Recap of the first Bloomreach User Group DACH

Even though Bloomreach has been working with a variety of high profile customers from Germany, Austria and Switzerland for a while now, until last week there had never been a chance for them to come together and meet their fellow Bloomreach users.

This is why on March 28, we organized the first Bloomreach DACH User Group at our customer Bayerischer Fußball Verband (Bavarian Football Association) in Munich. The attendees of the meeting included delegates from FC Bayern Munich, L-Bank, Lagerhaus, Baywa and HellermannTyton.

As the host of the meeting, BFV kicked it off with a presentation about their digital journey. The association connects all amateur football clubs in the state of Bavaria, and their aim is to utilize modern digital tools to connect the players with their clubs as well as with the association itself.

They are enabling thousands of football enthusiasts every week with match schedules, rankings and real life updates. They explain how they leverage user generated content like footage that was filmed alongside the field with mobile phones to assemble accurate recaps of every single amateur match.

Although one challenge BFV faces is finding a middle ground between having a strong central portal and enabling individual teams to present themselves through their channels.

After BFVs presentation, Bloomreach Product Manager, Gijs Hendrix, presented the latest Bloomreach roadmap to inform the attendees about upcoming product updates and longer term innovations to be expected.

This kicked off a lively discussion on product features, use cases and other product related topics like getting customers to login to receive better services. Also new touch points, like voice services, were discussed with some customers already experimenting in this field.

Over drinks, the conclusion was that the first DACH User Group was definitely a success and an added value for German speaking customers so there will definitely be a part II.