Proud to Thank Canada’s Physicians for 50 Remarkable Years.

OTTAWA, Sept. 26, 2019,/CNW/ – MD Financial Management Inc. celebrates its 50th year today as the only national financial services firm exclusively dedicated to the financial well-being of physicians and their families. To mark this milestone, we are proud to give thanks where it is due – to Canada’s doctors.
Canadians are invited to join us and recognize a doctor who has made a difference in their life by signing a digital thank-you card at ThankYou Doctors.ca. Add your voice to the many Canadians who have already said thank you.

MD Financial Management ThankYouDoctors Kiosk in Toronto, Ontario (CNW Group/MD Financial Management Inc.)

Every day across Canada, physicians care for patients in remarkable and life-changing ways.

One of MD’s own wants to thank the doctor who helped save the life of her son when he was just three months old:

“I want to give my heartfelt thanks for the treatment and care that the physicians at CHEO (Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario) gave to my son and my family,” said Rebecca Ford, Organization Development Coordinator at MD. “My son was admitted to the ICU with severe dehydration and, ultimately, he needed an emergency intraosseous infusion procedure to stabilize him. After many tests and sleepless nights, he was eventually diagnosed with a severe cows milk protein allergy. Hearing that your three-month-old has to live with a potentially life-altering allergy can be overwhelming for anyone. But thanks to the planning, guidance, and monitoring of the staff at CHEO, he is now a healthy 4½-year-old with absolutely zero allergies or intolerances — who enjoys as much cheese and milk as his mom lets him get his hands on!”

We’re proud to say thank you to Canada’s physicians

“We recognize that doctors make some of the most important moments and milestones in our lives possible,” said Brian Peters, President and Chief Executive Officer of MD Financial Management. “We are proud of our 50 years of experience exclusively supporting physicians at every step of their lives and careers — from medical school through retirement. Inspired by how they work tirelessly for their patients’ well-being, we continue to work with them to help them achieve their financial goals.”
While much has changed since 1969, one thing has remained constant: MD’s commitment to acting in the best interests of Canada’s physicians.

About MD Financial Management Inc.

With 50 years of physician-focused experience, MD Financial Management has one main goal: to help Canada’s physicians achieve financial well-being.

MD has more than $50 billion in assets under administration as of September 20, 2019, and is dedicated to serving Canada’s physicians and their families. MD Financial Management provides financial products and services, the MD Family of Funds and investment counseling services through the MD Group of Companies. For a detailed list of these companies, visit md.ca.

MD Management Limited was the first of the MD Group of Companies to be founded, in 1969. MD Financial Management Inc. wholly owns MD Management Limited. For a detailed list of the MD Group of Companies, visit md.ca.

SOURCE MD Financial Management Inc.

For further information: Media contact: Yali N’Diaye, External Communications Manager, yali.ndiaye@md.ca, 613 813-7361

Source: https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/proud-to-thank-canada-s-physicians-for-50-remarkable-years-805394500.html

EXPERIENTIAL MARKETING CAMPAIGNS: TOP MISTAKES TO AVOID

Brands are pouring more and more money these days into experiential marketing campaigns. Although social media engagement is still a strong tool, in-person interactions are proving much more useful in driving sales. But treating your experiences like a conference or tradeshow booth won’t give you the success you’re looking for. Whether it’s a whimsical display that caters to the senses or interactive gaming stations that invoke fun and laughter, there’s a ton of ways to get creative. To help ensure your experiential event is a success, we’ve come up with a list of common mistakes to avoid.

Mistake #1: Not understanding the customer experience

If you want customers to stay loyal, you must invest in the customer experience. When you put the consumer first, the rewards are immense. When using experiential marketing campaigns, you must go beyond handing out promotions and free samples.

It’s all about catering to needs and desires instead. You must foster positive emotions in people, even if those positive emotions are not directly linked to the product or service you’re selling. Simply put, you want potential customers to associate your brand with a certain feeling. That feeling must make them feel confident, worthy and fulfilled.

So when designing your experience, it’s helpful to momentarily forget about how you can get a sale out of your customers. Focus on how to make them feel good and appreciated instead.

Mistake #2: Lack of big-picture thinking

Avoid viewing each experience as a one-off event. Rather, think of your marketing campaign on a macro level. Plan out how each experience will tie into your overarching business objectives. Use the leverage from your experiential event to launch other marketing initiatives that will keep the dialogue going. After all, retaining customers is sometimes more valuable than acquiring new ones. Build off your experiential event to strengthen your relationships:

• 1.Give more value than you take. The more value a customer can draw from your experience, the better their perceived relationship with your brand will be.
• 2.Reward loyal customers. Spend money on customers who keep coming back to your brand; the feeling of exclusivity will empower them, making their business feel valued.
• 3.Bring customers into the boardroom. Get feedback from loyal customers who know your business; they’ll happily do it because they’ll want to be involved in improving the products they already love

Mistake #3: No chances for audience engagement

When planning your experiential campaign, think of all the ways in which participants can engage with your brand. Give your audience a world-class experience with big, bright visuals they can interact with. Gaming stations, video walls, and free Internet connectivity are all useful ways to get customers involved. Make sure your activations are bold enough to invoke curiosity. Here are some of the ways in which you can engage your audience:

• 1.Live videocast capabilities using Facebook Live and Periscope
• 2.Green screen photo/video booths with social media connectivity
• 3.Touchscreen surveys with incentives and instant giveaways
• 4.Virtual Reality (VR) headsets

Hire a company like Big Digital that specializes in impactful displays to help you achieve successful results. A good experiential campaign should put your customers on a ‘journey’ they’ll remember for a long time.

Mistake #4: Not leveraging the power of social media influencers

Your experiential campaign must have a strong social media strategy in order to be relevant and successful. Influencers are social media users who have a strong following, usually with credibility in a certain area. Never underestimate their power. When you connect with an influencer who loves your brand, you can bet they’ll spread the word. A good portion of your marketing strategy should focus on finding and cultivating influencers. Here are some added benefits of leveraging these powerhouses:

• 1.Content shared by an influencer does not feel spammy or aggressive
• 2.Average people trust the opinions of influencers nearly as much as friends and family
• 3.They have a large following of very specific audiences that your brand can tap into

To find social media influencers, use hashtags to find ones that are already interested in your product. Search hashtags that are relevant to your company or target market. Then reach out to those who have the Top Posts for that particular tag. You can also search through your own social media followers to see if any of them have a large following themselves. You’ll have an easier time convincing them to promote your brand if they’re already a huge fan.

By avoiding the above pitfalls, you can ensure your experiential marketing campaign has covered all its bases. As mentioned before, never think of your experience as a one-off event. Instead, think of it as the foundation of a solid marketing strategy.

For more information about pop-up marketing solutions, call Big Digital at 1-855-621-2842 or contact us here.

BIG DIGITAL WANTS TO MAKE EVENT SIGNAGE ‘BEAUTIFUL’

  Serial entrepreneur Mike Girgis has returned to digital out-of-home advertising with a new startup media shop slash experiential agency, formally launching this week under the name Big Digital.

Rather than wading into the already crowded market for digital outdoor, Big Digital plans to focus on portable, temporary and small-scale activations for conferences, retail pop-ups and seasonal displays. It won’t just provide screens, but will consult with clients to design custom content for them.

Girgis told Marketing he got the idea for a service-oriented OOH shop back in his days at OneStop Media, the OOH network he co-founded in 2005. Retail and event-focused clients OneStop worked with couldn’t always make big investments in high-tech, big-screen displays that they only planned to use a few times a year. But, there weren’t opportunities for renting that kind of equipment either — all the digital signage companies OneStop looked into working with only had pricey permanent displays available.

Another big pain point for clients that wanted digital displays for conferences was that they had to coordinate the effort between the AV team that owned the equipment, the creative agency that designed the content, and whoever showed up on site to set everything up, Girgis said. Most of the time, they were doing it without any way to measure its effectiveness.

Big Digital claims it can do all three. “If you could take an AV company and a creative agency and mash them up, that’s probably Big Digital,” Girgis said. “We’ve got digital strategists in-house, and we’ve been doing digital out-of-home for fourteen years, so we understand the tech.”

EMPHASIS ON PORTABILITY AND EASE

If you still think of out-of-home as a traditional media format, you won’t after seeing Big Digital’s standup displays. The team has spent the past 18 months building and testing a range of modular sets that combine up to 12 widescreen LCD screens, as well as LED backlighting, 3G network connectivity, and wifi access points for communicating with nearby devices.

The standard format displays are all named after friendly famous elephants, to make them more memorable and less intimidating. But the modularity gives them a lot of flexibility as well, Girgis said. The aluminum frames can be quickly resized and the signs can be adjusted to create entranceways, digital shelving, or in-store endcaps. Big Digital took inspiration from IKEA’s do-it-yourself philosophy — they’re designed to be set up and taken down in under an hour, by anyone who can read the instruction booklet.

They’re also all brandable, with space for the client to physically white-label each sign with a logo and company name. “We want it to look like the client has spent a lot of money,” he said.

ALL-IN-ONE CREATIVE AND ANALYTICS

Rather than pitching itself on tech, Big claims its approach is consultative and content-first, more like an experience design agency. In-house strategists figure out what the client’s goals are, whether it’s putting a product or brand on display in high-definition or getting conference attendees to approach and engage with a booth or sponsorship activation. Then, they customize the physical display and design the client’s content around those goals.

The last, crucial component to its service is analytics. According to VP and co-founder Jeff Wismer, Big Digital uses wifi hotspots to track when people (or more accurately their mobile phones) are dwelling near the display. Post-activation, Big Digital will report on how many people engaged with a client’s displays, which activation performed best, and when each one saw the most traffic.

Wismer said for a lot of event organizers, analytics usually extend to number of tickets sold and no-shows. For such a big investment, marketers and sponsors want to see measurable results. Foot traffic heatmapping — the same kind that retailers are starting to do to figure out which of their displays and products are performing best — can add a lot more measurability to events, he said. Big Digital’s reports tell clients how many people showed up, but also what time they showed up, what presentations and showrooms they attended, and when they headed to the bar.

“We’ve heard the numbers from some of our clients, who build these booths and have 50 shows a year,” said Girgis. “You think about the number they’re spending — with no analytics!”
Beyond conferences and events, Big Digital sees an opportunity in the growing popularity of temporary storefronts and pop-up shops. The idea is Big Digital’s one-stop offering is an easy way to add digital flare to a pop-up at a mall or festival, plus the kind of measurability that big-box stores are starting to add. For Me2We’s pop-ups, Big Digital’s screens add an extra layer of big-brand credibility, plus the ability to put a number to the passersby that were drawn inside.

Big Digital’s also experimenting with interactivity, using Kinekt, as well as screens that can stand up to outdoor exposure. Girgis said he sees temporary digital billboards in the company’s future.
Big Digital will run alongside Girgis’ ongoing content analytics venture with Deborah Hall, Dive Networks (formerly Performance Content Group).

Source: http://marketingmag.ca/media/big-digital-wants-to-make-event-signage-beautiful-144719/

Luminosity Gaming partners with BIG Digital to launch first of its kind eSports and gaming experience

Luminosity Gaming, one of the largest and most successful esports organizations in North America, has partnered with experiential technology company BIG Digital to develop an innovative first-of-its-kind interactive gaming activation and experience, with the first event taking place recently at Bud Light Dreams Festival on June 29 and 30, 2019.

Dreams is a two-day, three-stage outdoor sensorial celebration of Toronto’s music and arts community. Luminosity, well known for its overwhelming success in engaging with esports and gaming fans, landed at Dreams with its mobile tour that included interactive touchscreen gameplay, on-site gaming stations and merchandise sales.

“We believe there is a massive intersection of fans between the worlds of gaming and music. Our launch and presence at Dreams validated that belief. We received an overwhelmingly positive response throughout the weekend and can’t wait to replicate this success at other events in the future,” said Steve Maida, founder and president of Luminosity Gaming.

The esports category is exploding and becoming one of the most requested categories that brands want to activate against. BIG and Luminosity are building programs and products that educate brand partners and provide an easy entry point to connect with Luminosity audiences.

“The intent is to provide the esports experience to a wider range of audience groups. A key aspect was designing mobile and flexible structures for customizing the experience. The combination of gaming containers and digital technology, including a giant LED billboard and pop-up digital screens, featured Luminosity content that showcased team and player segments as well as a curated social conversation to festival attendees. A Wi-Fi network enabled mobile contesting and further interactions and engagement by the attendees,” said Michael Girgis, co-founder of BIG Digital.
Luminosity‘s success in connecting with a music-focused audience is not new. In April 2019, Grammy-nominated artist Tory Lanez joined Luminosity’s ownership group. As an ambassador for the franchise, Lanez continues to engage with fans, grow the brand, create content, and help the franchise continue its track record of success through creative ideas and by leveraging Tory’s wealth of experience in the music industry.

In addition to the launch at Dreams, Luminosity has recently made multiple game-changing moves:
The Official LG Fortnite House, a content hub and house in Florida featuring four of the most popular and innovative creators in gaming, launched on June 16, 2019. Formula, Kiwiz, Nicks, and Randumb joined an already stacked roster of Luminosity creators, bringing with them over 900,000 Twitter followers, 7 million YouTube followers, and close to 1 billion total video views. With their addition, the Luminosity online fanbase increased from approximately 50 million to approximately 58 million followers in total.

On May 31, 2019, Luminosity Gaming and Enthusiast Gaming announced a proposed merger. The merger and partnership includes eight esports teams (including Luminosity’s management of the Vancouver Titans Overwatch League franchise), 40 esports and gaming influencers, 80+ gaming media websites, and 900+ YouTube and Twitch channels, and will create a globally leading organization that will produce the best and most engaging experiences for a massive audience of approximately 200 million.

As the franchise continues its growth mission by investing in new teams, players, streamers, and influencers, stay connected with Luminosity for updates:

ABOUT LUMINOSITY GAMING:

Luminosity Gaming (LG) is a North American professional esports organization. Founded in 2015 in Canada by Steve Maida with the goal of giving aspiring competitive gamers sustainable careers, the company now hosts some of the best professional gamers in the World. Luminosity has teams and championships in game titles such as Fortnite, Counter-Strike, Call of Duty, Overwatch, PUBG, Halo, Madden, and more. Luminosity scouts for and hires players and teams who compete on the company’s behalf in tournaments online and in arenas around the world for prize money. Through those efforts, Luminosity has grown to be one of the largest and most successful esports organizations, not only in North America but in the world.


ABOUT BIG DIGITAL:

BIG Digital is a leader in experiential media and marketing technologies, providing top brands, retailers, and venues with the latest digital and interactive solutions. As the industry leader in digital out-of-home and interactive activations since 2001, BIG Digital enables all types of brands to engage audiences in unique and immersive ways. BIG Digital’s tech-based approach to creating and executing innovative campaigns using pop-up and permanent videowalls, projection mapping, augmented reality, and touchscreen kiosks continues to fuel the company’s leadership in the marketing, out-of-home, and retail verticals.


Source: https://europeangaming.eu/portal/press-releases/2019/07/09/50050/luminosity-gaming-partners-with-big-digital-to-launch-first-of-its-kind-esports-and-gaming-experience/

Luminosity Gaming seeks to bring new audiences to esports

Luminosity Gaming has partnered with Big Digital to launch gaming activation sessions.

Luminosity and Big Digital are looking to bring esports closer to mainstream media and a wider esports audience by providing that audience with a more interactive experience. The partnership aims to share the esports experience to a broader audience by combining gaming containers and digital technology.

Luminosity is focusing on music audiences, as they believe there is a large intersection between the gaming and musical worlds. Luminosity’s mobile setup with gaming stations and merchandise stalls was present at the recent Bud Light Dreams Festival. The mobile setup allows Luminosity to promote its teams and players and provides it with many channels of interaction with the audience, such as mobile contests and lotteries.

Bud Light’s Dream Festival took place in Toronto on June 29. It was a three-day long outdoor music festival at which Luminosity’s project received generally positive responses from attendees.

The partnership is also working towards educating its brand partners about the esports industry and marketplace.

Luminosity has been working hard to contribute to the growth of esports, especially in terms of connecting with different non-endemic audience groups. Grammy-nominated artist Tory Lanez has been helping Luminosity engage with more fans and grow the brand further as the organization’s brand ambassador and a part of its ownership group since April 2019.

Luminosity also announced the Official LG Fornite House located in Florida in June. Alex "Formula" Kushelevskiy, John "Kiwiz" Payne, Nick "Nicks" Spoerke, and Jordan "Randumb" Schneider have collectively boosted the brand with over one billion views on YouTube, seven million Youtube subscribers, and over 900,000 Twitter followers.

Big Digital is a provider of interactive design solutions in North America and is a leader in the digital marketing industry. Its specialty is turning marketing initiatives into interactive campaigns that help monetize digital programs.

Referral link:

https://win.gg/news/1607/luminosity-gaming-seeks-to-bring-new-audiences-to-esports

Luminosity Gaming and BIG Digital launch exciting new partnership at Bud Light Dreams Festival

Luminosity Gaming have announced a brand new partnership with technology company BIG Digital, with both parties aiming to create unique gaming experiences for players. 

The highly respected North America esports organization linked up with the technology company to launch the first of many gaming activation sessions at the Bud Light Dreams Festival, which ran between June 29 to June 30.

Following the festival, Steve Maida, founder and president of Luminosity Gaming, revealed the organization's ambition to bring an esports experience not only to more gamers, but also to branch out to a wider audience in the future.

The highly respected North America esports organization linked up with the technology company to launch the first of many gaming activation sessions at the Bud Light Dreams Festival, which ran between June 29 to June 30.


Following the festival, Steve Maida, founder and president of Luminosity Gaming, revealed the organization's ambition to bring an esports experience not only to more gamers, but also to branch out to a wider audience in the future.

"We believe there is a massive intersection of fans between the worlds of gaming and music. Our launch and presence at Dreams validated that belief," Maida said.

He added: "We received an overwhelmingly positive response throughout the weekend and can't wait to replicate this success at other events in the future."

Founded in February 2015, Luminosity Gaming have achieved remarkable success in the esports industry so far and BIG Digital is just one of many big businesses they are now affiliated to - with the likes of Scuf Gaming, Twitch, and Universal Music Canada all current sponsors.

This partnership is just the latest step taken by the esports organization to bridge the gap between esports and the mainstream, after signing Formula, Kiwiz, Nicks, and Randumbs creators in June. 
BIG Digital co-founder Michael Girgis echoed those same aspirations, too, and even gave esports fans and festival goers an idea of what to expect from this partnership moving forward.

"The intent is to provide the esports experience to a wider range of audience groups," Girgis said.

"The combination of gaming containers and digital technology, including a giant LED billboard and pop-up digital screens, featured Luminosity content that showcased team and player segments as well as a curated social conversation to festival attendees."

Attendees of Dreams, as well as events taking place later in the calendar year and beyond, will include Wi-Fi network enabled mobile contesting, pitting players against one another in an interactive setting.


Both businesses will be working closely together to ensure these experiences are increasingly interactive, with a view to potentially expand their audience to perhaps people that weren't interested in esports and gaming before.

Reference:
https://www.dexerto.com/gaming/luminosity-gaming-big-digital-launch-exciting-new-partnership-bud-light-dreams-festival-772502

Luminosity Gaming partners with BIG Digital to launch first of its kind esports and gaming experience at Dreams Music Festival

Luminosity Gaming, one of the largest and most successful esports organizations in North America, has partnered with experiential technology company BIG Digital to develop an innovative first-of-its-kind interactive gaming activation and experience, with the first event taking place recently at Bud Light Dreams Festival on June 29 and 30, 2019.

Dreams is a two-day, three-stage outdoor sensorial celebration of Toronto's music and arts community. Luminosity, well known for its overwhelming success in engaging with esports and gaming fans, landed at Dreams with its mobile tour that included interactive touchscreen gameplay, on-site gaming stations and merchandise sales.

"We believe there is a massive intersection of fans between the worlds of gaming and music. Our launch and presence at Dreams validated that belief. We received an overwhelmingly positive response throughout the weekend and can't wait to replicate this success at other events in the future," said Steve Maida, founder and president of Luminosity Gaming.

The esports category is exploding and becoming one of the most requested categories that brands want to activate against. BIG and Luminosity are building programs and products that educate brand partners and provide an easy entry point to connect with Luminosity audiences.

"The intent is to provide the esports experience to a wider range of audience groups. A key aspect was designing mobile and flexible structures for customizing the experience. The combination of gaming containers and digital technology, including a giant LED billboard and pop-up digital screens, featured Luminosity content that showcased team and player segments as well as a curated social conversation to festival attendees. A Wi-Fi network enabled mobile contesting and further interactions and engagement by the attendees," said Michael Girgis, co-founder of BIG Digital


Luminosity's success in connecting with a music-focused audience is not new. In April 2019, Grammy-nominated artist Tory Lanez joined Luminosity's ownership group. As an ambassador for the franchise, Lanez continues to engage with fans, grow the brand, create content, and help the franchise continue its track record of success through creative ideas and by leveraging Tory's wealth of experience in the music industry.

In addition to the launch at Dreams, Luminosity has recently made multiple game-changing moves:

• The Official LG Fortnite House, a content hub and house in Florida featuring four of the most popular and innovative creators in gaming, launched on June 16, 2019. Formula, Kiwiz, Nicks, and Randumb joined an already stacked roster of Luminosity creators, bringing with them over 900,000 Twitter followers, 7 million YouTube followers, and close to 1 billion total video views. With their addition, the Luminosity online fanbase increased from approximately 50 million to approximately 58 million followers in total.
• On May 31, 2019, Luminosity Gaming and Enthusiast Gaming announced a proposed merger. The merger and partnership includes eight esports teams (including Luminosity's management of the Vancouver Titans Overwatch League franchise), 40 esports and gaming influencers, 80+ gaming media websites, and 900+ YouTube and Twitch channels, and will create a globally leading organization that will produce the best and most engaging experiences for a massive audience of approximately 200 million.

As the franchise continues its growth mission by investing in new teams, players, streamers, and influencers, stay connected with Luminosity for updates:
Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | YouTube | Twitch | luminosity.gg

ABOUT LUMINOSITY GAMING
Luminosity Gaming (LG) is a North American professional esports organization. Founded in 2015 in Canada by Steve Maida with the goal of giving aspiring competitive gamers sustainable careers, the company now hosts some of the best professional gamers in the World. Luminosity has teams and championships in game titles such as Fortnite, Counter-Strike, Call of Duty, Overwatch, PUBG, Halo, Madden, and more. Luminosity scouts for and hires players and teams who compete on the company's behalf in tournaments online and in arenas around the world for prize money. Through those efforts, Luminosity has grown to be one of the largest and most successful esports organizations, not only in North America but in the world.

ABOUT BIG DIGITAL
BIG Digital is a leader in experiential media and marketing technologies, providing top brands, retailers, and venues with the latest digital and interactive solutions. As the industry leader in digital out-of-home and interactive activations since 2001, BIG Digital enables all types of brands to engage audiences in unique and immersive ways. BIG Digital's tech-based approach to creating and executing innovative campaigns using pop-up and permanent videowalls, projection mapping, augmented reality, and touchscreen kiosks continues to fuel the company's leadership in the marketing, out-of-home, and retail verticals.


Reference Link:
https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/luminosity-gaming-partners-with-big-digital-to-launch-first-of-its-kind-esports-and-gaming-experience-at-dreams-music-festival-822307551.html