Fiare Global Summit 2019: Round-Up

On Thursday, the 24th of May 2019, Fiare held their Global Summit for the third consecutive year, hosted at the HTC (High Technology Center) Helsinki. A place Fiare call home, where our Headquarters are situated. Customers, members of the board, staff and partners alike gathered in the Finnish capital to take part in an action-packed day full of meaningful conversations and knowledge sharing.

The excitement was such we had delegates from far and wide with a special mention to a customer flying just shy of 7,000km from Nairobi, Kenya to be at this year’s event.

Despite the early morning grey skies, that had settled upon Helsinki, the day got kickstarted by Tommi Heikkonen, Fiare’s CEO who welcomed everyone to the political, financial and cultural hub of Finland, where he shared a few key facts and figures in regards to Finland, listing their global rankings for equality, education, happiness and consumption of coffee being on the high end of the spectrum. He then proceeded to kick off the Fiare Global Summit 2019.

The journey of classifieds, modern online marketplaces, and challenges

Next, it was the opportunity for Gerald Coniel, Owner of Junk Mail Publishing, who shared with the audience his fascinating journey in the marketplace sector, which had started many years ago in the very city of Helsinki and had taken him on a journey and big changes ending up in South Africa where he started Junk Mail. His story, a perfect balance of humour and business savviness had the audience in awe of his journey and how much the industry had changed. He spoke about the modern online marketspace and challenges such as that of social media giants Facebook and how they are challenging conventional approaches to marketplaces.

Gerald Coniel, sharing his experience in Finland.

NettiX End-to-End consumer transaction example

Following Gerald, we had Maria Christensen, Development Manager at NettiX, who embraced the stage and explained how this Finish company and Fiare customers, who are leaders in the automobile marketplace in Finland, are constantly improving and making their customer experience better. With the implementation of technology in assisting the customer’s progression and ensuring they are adding value to the customer have a more seamless cycle of purchase and sale.

Maria Christensen from NettiX explaining steps taken to stand out from the competition.

SEO for marketplaces

After a break for lunch, we dived straight back into another exciting talk this time led by Simon Schnieders. The Founder of Blue Array gave everyone in attendance an insight into his roles at Zoopla and now as one of the biggest SEO companies in the United Kingdom. Simon helped attendees understand SEO’s and let attendees obtain the “Secret Sauce”, topics covered included internationalization and other simple changes to your SEO approach to ensure top results as well as outranking competitors in the market.

Simon Schnieders, about to show the secrets to SEO.

Fiare’s customer-centric growth hacking workshops  & development

Then came Fiare’s Kirsi Johansons opportunity to address the audience and the success Fiare has had over the past years and the next stepping stones to ensure continued success; announcing Fiare’s brand new workshops for customers branded Growth Hacking Workshops to help customers keep growing and be successful in their markets. These workshops will be available to more customers. Keep your eyes out for more updates.

A quick coffee and networking break later it was time for Jan Bechstein, Fiare’s Product Manager to take the stage and talk about upcoming updates to FiareAds and its roadmaps up to 2020, and how Fiare will be helping all customers upgrade to its latest version FiareAds 6.0 in the coming years. The new version will give customers greater control, but use all the new features we had been working hard on over the last year.

How to stop bad bots impacting your marketplace

The last presentation of the day was presented by Tony Robertson from Shieldsquare who educated the audience on bots, more specifically bad bots and how they can affect your marketplace. Tony helped the customer understand different solutions that can help prevent and avoid disasters by implementing simple steps to ensure your spaces stay clear of these bad bots that consist of nearly a third of the internet bots.

Tony Robertson, giving us details on Bots and how they can affect your marketplace.

Helsinki tour and evening program

The day of learning and knowledge sharing was over and the evening would begin with dinner at the sea-front and picturesque Mestrallitali restaurant where hosts were treated to local cuisine to replenish energy after a long morning and looking forward to an evening activity.

Summit group photo was taken at Sibelius Monument, Helsinki.

Following the dinner hosts walked past the Sibelius monument where a group picture was taken and then the surprise of the evening was a 2-hour tram which doubled as a mobile-pub. The tram took everyone around the city of Helsinki; through the heart of the Finnish capitals sites and historic neighbourhoods, allowing guests and locals to experience the city in a new and charming way. Everyone could unwind and socialise over a drink of Koff or Long whilst taking in everything Helsinki had to offer.

Attendees enjoyed a city tour on the local-brewery tram.

Here is a video of one of our attendees, Alison Price, sharing her experience during the summit. It is fair to say that the event was a great success, we at Fiare are very much looking forward to next year’s Global Summit and looking forward to welcoming all again.

If you are interested in those topics, want to be part of next years event, or have questions about the FiareAds marketplace platform, visit our contact page and choose a Fiare representative of your choice!