Adobe MAX Conference

The first steps in my journey to understanding Advertising and Social Media Management was done through a series of talks and sessions at this year’s Adobe Max Conference. As this conference was more design and branding focused, a lot of the content I viewed regarded those topics, from building online communities to developing content catered to a certain social media.

The notes I took down for some of the sessions can be found here, but continue reading to view my takeaways!

What is a BRAND?

With Branding, much of the sessions I watched covered the same consensus - that it was about VALUE. It’s much like a modern form of transaction where we as a brand would like for our audience to respond with engagement, in exchange for great content. But there must be things that determine if the content is worth their time and engagement, or in other words - valuable. As Jessica Holsman who led the “Growing An Online Community Using Multiplatform Storytelling” Session mentioned, it didn’t matter if we had big numbers in terms of followers, if there wasn’t any interaction going on - the priority was building a connection and making the audience feel belonged.

It got me thinking to what Music Vox as a brand was - were we just a Co-Curricular Activity in a school, or are we starting to be something more than that? A community, a platform, a space for budding musicians to experiment and learn? It was something still unclear to me and I've made it a point to continually ask myself this question of "What is Music Vox?" throughout my time working on this project.

The Different Forms in Social Media Engagement

In terms of social media, it is starting to pick up in what people pay attention to, and from many of the sessions, I’ve learnt that still images sometimes isn’t going to cut it anymore. Making use of subtle motion in post visuals is one small step one can take to “Stop The Scroll” as Shyne Webster puts it, and I’ve also come to realise there are a lot of Adobe applications to help us carry that out with ease. Another extension of interactivity I’ve come to take larger notice of, however, is the use of AR & VR technologies.

Within the short 24 minutes or so, that Heather Dunaway Smith shares about “AR Design Principles: How to Create Immersive Experiences” I’ve come to realise how the capabilities of telling a story with art, space, and sound, is becoming a much more accessible and noticeable expression in today’s era of technology. With easy to use applications like Adobe Aero, the ways you can give audiences an experience has expanded into something that’s an extension of our physical means of reaching out.

All these have led me to think a lot more about the way we tell our story to the people we are reaching out to, and with that said- WHO we are reaching out to, and really finetuning the plans as early as possible so that I don’t have to fight for time. Some ideas I have at the moment include a Virtual Scavenger Hunt experience, where clues will be posted on our social media, which will lead to checkpoints. Each checkpoint will be an AR Art experience, that tells one part of the story in the LP Narrative, instrumental music from the LP playing as they sit through the AR experience. With each checkpoint, and the narrative unfolds, they reach the end with a reward that I’ve yet to think about. This narrative will also play a part in the merchandise and I look forward to expanding more on these ideas once the LP name has been finalised.