Technology has always held the promise of delivering high ROI and accelerating business results, and with the explosion of digital technologies available today, the opportunity has never been greater. However, many obstacles remain, limiting effectiveness and impact. What keeps the promise from being realized? This session will discuss the underlying dynamics surrounding this strategic issue and provide ideas for how business leaders can better leverage technology investments, enhance capabilities and accelerate business results within their organizations.

1. Realizing the Technology
Promise
What’s Holding Your Organization Back?
Bill Parkes
Founder and CEO,
Chief Digital Advisors
@BillParkes
Image source: J Lafferty

2. What’s Holding Your Company Back?
“We don’t have the capabilities or budget”
“Executive leadership doesn’t see this as a priority”
“Our current technology investments haven’t delivered”
“It’s too hard to drive change in our organization”
“It’s too confusing and complicated; how do we make
sense of it all?”

3. Key Steps to Realize the Promise
1. Prepare your Organization
2. Understand the New World
3. Structure for Success

4. Prepare Your Organization

5. Align Across the Executive Team
Vision
Expectations
(pacing)
Strategic KPI’s
(accountability, trust)
Baseline Metrics
(fact-based proof)

6. Adopt Best Practices to Build Capabilities,
Credibility and Confidence
(within existing resource and budget constraints!)
• Develop Personas
• Map Digital Customer Journey
Understand your
Customer
• Define the intersection between your customer’s
needs and your business or brand
• Define the roles of Paid, Owned and Earned digital
experiences
Clarify your
Content Strategy
• Optimize video content for sharing and discovery
• Evaluate content caching (CDN)
• Evolve current email strategy
• Many, many more…
Optimize
Experiences

7. Building a Case for Marketing
Automation Using Your Current ESP
• Define customer segments based on
personas, needs
Understand your
Customer
• Revise content strategy for customer-centric
relevance and value (by segment)
Clarify your
Content Strategy
• Optimize for mobile and tablet viewing
• Cross-promote between email and social
• Deliver personalized emails by segment
Optimize
Experiences

8. Understand the New World
Image source: SpaceX

9. Marketing Clouds are Maturing

10. Integration Constraints are Fading
Implication:
• Build your Digital Vision based on all data across
systems and sources being accessible and integrated

11. It’s about Configuration, not Coding
Implication:
• Planning, design and implementation can be led by the
Marketing organization (with support from IT)

12. Usability Has Become the Imperative
Ease of use
Functionality
Implication:
• Adopt intuitive systems to speed adoption and build
capability

13. Prepare for Liftoff
Image source: SpaceX

14. Business Strategy + Digital Vision
Where to play, how to win
Includes ‘role of digital’ in strategic planning
Marketing Objectives
Informed by Business Strategy and Digital Vision
Goals
Quantification of objectives to
‘set the bar’ on what defines
success
Measures
KPI’s to evaluate progress
Strategies
Identify the conscious choices
required to achieve goals
Operational Plans
Discrete activity sets to deliver
strategies
Focus Here
Not here!
Establish a Shared Vision

15. Define Your Governance Framework
Executive
Sponsors
Demand
Gen
IT
Legal Social
PR Brand
Content
Business
Lead
Technology
Lead
Key
Stakeholders
and Team
Project Team

16. Establish Clear Roles to Focus the
Team and Accelerate Decision Making
Name Role Responsibility
Internal Team Members
Anne P. Executive Sponsor • Budget approval
• Executive team alignment
• Ensure Brand identity, standards compliance
Jim S. Technology Strategy Lead • Initiative co-leader
Bob B. Business Strategy Lead • Initiative co-leader
Sean A. User Experience Lead • Usability best practices
• UX architecture, experience design
Sarah R. Project Manager • Manage critical path, communications
• Manage issues and risks; contingency planning
• Escalate issues to Leads, Sponsors as required
Agency Partners
Lee H. Creative Director • Concept development and build out oversight
Mike F. Producer • Production (project management)
Technology Partners
James B. Integration Architect • Integration design and build strategy

17. Lift Off!
1. Prepare your Organization
2. Understand the New World
3. Structure for Success
Image source: SpaceX

18. Thank You!
Bill Parkes
bparkes@chiefdigitaladvisors.com
www.linkedin.com/in/bparkes
@BillParkes
Image source: SpaceX