Challenge: Evolve Illumina from the genomics market leader to the industry thought leader to advance the positive impact of genomic-led health.
Insight: Science by its nature is siloed, competitive, and unhurried. Industry events and content reflect the specialty alignment, leaving less room for cross-disciplinary curiosity.
Strategy: Ignore industry borders and break down the tracked, specialty-focused culture to accelerate innovation. Create a cross-ecosystem idea exchange creating space for cross-disciplinary conversation and community building. Showcase the application and innovation that only the industry leader could bring together. for
Role: Drove the strategy, event narrative, and attendee experience for the inaugural Illumina Genomics Forum to bring first-time conversations to the stage and convene catalysts. Created a cross-ecosystem marketing channel and idea exchange that brought over 50 speakers to a sold-out audience of 1,500 C-suite, director-level and above influencers, researchers, clinicians and changemakers.
Main Stage Spotlights: Diverse Voices and Points of View
Changed the industry conversation working with main stage speakers Barack Obama, Bill Gates, Anne Wojcicki, Chris Evert, Karen Knudsen, Scott Gottlieb, Nobel Laureate Frances Arnold, Eric Topol, Abasi Ene-Obong and more.
Creative Casting — Not Your Ordinary Science Conference
Strategically paired moderators and spotlight speakers to drive authentic conversations against strategy. Met with VIP speakers and their teams to guide the narrative and workshop sessions.
An Invitation to Optimistic Collaboration: Let’s Power Better Human Health
Breakout Sessions — Going Deeper and Interactive
Researched and strategically cast 14 breakout sessions with over 30 diverse voices from stalwarts to up-and-comers.
Authored content terrain documents for each. Met, ideated, and coached every session.
Learning from Attendees — Interactive Investigation
Researched and directed agency partner to bring relevant, science-based activations to the experience.
“Sequence of Beliefs” let attendees weigh in on the factors they felt would drive the positive impact of genomic health.
The Patient Wall greeted attendees every day reminding them of the reason to push scientific boundaries and application. First-person narrative videos made real the diagnostic journeys accessible not exploitive. Event badges with QR codes let attendees dive deeper.
The activation also invited conference-goers to continue the conversation and collaboration via a LinkedIn community.
Did the NHGRI bold predictions have it right?
Interaction gamified the bold predictions with a fresh question daily and allowed Illumina to understand attendee opinions on the state of human genomics.
The Innovation Roadmap
Day two product announcement session met the storytelling and logistical challenges of unveiling a new technology and inviting attendees to learn about the boundless possibilities.
The Lightbox
Encouraged conversation beyond the stage, we established an onsite production pod to capture organic chats between industry and Illumina subject matter experts. Scheduled and spontaneous discussion ensured a long tail of content following the event.
Results
The sold-out inaugural reinforced Illumina
as thought leader and community convener.
81% overall satisfaction
74% likely to endorse or adopt genomic health as a result of attending
77% of attendees agreed event opened possibility for genomic application in their field
70+ top-tier articles and global media placement