Equal parts music festival, cram marathon and a family reunion, Dreamforce, Salesforce’s annual user conference and flagship marketing event, welcomed more than 45,000 attendees to its massive national park-themed campus around Moscone Center in San Francisco Sept. 17-19, with millions watching online.
What started as 2,000 people in a ballroom in 2003, has grown into a cultural phenomenon that finds ways to evolve at the speed of AI, which is now the company’s driving force while keeping its authenticity.
“Dreamforce is a true manifestation of the brand and the business together,” says Scott Burns, svp-head of creative at George P Johnson, agency lead on the event. “Everything from the content to design to architecture sets a precedent for how Salesforce shows up as a company, as a brand moving forward.”
Here’s the tricky part: Just weeks earlier, Salesforce announced a major bet on its new offering—Agentforce—a set of so-called AI “agents” that customers can program using the company’s existing software tools to automate various tasks. And Dreamforce was to be the launchpad. That meant that layouts had to be rearranged to accommodate the new zones and most of the messaging had to be changed out (and recycled) in record time.
EM was on-site to experience it all firsthand. We present the play-by-play.
1. Instant Vibe and Super-Fast Reg
Walking into Moscone West, along with multiple other entrances, Trailblazers—the community of the company’s customers, partners and employees—got right into the groove of things with DJs spinning tracks against splashy Agentforce messaging and futuristic scenes with the brand’s characters. It felt like entering a theme park for superfans where you never put your phone away.
This year, the event partnered with Wicket, a facial authentication platform, and about 60 percent of attendees opted into express badge pickup by providing their photo ahead of time. Once on-site, they could come up to a digital pass kiosk, get authenticated in seconds, and pick up their physical badge. Between 6 a.m. and 11 a.m. on the first day, some 14,000 attendees got through this process, according to GPJ.
2. Hyper-personalized Journeys
Dreamforce serves an entire ecosystem, so maximizing each attendee’s experience with a personalized agenda is crucial. Dreamforce accomplished that in several ways. First, with the app. In the past, Trail Maps generated in the app recommended sessions by role and industry. This year, Personalized Trail Maps took it a step further, with AI and machine learning-generated session recommendations tailored for each attendee. A recap of all activity was also available in the app.
Once on-site, attendees could connect with like-minded people in Lodges—special areas by roles, geographic location and communities—featuring discussions and building connections. A cool feature of the Lodge Village was Braindates, a peer-to-peer learning experience anyone could sign up for on the app and dive right into pressing topics in a one-on-one conversation.
With such an extensive campus, physically finding your way around could also be a challenge. The app was very helpful with its venue overview maps and interactive wayfinding. Or in the true spirit of a park: tree-like signage offered easy directions to the main buildings and key activations.
Wayfinding signage on the Dreamforce campus. (Photo: Anna Huddleston)
3. Success Through Customer Stories
“AI-enhanced Sales Propel Bombardier to Sky-high Revenue Growth,” read one of the banners overlooking the event. Dreamforce leveraged this customer-centric approach on multiple levels, from strategically positioned signage with examples by specific companies, to customer and partner show floor exhibits centered around solving for complex challenges.
High-end retailer Saks, for example, talked about delivering a personalized shopping experience using Salesforce’s tech in an activation that blended a stylish retail front and touchscreens to explore the AI-powered logistics of luxury. IBM Watsonx showcased paving the way to a collaborative and AI-driven future with a ping-pong-themed activation, using real-time data in a fun and engaging way.
4. Next-level Content Engagement
With high-profile speakers including NVIDIA’s Jensen Huang, Jane Goodall and Matthew McConaughey, much-anticipated keynotes, and hundreds of sessions, the amount of content produced during Dreamforce is staggering. Steamed live on Salesforce+, day one alone garnered more than 1 million views, according to NOMOBO, the broadcast partner with a full production studio on-site and remote. Soledad O’Brien anchored discussions with industry visionaries in a morning news-style set right on the show floor, a broadcast turned into activation. More than 400 sessions became available as video on demand. Would you rather listen over lunch? Tune in from anywhere on the app. No time to listen or watch? Many sessions offered key takeaways summary by Einstein, Salesforce’s AI.
5. Hands-on with Robots
With AI “agents” the stars of the event, it was not surprising that robots were everywhere—from walking around Dreamforest to serving chocolate-dipped waffles. But what was surprising was the intense hands-on experience in the Agentforce Launch Zone, where hundreds of attendees were seated at long tables and spent time building functional AI agent prototypes for their companies. Experts were on hand for guidance. More than 10,000 such autonomous agents were built on-site during the event.
6. Low-tech Ideation
With all the focus on robots, it was cool to see old-school touchpoints like the Idea Wall, where attendees could write their thoughts about using the Prompt Builder and Agent Builder (ironic!) on a card and pin them to the cork board, which was nearly filled by day two. The action was also in full swing around the LED whiteboards, where attendees could join their peers in collaborative workshops. Nobody was looking at their phone there.
7. Accessibility for All
Staffers ready to help people with special needs were available at every entrance. They could also get required services at the help desk and the neurodivergent community and anyone feeling a little overwhelmed could get noise-reducing earplugs and fidget toys. Designated cool-down spaces were available and most attendees who needed a minute to reset appreciated the calming setting with dimmed lights in the hallways between venues.
8. Not a Show Floor
For starters, it’s called Campground. And it feels nothing like a traditional show floor. A vibrant yet intimate space under sequoia-sized trunks was designed to be a common experience for Salesforce and its key partners. Color and targeted lights identified different areas by role to make it easier for attendees to find relevant offerings. Partner activations focused on integration with Salesforce. Cool features included an Industry Micro-Museum showcasing AI uses across different industries and a Salesforce+ production set that drew a crowd.
Content becomes an experience on the show floor. (Photo: Anna Huddleston)
9. Sustainability as a Core Value
One-hundred percent of graphics were recycled. The waterfall used 100 percent recycled water. And all of the meal packaging was 100 percent compostable. No beef or pork were served during meals, saving more than 10 million gallons of water. Attendees could offset their travel-related emissions with Net Zero Cloud and were encouraged to walk around the campus and to the Giants Ballpark.
10. ‘Dreamforest’ as Connective Space
This year, Howard Street in the middle of the Moscone campus was shut down and transformed into Dreamforest, complete with the iconic waterfall, nature sounds and live plants. After visiting busy indoor spaces, it was a welcoming space with live music sessions, tons of photo ops—when else will you get into a canoe with your coworkers—food, coffee, spaces to work and relax, and the social glue that makes this event so much fun.
Dreamforce Gives was on hand with opportunities to plant trees and put together water filters. UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals were accepting donations.
Brands also creatively leveraged this prime space. Accenture decked out its doubledecker here with a wine theme and offered a wine-making workshop with Futo Estate. Deloitte Digital brought a San Francisco-themed putt-putt activation. It was a perfect place to reflect that innovation and personalization are essential to driving engagement, and get inspired to blaze your trail.
And yes, the butterflies were real.
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