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Retail Success Story
Challenge: Agency Cost Optimization
A global retailer needed to retool its legacy marketing systems and establish agency cost-optimization. These systems were inefficient in supporting collaboration, asset sharing and similar work processes across the company’s widespread locations. Such inefficiencies included utilizing 10 separate platforms and tools to orchestrate marketing plans, strategies and work processes, as well as a separate production system with the company’s creative agency.
Our client needed a partner to implement and integrate an enterprise work management software with customized and personalized API automation functionality specific to their marketing business, and to train users within the organization and within the creative agency. They needed a partner who could:
- Understand and help solve their unique marketing challenges
- Model detailed sales and marketing “as is” processes and develop “to be” processes
- Design and automate custom extensions for custom fields, templates, budget management and reporting
- Help align core team members, engaging sponsors and agency staff
- Create a customized business solution that specifically addressed the company’s marketing challenges, and that would be thoroughly adopted and enthusiastically utilized across several global markets and between the company and creative agency
Primary Objectives
- Process Efficiency
- Reduce Cycle Time
- Improve Productivity
- Standardization
At CapabilitySource we believe that the difference between a good and great technology happens at the user experience level. Why settle for good when you can have great?
Solution
The CapabilitySource team approached the challenge with a proven methodology applied across People, Processes, technology and Information that allowed us to:
- Focus on upfront user engagement and change management
- Engage through personal interaction with six different CapabilitySource specialists, including executives, business analysts, configuration specialists and custom application developers
- Utilize organizational design and process design best practices
- Apply Lean Six Sigma best practices to determine personalized collaborative work management technology configurations
- Extend out-of-the-box enterprise work management software using the CapabilitySource Connect automation platform to build custom pluggable applications that eliminate complex and time-consuming manual tasks
- Design and implement API automations for customized forms, workflow templates, standardized work requests and campaign templates
- Develop and deliver custom on-site user training
- Provide ongoing support and hosting of MarTech solutions, API automations and extensions.
Custom Application
CapabilitySource started the engagement with insights from a pre-project prototype. Leading structured, on-site discovery sessions with both the company and creative agency team members, we developed an integrated, to-be process design that met the needs of both. The to-be process design leveraged both out-of-the-box enterprise work management functionality and CapabilitySource Connect custom application functionality. It fully replaced 10 legacy systems that were in place at the time.
The solution was configured to enable and automate the specific and individualized end-to-end processes into one system used across countries, organizations, creative agencies and the enterprise. In addition, off-the-shelf extensions were customized and personalized, extending the boundaries of implementations and automations that met unique user experience needs.
The final solution design included:
- 70+ standard workflow templates
- Integrated creative and content briefs
- Integrated marketing communications plans
- Standardized work requests across marketing, sales and training departments
- Custom reporting
- Standardized job codes and names
- Standardized web asset names
- Dynamically generated and integrated translation activities
- Dynamically automated assembly of campaign templates
- Automated job pricing, costing and approvals for real-time campaign cost management
Results
The project delivered successful consolidation of 10 marketing systems and the addition of new agency cost-optimization functionality. By utilizing CapabilitySource Connect as well as a proven methodology applied across People, Processes, technology and Information, CapabilitySource helped more than 350 marketers adopt a modern digital work management solution.
Agency costs and trade-offs were defined and greatly simplified. Automations enabled cycle time reduction so time to market was reduced. Alignment was realized between the client and agency eco-system. The client was able to regain control of agency services spend per individual marketing initiatives, resulting in overall cost-optimization.
We have a powerful work management platform, and by utilizing add-in tools such as CapabilitySource Connect, we have been able to extend the capabilities and improve internal processes. We’ve realized automated complex project setups, including campaign generation and duplication, job translation, integrations with outside creative agencies, and integrations with various internal platforms.
Head of Digital Operations, International Retail Client
