Case Study: Genesis of WATCH Media
WATCH Media is a purposeful media venture started when Equality Moonshot—a consortium of impact investors, government and business officials, along with MAP Digital as its technical director—realized in the early days of the COVID-19 lockdown that this was the perfect time to “pass the torch” to Generation Z and help them shape the discourse in building a sustainable and equitable world.
Key challenges
The Equality Moonshot’s aim is to have women capture at least 30% of the investments and wealth created from the estimated 25 trillion dollars that will be spent in the next two decades to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals 2030. In late March, their investor and female founder conference at the Global Summit of Women in Bangkok was cancelled. The EM team was now left without a global stage. Meanwhile, a collaboration between MAP Digital and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School was progressing.
Strategy
The pilot program of WATCH Media, #ReBootRoundtable: Post Covid-19 Opportunities with Global Thought Leaders was structured as a 60-minute news program with WATCH Media co-hosts interviewing four key members of the Equality Moonshot about their advice to Gen-Z for leading the charge to build a better world. The Equality Moonshot speakers were captured live from Shanghai, Munich, and New York.
Dr. Mariana Bozesan
Brought the internet to Europe; Full Member of the Club of Rome, Co-founder of AQAL Capital; Europe’s Female Angel Investor of 2019.
Tess Mateo
Senior Advisor to the UN on Climate and Gender; contributing author of the UN SGDs and UN Global Compact; serial entrepreneur; Former Director, PricewaterhouseCoopers’s Office of the Global CEO.
Jill Faherty Lloyd
Managing Director and Financial Advisor at Evercore Wealth Management; Champion of women investors; Served for ten years as President of the Board at educational arts foundation, ASAP; Current member of the New York Society of Security Analysts, IGNITE, SheEO, High Water Women, and 100 Women in Finance.
Peggy Liu
Chairperson of JUCCCE, leading US-China collaboration to scale sustainable innovation; Best-selling author of “Mesmerize the Media: Maximize Your Impact With more Press”; World Economic Forum Young Global Leader; Awarded the “Nobel” of climate change, the “Hillary Step.”
MAP Digital’s team directed the virtual event and provided technical support, speaker management, and live streaming on their MetaMeetings platform. The WATCH Media team invited a number of their colleagues into the livestream to ask their questions directly of the speakers and to field questions from the worldwide audience.
The inaugural WATCH was supported pre-event by a strong social media campaign, especially on Instagram, and by an email campaign and press release. The live virtual event had nearly 300 webcast attendees, asking 18 questions and downloading 97 articles and reports such as The Club of Rome’s “Transformation is Feasible.” Post-event, WATCH Media edited a series of video snippets from the key thought leaders and conducted an integrated social media campaign, encouraging viewers to visit the WATCHMedia MetaMeetings website to watch whole sessions, review reports and to “Talk to Watch.”
MetaMeetings features
Customization
MAP Digital’s team of software engineers and designers customized all aspects of the MetaMeetings platform to match WATCH’s branding.
Interactivity
WATCH Media’s content, powered by MetaMeetings, engaged its audience before, during and after the event. MAP’s team set up polling capabilities and a online question box labeled “Talk to WATCH” for attendees to use to contact WATCH or get in touch with its panelists. WATCH Media’s social accounts were embedded onto the MetaMeetings page, allowing attendees to follow live conversations and encouraging them to participate in discussions. Prior to the event, WATCH’s team reached out to Millennials and Gen-Zers to submit questions to the panelists and, during the event, even allowed attendees to virtually join the conversation to ask their questions directly to the panel.
Outcome
MAP Digital successfully launched WATCH Media’s inaugural virtual event and brought together both Equality Moonshot and WATCH Media for a diverse, multi-generational and global audience dedicated to build a better future for this world. Now, MAP Digital has passed the torch fully to WATCH Media to develop their own team and programming, with a pledge to continue its mentorship with technical support and access to world leaders and influencers via MAP Digital’s other pro bono social responsibility projects.
Even in the midst of global crisis, such as the world witnessed with the COVID-19 pandemic, the power of people convening to problem solve through a live or virtual event helped WATCH Media find its voice for building a better world.
“Great stuff, this first event, really. Thanks. I actually cried a tiny bit during the panel because it is great to see that successful women invite a community like this to connect and share experience and knowledge while also sending out a call for action to think and act sustainably. Great narrative, really.”
—Eva F. from Zurich, Switzerland
“Congratulations on a very professionally presented and fascinating virtual event. My daughter and I were most impressed by the quality of the contributors, by how the technology brought everyone together, and by the in-vision presence of the questioners…so much better than having questions read by anchors. My daughter learned a lot, as did I. It was especially interesting for me to hear about virtual internships!”
—Alun D. from Strasbourg, France
“The event was so well presented and appeals to a wide range of age groups!”
—Mary D. from South Carolina, USA