Can you give us a glimpse of your journey in the Sitecore ecosystem?

I first worked with Sitecore starting somewhere around 2010. I’ve deepened my knowledge of Sitecore over the years to the point that I was awarded the Sitecore MVP status in 2018 and have been lucky enough to retain it ever since. I explain more about my full Sitecore journey in this podcast if you’re eager to hear more: https://coresampler.fm/59.

How do you define 1:1 personalized, connected experiences? How does this approach influence your work?

To argue that a customer is wrong to expect personalised & connected experiences is like a ship’s captain complaining about the sea. Whether brands like it or not, this is what their customers now expect.

Before digital, business was all about managing scale, with standardized products, globalized process and mass marketing. That’s how industrial businesses made money. The internet changed everything by removing the constraints to personally servicing many people at once. As such, customers’ expectations have been realigned to expect personalised experiences that connect across all their moments of interaction. And they continuously vote with their wallets.

I have built my career on helping brands find their new competitive advantage through such customer experiences.

When it comes to personalized customer experiences, what advantages do you provide clients with?

I’ve worked with brands in all different types of industries and even government organizations, and I don’t profess to be an expert in any of their internal production processes or products. The value that I add is understanding how to change the mind – and ultimately the actions – of the end customer by changing the way your customers feel about your brand and how they value your products.

What do you want the main takeaway of your session to be?

I have two sessions, with two of our clients. The first is with Emirates NBD, the largest retail bank in the Middle East, where we'll dive into how they leveraged CX to change the perception of their credit cards into something more valuable than just another financial product. It’s a great story that really flips the conventions of the financial industry on its head.

Then I speak with our client at Yas Island, the Middle East’s premium entertainment destination. There, we will be discussing the dramatic results in ticket sales when they made their ecommerce journey as exciting and fast as their rollercoasters. I’m also proud that we at Horizontal Digital have partnered with Yas Island to give one lucky Symposium-attendee the chance to win a free trip and check it out for themselves!

How many Symposiums have you attended? What are you looking forward to this year?

I’ve been to 3 symposiums in the past and am looking forward to attending another in-person one this year. What I'm particularly excited about this year is showing the global community the great work happening in the Middle East and APAC.