DDW,
Making every week Dutch Design Week
For over 10 years, Verve has been creating new ways for Dutch designers to connect and interact with manufacturers and visitors during our industry’s most celebrated annual event.
A meaningful partnership
DDW is Europe’s largest design event. Since 2020, it has been integrated online. Dutch Design Foundation has chosen Verve as its digital innovation partner to create more impact as an organization. We were engaged to create a digital framework for growth that serves all of DDW’s diverse target groups. At different times of the year DDW has to attract B2B contacts, generate new participants, sell tickets and be accessible to more than 2,600 participants who create their own digital exhibitions — all this on one platform.
Design time
To increase DDW’s online brand experience, we built the website on the foundation of Design Time. Design Time means that the website and user experience shifts throughout different phases of the year. For DDW, it’s a platform that can easily shift focus from conversion to curation to lead generation to practical programs. For participants we developed a Salesforce CRM API that gives them all the tools they need to present themselves in the best way possible.
UX for savvy audiences
The concept of Design Time influences the choices in development, content algorithm and user experience. The website algorithm for example showcases content dynamically, depending on user interaction, relevance or editorial calendars. In this way the website functions as a stable beacon for the design community throughout the year.
Smooth and serverless
From this strategic base, we are able to continuously optimise one experience at a time, shifting focus from the DDW visitor to participating designers or to enhance tools for the professional community. Thanks to our serverless environment, the digital platform is able to welcome millions of users in a fraction of a second.
In development we always focus on performance, loading time and mobile usage, enabling the possibility to welcome millions of visitors in a blink of an eye. More about the technical set-up can be found in the Dutch Magazine Emerce.
Sensory spaces
With the back-end in place, it’s the user experience where the brand Dutch Design Week comes to life. The 2020 edition was the biggest virtual design festival in the world. With the use of smart tooling like Vimeo embeds, we bypassed expensive subscription models. The real-time program moves with the program, scheduled by both the organisation as the participating designers.
Mark de Greeff, Chief Marketing Officer Dutch Design Week
“A collaboration of this kind requires enormous trust in each other’s abilities. We had to build the bridge as we walked on it.”
