3 Key Components That Build Centralization to Enable Modern Marketing Transformation

Transformation at any scale can be complicated and messy. It’s rife with opportunities to fail, with a recent estimated failure rate of 84% for digital transformations. However, refusing to transform can leave organizations in a worse position.

Marketing leaders know the feeling of change well: the number of marketing technology (MarTech) tools grew from 150 in 2011 to 9,500 in 2022, investment in data and analytics tools almost doubled since 2017, and highly relied upon cookies are being phased out.

Marketers who mature with these changes can expect significant returns on their investments. Data-centered marketers see 15% to 20% better results and organizations who focus on personalization could see increased purchases with 80% of consumers saying they will purchase more with personalization.

To prepare for personalization and data-driven marketing, organizations must adopt centralization among their partners and within their own organizations to deliver a loyalty-building customer experience (CX).

Modern Marketing Transformation for Customer Experience in Action

Credera partnered with over 17 other Omnicom agencies as a group agency to enable modern marketing transformation at a global luxury automotive manufacturer. To establish a sound foundation for transformation it was first necessary to transition the existing work from the current agency of record over to the new group agency, and to position it to achieve the automotive manufacturer’s goal of centralization of their marketing activity with “no balls dropped.”

With a focused transition and program leadership effort led by Credera, we helped guide the newly formed agency and automotive manufacturer toward readiness for the eventual handover of the current work. This spring boarded the modern marketing transformation efforts through personalization and loyalty- and brand-building efforts at scale.

The transition effort focused on three key components:

1. People: Get the right people with the right skills hired, onboarded, and trained to deliver marketing excellence.

2. Workstreams: Organize marketing activity into cohesive and manageable workstreams. Understand and improve existing processes for easy, ongoing use.

3. Technology: Document and detail the luxury automotive manufacturer’s existing MarTech infrastructure, understanding nuances that exist across markets, workstreams, and business units. Identify the right technology systems for the use case to enable the people and workstream initiatives.

Modern Marketing Transformation: People

In this case, Credera mobilized a program management office (PMO) and worked collaboratively with other agency leaders to onboard over 750 new team members prior to their group’s official launch date. Additionally, we supported the talent management leaders to organize more than 700 interviews and track hiring and onboarding key performance indicators to ensure operational readiness.

The PMO also collaborated with the luxury automotive manufacturer and key workstream leaders to design and deliver an effective training strategy and onboarding process for all team members to ensure a seamless experience for the agency group colleagues and the automotive manufacturer. This was key to developing the “agency model of the future” that supports quick responses to personalization needs and enables the automotive manufacturer to continue toward their marketing goals at pace with no interruption.

Credera deployed transition leads to work across regions and business units around the globe to create a seamless leadership transition. Alongside transition leads, the PMO streamlined and centralized recruitment tracking, which allowed for visibility at a global and regional scale.

To learn more about this component, explore this client story.

Modern Marketing Transformation: Workstreams

To enable success for the luxury automotive manufacturer, Credera and the rest of the agency organized all activity into 10 workstreams spanning four regions, five business units, and 44 markets. All activity was transitioned in 71 business days through documenting, pressure testing, and rehearsing usage of the systems, processes, and assets through “day-in-the-life” dry-run simulations.

Truly taking a “practice makes perfect” approach can minimize potential transformation failures and familiarize teams with new processes and operations.

To learn more about this component, explore this client story.

Modern Marketing Transformation: Technology

Understanding the existing technology landscape and identifying the right complimentary technology to enable transformation can be a critical decision in marketing transformation. Using coordinated efforts, the team set up a workflow management solution that tracks projects, campaigns, and deliverables across workstreams to enhance visibility for the marketing organization. With visibility comes flexibility to change for shifting customer expectations and delivering on the personalization promise.

To learn more about this component, explore this client story.

More About the Credera Difference

Modern marketing transformation doesn’t happen without a foundation of current technology, agile people, and clear workstream delineation. Once organizations have clear visibility into their processes and move with agility, then they can deliver on evolving customer expectations at scale and at pace. Designing and implementing an effective transition framework is key to succeed during mass scale modern marketing transformation.

As the saying goes, a challenge shared is a challenge halved. Better to half it with a partner you trust and enjoy. That was part of the difference in achieving marketing modern marketing transformation through these three components.

Credera offers the experience, expertise, and geographic reach of a global organization, with the culture and client partnerships of a boutique firm. We maintain a people-first mentality and a work environment deeply rooted in our core values.

To learn more, or to start a conversation, reach out to us at findoutmore@credera.com.

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