Why we made this report
So that the ideas and inspiration we took from Brand Week Istanbul keep guiding our work after the stages close. The report is a starting point for rethinking, questioning and building on the three days together.
Key findings
- 01While the progress of AI was on stage, several sessions tied success to understanding real people and to human judgement.
- 02From sports sponsorship to e-commerce, lasting impact is sought after the first contact: regular participation, repeat purchases and brand promises that are kept.
- 03The push for faster production came with a call for room to think, resources to experiment and decision space for employees.
- 04Test how AI represents your brand: build a test set from real customer questions and track visibility, misrepresentation and consistency separately.
- 05Align your measurement vocabulary: use shared definitions for views, sales attributed to the brand and the extra contribution actually created.
- 06Take research into the field: in your next brief, also listen to the repair technician, the service team and the users who rejected the idea.
Read it on the web
Read all 58 sessions day by day, filter by stage and search for a session, speaker or idea (in Turkish): Brand Week Istanbul 2026’dan Unutulmaması Gerekenler.
What’s in the report?
- Foreword, the three days in numbers and the topic map (p. 02)
- Day 1 · 4 November 2026: 22 records and three ideas from the day (pp. 03–15)
- Day 2 · 5 November 2026: 19 records and three ideas from the day (pp. 16–27)
- Day 3 · 6 November 2026: 17 records and three ideas from the day (pp. 28–38)
- Scope, how summaries and comments are separated, and source notes (p. 39)
On every session card
The stage and topic tags, a short summary, two key ideas and, in a separate box, the Gamechangers comment. Each day closes with three ideas we will take back to work and the sessions they are based on.
Three days, three questions
- Day 1: The brand of the future is being built in today’s way of working.
- Day 2: Growth’s new question: how do we connect with people?
- Day 3: Tools are speeding up; the difference comes from ideas that understand people.
What was discussed?
Customers and marketing (12), culture and storytelling (12), creativity and working life (10), strategy and economy (9), AI and technology (7), sport and sponsorship (4), awards and closing (4). This is an editorial grouping that counts each record once, under its main topic.
Scope and method
The report covers all 58 audio session summaries provided for Brand Week Istanbul 2026: 54 main sessions, 3 award segments and 1 closing show (22 / 19 / 17 by day). The summaries are not verbatim transcripts, and not every session in the official programme is in this archive. Session summaries and key ideas are editorial paraphrase; the Gamechangers comments and the three-ideas sections are our own assessment and should not be read as the speakers’ words or endorsement. The session images are representative illustrations made with AI. The report is in Turkish.
Want to apply it with your team?
To bring these ideas into your own brand’s plans, see our corporate training and workshops or write to us. Our report 10 Critical Platform Algorithms for Brands in 2027, first shared at Brand Week Istanbul 2026, is also in the Akademi. You can read about our work on the festival’s digital communication in our work.