Couldn’t make it to Refresh 19 London? Here’s what you missed

After two intense but fun-filled days of discussions and conversations revolving around the concept of customer experience and why experience matters, the curtains have just come down on Freshworks’ latest global user conference, Refresh 19, in London.

Over 500 of Freshworks’ customers, partners, and friends from 23 countries gathered at Tobacco Dock, London, and took part in 40 knowledge sessions, 15 workshop sessions, and over 15 exhibits on subjects related to customer experience, IT service management, and sales and marketing.

Refresh-19-london-at-Tobacco-dock

The conference brought together our users, partners, industry leaders, and SaaS enthusiasts, all united by their desire to give their customers the best possible experience and redefine the trajectory of customer engagement.

The energy and enthusiasm that filled Tobacco Dock was beyond anything we had imagined!  

In case you missed being part of the jamboree, here’s a wrap of what went down over the last two days:

Celebrity speakers:

The twin highlights of the event were the keynote speech by our founder and CEO Girish Mathrubootham, and his fireside chat with our special guest – ace footballer, captain, and legend John Terry.

John-Terry-at-Refresh-19

Girish, in his keynote that kicked off the conference, spoke about the future of customer engagement, customer experience, and why experience matters.

Girish unveiled Freshworks’ new brand identity and brand promise – Customer for Life – and took the audience through the key trends that are shaping the future of customer engagement – customer 360, collaborations, and artificial intelligence (AI).  

customer-for-life-software-by-freshworks

Freshworks has been known for its unique company culture, and its vision to inculcate a culture that helps teams deliver moments of wow to their customers.

It was fitting that someone who constantly delivered moments of wow – football legend John terry – was a special speaker at the conference.  

You might be wondering what John Terry has in common with a SaaS company, but being a winner on the pitch isn’t too different from being a winner with a business.

What has remained constant through his time as a football player, captain, and now a coach, has been his ability to create a winning culture among his team. And that is exactly what we at Freshworks are doing — trying to create a culture where teams deliver moments of wow to their customers, thereby winning customers for life.

Terry and Girish discussed leadership, football, and more in an inspiring, energetic, and humorous conversation on stage.  

john-terry-at-refresh-19-freshworks'-user-conference

john-terry-at-refresh-19

Knowledge sessions:

Aside from the two star sessions, we had industry experts from companies such as Amazon Web Services, Travix, ThinkJar, Service Desk Institute, and our in-house experts at Freshworks talk about different aspects of customer experience, IT service management, and sales and marketing.

customer-experience-matters

We had industry analyst Esteban Kolsky speak about the dynamics of engagement, be it customer engagement or employee engagement, and had Mirjam Van Den Berg, VP – customer operations at Travix interview with Simon Johnson, the general manager of Freshworks in the UK.  

On the second day of our conference, we had Steven Bryen, senior technical evangelist at Amazon Web Services (AWS), our title sponsor, talk about the future of customer experience and artificial intelligence (AI) and how Amazon innovates with machine learning.

fireside-chat-sessions-at-refresh-19

Product tracks:

Given that we have people from multiple domains participating in the conference, we had subject-specific talks. We had experts both from within Freshworks and elsewhere cull out important trends in each of their domains and share their thoughts with the audience.

The customer experience track had sessions on subjects such as omnichannel support, the importance of putting the customer back in customer experience, and building customer loyalty.

The IT service management track handled topics such as the evolution of self-service, importance of employee experience, and the ITIL 4.

The sales and marketing track discussed the use of automation in your customer relationship management (CRM) process, and the best ways to use the multiple features that our product offers.

The attendees also got to hear from our product managers what Freshworks has in store for Freshdesk, Freshservice, and Freshsales, and had the opportunity to chat with the different product managers.

 

Hands-on workshops, roundtable sessions, experience centres:

Our participants also got the opportunity to take part in hands-on workshops and learn about the different Freshworks products and the various features. From rapid fire quiz rounds to crossword challenges, the workshops were designed to see to it that the attendees had  fun while learning about the products. And our attendees seem to love it! 

workshops-at-refresh-19-Freshworks'-user-conference

They told us that they enjoyed learning about the new features our products offer, and learn how they can customize those features for their company.

We also had our participants walk around our lively experience and exhibit centre to take a look at the demos of the different products in the Freshworks suite, and experience Freshworks’ solutions first-hand.

experience-center-at-refresh-19

Customer love, ‘wow’ moments:

Hundreds of customers from across the globe joined us to make sure the event is a success. Here are some snippets that show how wowed they were by Freshworks and the Refresh conference in London. 

Treasure hunts, Freshworks swag, after-party:

What’s a conference without fun and partying!

During the day, we made sure that  all participants got a chance to cool off between sessions, and enjoy treats at our ice cream and donut trucks.  

trucks-at-refresh-19

donut-truck-at-refresh-19

And once the conference was done, we got all the participants together to experience something they probably never had experienced before.

 

From an Indo-western live Bhangra band and mind blowing acrobatic performances by Cirque du soleil, to personalised poetry writing sessions and live ice sculpting, the Refresh after-party was truly a fitting wrap to a grand day! 

freddy-the-cool-omnibot-at-refresh-9

Freshworks focuses on going the extra mile and deliver moments of ‘wow’. So we decided to thank everyone who took time off to join us at Refresh 19 at make it a grand success by giving them cute Freshworks swag that will serve as reminders of the two great days they had at Refresh 19.

swag-box-at-refresh-19-by-Freshworks

And that wraps up Freshworks’ first user conference in the UK! We thank all our attendees and sponsors for joining us to make this event a grand success! We can’t wait to meet you all again at Las Vegas soon!

 

 

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