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Every year AkzoNobel launches "The Color of the Year," a global campaign that needs to be rolled out across 60 markets at lightning speed. In such a case, how do you ensure scalable, efficient and personalized content creation? Together with Full Force Digital, AkzoNobel developed a digital approach that brings marketing and commerce together. Joris Vollebergh, VP of Digital Commerce Solutions at AkzoNobel, and Eric van der Hoeven, co-founder and co-owner of Full Force Digital, talk about it in the video collection Digital commerce: trends and challenges.

AkzoNobel has gone through an extensive digital transformation. The challenge was a fragmented technical landscape, stemming in part from the company's history of bringing together diverse organizations and business units (nine currently, previously more). This resulted in as many as 300 branded websites running on different technologies. This technical landscape made innovation, speed, consistency and harmony in their branding difficult.

The goal of the digital approach was to create scalable, efficient and personalized content communications. The company wanted to bring marketing and commerce together. Especially for large campaigns such as the global Color of the Year campaign, rolled out across 60 markets, a faster, more automated approach was needed.

The approach involved implementing a harmonized approach to marketing and publishing. A key component was optimizing the content supply chain, from creative idea to a relevant message to the customer. Automation and exploring Generative AI allowed AkzoNobel to easily adapt content to specific countries, languages and settings.

The impact of this transformation was significant, according to Vollebergh: A 60 percent faster turnaround time from content creation to publication. Fewer people were involved in the chain (agencies, creative and technical people) and the ability emerged to publish to 48 markets at the push of a button.

The biggest obstacles were not primarily in the technology itself, both table guests say. The complexity was in connecting different disciplines (technology, data, content creation) that often function as separate worlds. It required a new way of working, different processes, new governance and new capabilities, which called for a reorientation of the organization and a shift from an offline to a digital marketing mindset. To support employees through the rapid technological changes, they implemented a digital activation support team.

"Start small, but think holistically about the end goal and the whole chain," says Vollebergh. Crucial to success was making the end customer more central. This goal - becoming more relevant to the customer and better achieving business goals - proved to be a unifying force across departments.

The focus now is on deepening the customer journey, leveraging new channels such as social apps and AI platforms (e.g. ChatGBT), and recognizing that digital transformation is also relevant and driving change in the B2B sector, where buyers are increasingly digital. The journey continues, full speed ahead.

The video AkzoNobel reduces campaign turnaround time by 60% through AI and automation is free to watch after registering.

© The Content Exchange, source News