal was to define how our events would fit in the overall strategy and how they could support everything else.
Above all, it was about applying what we preach to startups, but this time to our own products. From lean startup to customer development, from user testing to design thinking. We made a plan to listen to our community and core partners, to identify the needs, to (re)design the value proposition, to test new features, to adjust our dynamics and raise the bar on content, to measure what’s relevant and to ensure that we deliver a valuable experience. That is our strategy for 2017.
Turning the lights off and looking forward
But, what triggered all of this? Well, this whole thing started back in December 2016. As some of you might know, Ricardo Marvão, the co-founder of Beta-i directly involved with the events’ team, took a month off to think things through and wrote this blog-post to explain it: “Turning the light off”.
Well, as I was processing the information from all the projects and our own events, I got a phone call from Ricardo:
“Ines, I was thinking about our events roadmap for 2017. We have it wrong. We can do more. We need to redesign the whole thing. Let’s think about this. Keep talking to more people from our team and community, and in January we’ll come up with a new strategy for events, more ambitious and focused.”
What’s the best we can deliver? We want to answer this question in a leaner way, understanding better what’s needed, what’s missing, how to focus and how to test and learn. That’s our mission for 2017. We will need you, your feedback, your requests, your inputs and much more, to make sure that we are on the right track.
We will soon let you know what we are up to. One thing we know for sure, #LIS – Lisbon Investment Summit will still be here. Better than ever.
Have feedback or suggestions? Feel free to drop me an email at ines.dartiguenave@beta-i.pt
by idartiguenave | Oct 12, 2016 | Uncategorized
Web Summit is not magic. Seriously, you have to hack it. 45.000+ attendees are announced. It’s massive. Much more than a conference, it will be a whole city fuelled by enthusiasm during a full week and that’s what we should leverage on.
You can easily get lost with the amount of stages, people and side events happening while you juggle with limited resources such as time, team and budget allocated to the event. The Web Summit is at the same time a huge source of opportunities and a potential trap if you just seat there and wait for things to happen. Sorry to say this, but you need to act on it.
To ensure that you get concrete outcomes from the Web Summit, you should take on an integrated vision and define a specific strategy for the main objectives, whether they are related to investment, media, sales, talent or further opportunities.
That’s what the bootcamp “Road 2 Web Summit” will be about. In partnership with Startup Portugal and the Web Summit team, Beta-i will help Portuguese founders to plan a relevant roadmap. Trainers include Josh Collins (Startup Programme Manager @ Web Summit) , Marian Gazdik (Managing Director Europe @ Startup Grind), Felix Petersen (Managing Partner @ Faber Ventures), Clara Armand-Delille (Founder @ ThirdEyeMedia), Jorge Reto (Founder & CEO @ Xposition), Pedro Alegria (Founder & Creative Ideator @ TORKE+CC), Rita Mendes (Operations Lead @ Landing.jobs) and Maria Almeida, our almighty Duchess of Content.
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Interested in better understanding how to get ready to talk to investors, journalists, prospects, potential hires; master your 1-min pitch and hack your way to stand out at the Web Summit? Stay tuned as we will share some insights from this bootcamp, happening at the end of the week.
As Paddy Cosgrave told us a few weeks ago at the event “Road 2 Web Summit”: The Portuguese have an unfair advantage, they know the city. Now, it’s game on!
Here is what you need to know:
1 – The side events will be announced tomorrow
2 – The app will be released next week
Any question or suggestion, feel free to reach out to me: ines.dartiguenave@beta-i.pt
