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The human condition

is enduring, while its
technological environment
is fleeting. Understand
both, along with their
relationship, and
anything is possible.
- Gaston Legorburu
Worldwide Chief Creative Officer, SapientNitro

WELCOME TO INSIGHTS
One of the worlds earliest and most paramount inventions of our time is the wheel, most notably recognized
for its enablement of transportation. In its initial development, the wheel was created as a tool to facilitate
pottery around the year 3500 B.C., but what is not commonly known is that the wheel was one of the first
human inventions that was not inspired by an artifact in the natural world, but rather was 100 percent the
result of a Homo sapiens ideation.
Over the course of time, humans have imagined new opportunities for the wheel. By facilitating the movement
of static things, the wheel increased the efficiency of manual labor and enabled methods for the movement
of both goods and people. As technology advanced and the wheel was placed on new inventions, it became an
essential component of our everyday lives, withstanding and evolving over time to ultimately enable humans
to discover new experiences.
So too with the invention of the Internet, which continues to inspire new innovations that further enable and
connect people across the world. Its expansion, combined with the proliferation of mobile devices (5.2 billion
subscribers and counting), is transforming global human behavior in remarkable ways. For brands, the mobile
Internet has strengthened their understanding of consumers by way of increasing data and analytics, and
new channels to reach them. More importantly, perhaps, the same technology has also empowered consumers
at home, in transit, at work, or on vacation to be the ones who now determine when and how their lives
connect to those touchpoints.
At SapientNitro, we are studying that very fascinating intersection of advancing technologies and the evolving
behaviors of those who are integrating it so seamlessly into their daily lives. We see that it is not without
story, without dreams, without imagination that these advancements become a part of who we are, and how
we connect to people and things in this world. As a new breed of agency, and now as a part of Publicis Groupe,
we are helping our clients create meaningful experiences that inspire consumers to invite brands into their
always-on lives.
In this issue of Insights, we welcome you to share in our thinking around trends that sit at the intersection of
technology and story, like advancements in virtual reality, the Internet of Things, and motion and animation.
Explore advancements in the ever-evolving banking industry, opportunities for retail in-store experiences, and
insights on performance analytics that help us all make data more actionable. Learn about the buying trends
of Chinas digitally confident, hyper-connected, socially influential women. Get a view into game-changing
shifts like the rise of the Chief Marketing Technology Officer, and our Storyscaping approach
a methodology which combines for our clients the power of stories with the excitement of
experiences to create immersive worlds where brands and consumers connect.
Thank you for your interest in SapientNitro and for taking the time to imagine with us.
Just like the evolution of the wheel, well continue to ideate and innovate on the
possibilities that are in front of us, creating opportunity never before possible
that will further enable humankind.

Alan Wexler
SapientNitro CEO

C
ONT
ENT

TABLE
OF

INTRODUCTION
6

Contributors

10 Our Storyscaping Approach

RESEARCH

20 Analyzing the Chief Marketing Technologist

OUR PERSPECTIVES
42 Planning (and Doing) Innovation
52 Where Have All the Brave Brands Gone?
60 Reaching Maturity: Analytics Is Only as Good as Its Data

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

70 Chinas Wired Women and the Future of Global Consumption
80 Banking in the Customer Experience Era
88 Thinking Beyond Smartphones: Building In-Store Experiences

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION

OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY
100 Virtual Reality in Retail
106 Applied Analytics: Creating Serendipity
110 Motion and Animation
116 The IoT: A Revolution Is Under Way

THE EYE-OPENER
126 On Engagement

Parvez Ahmed

Flavia Barbat

Experience Technologist,
SapientNitro Detroit

Contributing Editor

Parvezs passion for mobile and web

apps have allowed him the opportunity
to collaborate with designers and
developers in order to push coding as
a creative medium into exciting new
areas where creative technology and
motion design meet.

CONTRI
BUTORS

Flavia, a contributing editor of Insights

2015, is a professional writer merging
branding and content perspectives with
strategic digital architecture. She is also
Editor-in-Chief at Branding Magazine.

Hilding Anderson
Editor-in-Chief
Hilding is the Editor-in-Chief of Insights
2015, and a Director of Research and
Insights at SapientNitro. He helps set
the thought leadership agenda across
the agency, and advises global clients
on emerging trends.

John Cain

Jon Day

Vice President, Strategy and Analysis,

SapientNitro Chicago

Director & Global Lead, Financial

Services, SapientNitro Toronto

Based in Chicago, John plays an active

role in experience and innovation
research to increase our understanding
of consumer behavior. He provides
expertise in advanced analytics and
data visualization, data modeling,
measurement, and reporting that shapes
business innovation and design strategy.

With over 22 years of experience in

financial services, Jon guides our
development of thought leadership,
insights, and research related to
dramatic trends and movements that
redefine customer experience and how
brands connect to customers in the
financial services sector.

Donald Chesnut
Senior Vice President, Chief Experience
Officer, SapientNitro New York
Donald Chesnut is SapientNitros Chief
Experience Officer and the global lead
for SapientNitros Experience Design
practice. Over the course of nearly two
decades as an executive and experience
designer, he has worked with some
of the worlds leading global brands,
including Disney, BP, and Unilever.

Neil Dawson

Kim Douglas

Chief Strategy Officer,

SapientNitro London

Vice President, Managing Director,

SapientNitro Singapore & Hong Kong

Neil has previously held strategic leadership roles at Havas, Dare, TBWA, and
in his own creative agency. He is passionate about proving the link between
creativity and commercial effectiveness.

Kim has spent some 20 years in

advertising agencies and has been the
MD for the last 5 years. His primary
focus today is growing our business
across APAC out of the regions HQ
in Singapore.

Simon James

Joel Krieger

Zachary Jean Paradis

Rick E. Robinson

Vice President, Global Lead Performance

Analytics, SapientNitro London

Group Creative Director,

Second Story Atlanta

Director Experience Strategy,

SapientNitro Chicago

Vice President, Marketing Analytics,

SapientNitro Denver

Simon is the global lead for Performance

Analytics. For the past 20 years, he has
worked in marketing as a data analyst.
His team is responsible for measuring
and optimizing the effectiveness of
our work.

Joels collaborative, lab-based approach to

design allows him to focus on experimentation and rapid prototyping. And his focus
on responsive environments bespoke
interactive experiences for physical places
enables audiences to be immersed in
both cultural and brand spaces.

Zachary is a strategist, professor, and

writer obsessed with transforming lives
through customer experience. He acts
as co-lead for the firms Experience
Strategy domain, supports the companys
innovation efforts, and teaches at the
IIT Institute of Design.

Rick was originally trained as a social

psychologist at the University of
Chicago. He found the world of design
and strategy nearly by accident. He
co-founded research consultancies e-lab
and iota-partners with John Cain.

Gary Koepke
Vice President, Chief Creative Officer
SapientNitro North America

David Poole
Senior Strategist, SapientNitro Boston
David leads strategy for the Financial
Services Center of Excellence, which is
responsible for supporting our global
network of clients in thought leadership, innovation, transformation, and
consumer insight.

Gary is an internationally acclaimed

designer, creative director, and marketing
executive who is bringing to life our
vision of redefining storytelling for an
always-on world.

Evelina Lye

T.J. McLeish

Ryan Scott

Sue Su

Regional Marketing Lead,

SapientNitro Asia Pacific

Director of Experience Technology and

Emerging Analytics, SapientNitro Chicago

Vice President, Global Strategy Lead

Digital Marketing, SapientNitro Boston

Manager, Marketing Strategy & Analysis,

SapientNitro China

Evelina leads the marketing efforts for

APAC and is at the forefront of building
the agency brand in China, Singapore,
Hong Kong, and Australia. Evelina has
worked for some of the best global agencies
in Asia, UK, and Australia. Evelina spoke
at SXSW 2015 on the same subject of
her piece.

With his 15 years of experience in

ubiquitous computing and the built
environment, T.J. provides expertise in
advanced analytics, data visualization,
data modeling, and measurement to
guide innovation and design in the
digital/physical world.

Being responsible for defining capabilities,

technologies, and partnerships (including
our global partnership with Adobe),
Ryan is able to lead development of
SapientNitro offerings including our
Integrated Experience Architecture to
serve clients across a range of industries.

Sue is a hybrid of brand planning and

digital planning, with strong passion
and determination to break the boundary
where story and technology meet in
this digital era (to make a difference in
marketing and communication).

Darren Daz McColl

Vice President, Managing Director,

SapientNitro Minneapolis

Darren (Daz) McColl is co-author of

Storyscaping and Chief Brand Strategy
Officer at SapientNitro. Through insight
and strategic guidance, Daz helps create
worlds of immersive stories and experiences for client brands.

Adrian heads up SapientNitros innovation offering, which includes a lab, an

investment arm, and formal relationships with university innovation centers.
Broadly speaking, he is focused on the
continued evolution of both mature and
emerging digital experiences.

Sheldon Monteiro

Padmini Pandya

Scott Tang

Global Chief Technology Officer,

SapientNitro Chicago

Strategic Business, Planning,

SapientNitro Asia Pacific

Head of Global Consumer & Industry

Research, SapientNitro Chicago

Sheldon leads global technology capabilities, engineering, quality, methods,

devops, and tools. He sponsors and is a
senior faculty member at SapientNitros
CMTO University, an in-house executive
development program to grow SapientNitros marketing technologists.

As an industrial/organizational
psychologist and founder of two American
startups, Padmini now oversees Corporate
Strategy for APAC, focusing on change
management, organizational design,
integration, and expanding SapientNitros
footprint across Asia.

Scott leads a team of researchers

that supports SapientNitro worldwide
through secondary and quantitative
analysis on topics regarding consumers,
industries, and all things digital.

Adrian Slobin

Chief Brand Strategy Officer

SapientNitro Miami

Alan Wexler
SapientNitro CEO
Alan is responsible for overall leadership
of SapientNitro globally, Alan has held
a number of key management positions
since joining Sapient in 1998, including
leadership of the North America, Europe,
and Asia-Pacific regions. Alan has also
led several industry verticals including
media, entertainment, telecommunication, and healthcare, and launched
SapientNitros mobile practice in 2000.

10

OUR STORYSCAPING
APPROACH
DARREN DAZ MCCOLL

Our approach envisions content and

experience as parts of a holistic, enveloping
system rather than as components of a
deterministic, linear journey.

Launched in 2014s bestselling book Storyscaping, our strategic approach has

continued to fuel powerful thinking about brands and experiences at the intersection
of story and technology. Our Storyscaping approach is a way of looking at the
world that we have refined into a powerful model for working with brands, people,
and technology. Storyscapings principles guide how we create worlds, and we
have had the opportunity to create some great ones in a huge range of sectors
this past year. Born from our unique expertise in technology and storytelling, we
are excited by the results that it has helped us, and our clients, achieve.
The Storyscaping approachs two key components are the Organizing Idea and
Story Systems. Inspired by the Organizing Idea (described on the next page), this
approach transforms a great storyline into an immersive Story System, where people
enjoy connecting with and participating in brand stories. It teaches us to delve
deeper to understand consumers and, with that knowledge, craft opportunities
for them to invite brands, products, and services into their worlds thus creating
Shared Stories and building brand loyalty.

12

The Organizing Idea

FIGURE01

An Organizing Idea does just what its

name implies. It organizes (see Figure
2). Its a strategic idea that guides and
organizes the interactions between
consumers and brands that transpire
across all channels, to build emotional connections and inspire behavior.
The very premise of what content you
create, curate, or associate ought to be
considered relative to your Organizing
Idea. A good Organizing Idea gives
purpose and tangibility to how a story
is communicated, expressed, delivered,
and experienced. It is built from the
insight and knowledge gathered during
research about brands and their desired
consumers. Without a connection to
the Brand Purpose, the Organizing Idea
is just an idea and probably a random
idea at that.

An Organizing Idea is the statement of

action that defines what the brand must
do to change consumer behavior. Marketing has long been dependent on the
power of a great idea. And while great
ideas are critical, its more important
than ever to create systems in which
ideas can live. The proliferation of
channels, the power of microaudience
targeting, and the necessity of supporting multiple stories by and about every
brand makes having a system essential
to executing strategies. By establishing
Organizing Ideas not just big ideas
and thinking about systems that live
in experiences and stories, brands
can drive effectiveness on all levels of
consumer engagement.

The core elements of the Storyscaping approach

The Storyscaping approach transforms a great story into an immersive Story System.
Using this approach, brands start with their strategic pillars to develop Shared Stories that live at the intersection of the
brands' and consumers' values and experiences.
To create worlds, the Storyscaping approach uses Organizing Ideas, combined with a deep knowledge of the Experience
Space, to ultimately create the final Storyscape: a flexible, holistic, and enveloping system of experience that brands use to
make their stories real for customers.

Story Systems
The second powerful aspect of the
Storyscaping approach is the Story
Systems emphasis, which enables the
development of complete platforms
for marketing, or as we like to say,
worlds of experience. Organizing
Ideas create great experiences when
they are realized as part of a dynamic,
multidimensional Story System that
stretches across many channels and
touchpoints, with well-tuned variations
and adjustments.
The systems approach envisions
content and experience as parts of a
holistic, enveloping system rather than
as components of a deterministic, linear
journey. This is perhaps best expressed
in the idea of an Experience Space
(see Figure 3). The Experience Space
is a three-dimensional representation
of the physical and virtual places where
brands and consumers meet. It helps
define the role of channels, the storyline
connections, and the types of experiences that matter.
Planning potential connection points
across an Experience Space is key.
Its how marketers map all the
possibilities to then narrow down
the options by identifying the most
effective brand-consumer connections.
This canvas also helps them develop
the technologies and platforms that
connect the many points of the
consumer experience.

FIGURE02

The six main characteristics of an Organizing Idea

An Organizing Idea is a key step in creating a holistic, immersive, non-linear Story
System. The Organizing Idea guides and organizes interactions between consumers and brands across all channels.

Exemplary Organizing Ideas

X-GAMES
Activate Awesome
LYCRA
Lycra Moves You
REGIONS BANK
Live and Grow With Confidence

FIGURE03

The Experience Space

The Experience Space is a three-dimensional representation of the physical and
virtual places where brands and consumers meet. By defining the potential Experience Space, you can then develop the actual Story System the chosen points of
interaction that make sense for the brand and customer.

By understanding the whole space of

possibility, you can build interactions
that, as the saying goes, end with a
comma rather than a period (or full
stop). A systems aim is to allow every
interaction and connection to inspire
connections to other useful pieces of
content or great experiences.

13

14

Some exemplary cases

[The] Storyscaping
[approach] really
helped us take a step
back in the process
and look at things in
a consumer-centric
way. We naturally
have more cohesion
in everything that
weve done using
the Storyscaping
process.
- J. Adams
Regions Bank Senior
Advertising Manager

At Regions Bank in North America,

the Agency Integration Team (a small,
multi-agency strategy team) has
adopted the Storyscaping approach
for all work across agencies, with a
very positive response from Regions
and the client teams. Having defined
Organizing Ideas, the activities of each
specialized agency are connecting
more efficiently and effectively.
Using the Storyscaping approach and
working across agencies, Regions
Bank launched a consumer campaign
called The Next Step Project. The
Next Step Project is a platform for
Regions to tell these stories through
the narratives of actual customers.
These go beyond just the banking
relationship. They show the impact that
the right financial guidance can have on
important life decisions and the ability
of customers to achieve their goals.

FIGURE04

Regions was guided by the organizing

idea of Live and Grow With Confidence, and used that as one input
into creating the platform that utilized
long-form videos, TV, radio, print, OOH,
digital, and social media.

Vice President, Head of Marketing at

Regions Financial Corporation.
Regions is committed to the financial
well-being of our customers and offering
education, tools, tips and calculators that
they may use in making their life better.

Regions challenged all of its agencies

to create more meaningful content
to engage prospects and customers
across a variety of channels to share
the message that Regions can make a
difference in their lives by providing an
array of financial solutions, including
expertise, education, products and
self-service tools to make banking
easier, stated Michele Elrod, Executive

The Storyscaping approach has been

rolled out around the world and in many
other industries beyond banking. In
Australia, for example, it gave a CPG
firm, Dairylea, a new way of looking at
the packaged goods environment with
the Mummy Hacks project.

FIGURE05

Consumer Insight: Understanding the daily needs of a 2- to 5-year-old child

Using ethnography, the Storyscaping approach places a strong emphasis on understanding the customer journey and customer behaviors. In this example of a customer journey, you can see how digital ebbs and flows through a single day.

The Next Step Project tells people's real stories, highlighting life and financial planning goals by using the Organizing Idea of
Live and Grow With Confidence. The print, OOH, TV, radio, and other promotions all direct customers to branches and interactive channels that present an array of self-service and guided financial tools as part of the Experience Space.

MORNING
ROUTINE

BREAKFAST

LUNCH

PARENTS
BACK FROM
WORK

NAPTIME

Digital play helps the

parents get ready
in the morning

END OF DAY

DINNER
Outdoor play time
(weather permitting)

DIGITAL
USAGE

BEDTIME

Occasional special
movie-nights, but
otherwise no digital

Digital only if used

collaboratively

We start the story

halfway through,
so its shorter

PLAYING
WITH FRIENDS
& SIBLINGS

PRE-K /
KINDERGARTEN

No digital permitted
at school

One parent bonds with

girl while the other
prepares dinner

Books & stories

at bedtime

ACTIVITIES
THE
ROLE OF
DIGITAL

15

SUPPORT EARLY
CHILDHOOD EDUCATION

IDENTIFY OPPORTUNITIES
FOR COLLABORATIVE
DIGITAL PLAY

INTRODUCE NEW PLACES

AND ADVENTURES

PARENT
BONDING

CHILD

END OF DAY RELAXATION

16

Looking forward
In partnership with our clients, we
continue to drive innovation around
the Storyscaping approach. Soon we
will be introducing an add-on to our
approach: a Story System app that
assists with driving business goals,
prioritization, and collaboration through
3-D interactive visualization (see Figure
6). This new tool enables systematic
business goal-setting and scoring of
Story System components. Each and
every touchpoint can be identified
and scored for relative priority or value
against desired business goals. This
provides multiple dimensions for the
application of Storyscaping principles.
The tool also renders a 3-D visual
representation of a Story System with
ways to adjust the images to stimulate
new conversations around the values

of different touchpoints. It enables

marketers to more clearly visualize the
spaces of opportunity.
As you will see throughout Insights,
there are many ways in which we
continue to evolve our thinking across
a wide range of markets, businesses,
and technologies. The Storyscaping
approach continues to grow and evolve
by incorporating new insights, helping
our teams create wonderful results
for our clients brands, and making a
meaningful impact on the world.

Darren Daz McColl

Chief Brand Strategy Officer
SapientNitro Miami
dmccoll@sapient.com

FIGURE06
The Story System app will soon be introduced to assist with business goals, prioritization, and collaboration. Shown below is
a Story System with performance metrics for a major travel and hospitality business.

17

20

Analyzing the Chief Marketing Technologist

Sheldon Monteiro, Hilding Anderson & Scott Tang

RESEARCH

ANALYZING THE
CHIEF MARKETING
TECHNOLOGIST
SHELDON MONTEIRO, HILDING ANDERSON & SCOTT TANG

A reflective survey of MarTech professionals and what it means

for brands and the profession
Its yesterdays news that marketing and technology have become inextricably
intertwined. Tectonic forces, enabled by technology, have fueled more disruption
and competition for customer attention in the last five years than corporations
experienced in the fifty years prior.
On the one hand, Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) have realized that marketings
success is gated by the digital acumen of their own organizations. On the other,
Chief Information Officers (CIOs) find that the expectations of their engineering
teams are influenced more by digital exemplars like Amazon, Google, and Silicon
Valley start-ups than by peer benchmarks within their own industry.
Its no surprise then that Harvard Business Review recently joined the chorus and
profiled the Rise of the Chief Marketing Technologist (CMT) a new type of executive
responsible for bringing marketing and technology together.1 According to a 2014
Gartner study, 81 percent of large organizations now have a CMT.2

Scott Brinker and Laura McLellan. The Rise of the Chief Marketing Technologist. Harvard Business Review. July, 2014.

Gartner. How the Presence of a Chief Marketing Technologist Impacts Marketing. https://www.gartner.com/doc/
2652017/presence-chief-marketing-technologist-impacts.
2

RESEARCH

22

Despite the excitement around marketing technology and the CMT role, the
ambiguity as to who these individuals
are, the skills they possess, and where
they sit organizationally has led to considerable confusion. And the confusion
results in two related issues. One,
executives need better clarity regarding
how they can identify, recruit, bring
on board, and retain these talented
individuals. Second, aspiring marketing technologists have no guidelines
against which to benchmark and level
up their own skills.
To help us shed more light on these
issues, SapientNitro partnered with
Scott Brinker, the host of the MarTech
conference and popular chiefmartec.
com blog to conduct a first-of-its-kind
study of marketing technologists skills,
career paths, attitudes, and behaviors.3
For the first time, we have been able to
x-ray the professional marketing technologist. And the results are striking.

Marketing
technologists
cluster into
six distinct
archetypes

Todays marketing technologists cluster

into six distinct archetypes, and they
are not equivalent or interchangeable.
Of the six archetypes, three are focused
on technology and three are focused on
marketing (see Figure 1). Respondents
self-identified skills fell into distinct
clusters, revealing the archetypes.

MARKETING MAVENS (26%)

With marketing skills emphasized over
technology, mavens specialize in building marketing programs using expertise
in marketing strategy, strategic positioning, and promotion.

DATA DIVAS (17%)

FIGURE01

Divas are skilled in marketing operations management, customer relationship management (CRM), data
science, analytics, and modeling. They
know how to acquire, integrate, and
make data perform.

The six archetypes have two main

areas of focus

CONTENT CURATORS (16%)

Storytellers. Message crafters.
Marketing strategists. Content management platform experts. This type
exercises considerable knowledge of
content marketing and related technologies to direct communicationsoriented marketing.

We found that marketing technologists

are grouped into six archetypes three
with a marketing focus and three with
a technology focus.

INFRASTRUCTURE
ARCHITECTS (16%)
Enterprise-level technology chops
define this archetype, but they are
also business consultants and bring a
high-level understanding of a companys marketing initiatives.

EXPERIENCE ENGINEERS (15%)

One foot in technology and the other
in experience. They are experts in
cutting-edge technology: from
e-commerce to front-end technology
and mobility.

52% Marketing
10% Media & Marketing Analyzers
16% Content Curators
26% Marketing Mavens

48% Technology
17% Data Divas
16% Infrastructure Architects
15% Experience Engineers

MEDIA & MARKETING

ANALYZERS (10%)
This archetype specializes in
research, consumer insights, and
strategic planning. Members think
strategically about segmentation and
connections planning.

3
We asked the community of marketing technologists recruited from the MarTech 2014 fall conference and Scott
Brinkers popular chiefmartec.com blog to help us document this group. We contracted an independent market
research firm Decision Analyst to execute the survey. Our study had 280 respondents, and took place from
August 15th, 2014 to September 8th, 2014. (For more details, see About the Survey at the end of the article.)

23

RESEARCH

24

The emergence of these archetypes

may represent specialization within
the profession, often seen in mature
fields such as medicine or engineering.
However, we doubt it.
More likely, the skill gaps we found
indicate that the archetypes are emerging through a Darwinian selection process as individuals who may not meet
the full job specifications are promoted
into this new role.

The emergence of
these archetypes
may represent
specialization
within the
profession...
however, we
doubt it.

One immediate implication for those

organizations in search of the best
person to steward marketing technology through a period of profound
disruption is that they need to define
the role more specifically than simply as
marketing technologist. The needs of
an organization may in fact require that
the CMT embodies a combination of at
least two and possibly as many as all
six of the archetypes.
This said, the archetypes are a starting
point to contain search efforts and
costs, as they are clear segmentations
of todays talent.

Marketing technologists report

to marketing
While 69.2 percent report to the
C-suite, just 8.6 percent of marketing
technologists reported to the CIO,
with the majority reporting to the
CMO or CEO/President. Our findings
matched other recent industry surveys
in this regard.
In our view, this reporting bias could
explain the surprising underweighting
of science, technology, engineering,
and math (STEM) academic back-

25

grounds in the population, which we

describe further below. Our hypothesis:
Marketers and business leaders are
promoting from within their own departmental ranks and backgrounds. This is
understandable, but executives should
consider where pure-play digital firms
who are setting the pace of todays
disruption are sourcing their talent,
and then consider proactive skills
development to level up existing talent,
or increase the diversity of their talent
sourcing, for instance, by overweighting
IT and business analytics capabilities.

Todays practitioners are learning

technology on the job
Today, marketing technologists are
strongest in core marketing skills, and
only 26 percent have STEM degrees.
Additionally, nearly half of the respondents reported that their prior job was
managing technology or programming
often in a marketing context providing the job environment for developing
technical skills. We believe the lack of
hybrid academic programs is forcing
talent to train on the job. The implication? Rudimentary preparation in computer science fundamentals, systems
and algorithmic thinking, statistics,
and data science may be glossed
over or completely skipped, which will
undoubtedly impair job effectiveness.
Interestingly, technology-oriented marketing technologists are 20 percent
more likely to be the primary or chief
marketing technology officer, indicating
that greater responsibilities are awarded to those with technical proficiency.

Current and desired job skills are

balanced between marketing,
technology, and business
The top five skills that respondents
report possessing are marketing strategy
and positioning, marketing operations
management, website design, the
ability to persuade and negotiate, and
marketing channel strategy/connections planning. Perhaps attributable in
part to confirmation bias (the tendency
to search for or interpret information
in a way that confirms ones preconceptions), three of these were also featured in the five skills that respondents
said are most important to the future
of marketing.
Regardless, we are delighted to
observe a balance between marketing,
technology, and business domains, all
three of which are essential for success
in the role, in our view (see Figure 2).

There are alarming deficiencies in

current skill sets
Advertising technology, system performance and resiliency, and several
omnichannel-enabling technologies
are featured in the bottom ten of
self-assessed current skills, with information security coming in dead last.
This lack of skills is of huge concern
in light of recent, massive security
breaches across industries, the extreme
scale at which digital businesses must
operate during periods of high demand,
and the ever-increasing requirements
for brands to imagine and deliver
immersive and pervasive experiences.

RESEARCH

In addition, when we examined the

largest skill gaps (differences between
stated future importance and current
self-assessment), big data techniques
and technologies emerged as the skills
with the widest gap. The absolute deficiencies in current skills, the gap between current and desired future skills,
and the under-representation of STEM
academic backgrounds reinforce our
view that todays marketing technologists must level up their technology
chops with great urgency.

The gap between marketing and

technology is real, even for marketing
technologists

FIGURE02

The future of the CMT role

The most important future job skills,
according to our survey, include
marketing, technology, and business
skills (see Finding #6).

Marketing
Skills

Technology
Skills

Business
Skills

While 94 percent believe that marketing and IT skills could be combined in

a single person, respondents identified
a stark polarity between marketing and
systems integration expertise.
Most technology archetypes are
less likely to describe themselves as
marketing experts and marketing
archetypes dont think of themselves as
systems integrators. This subtle indication of how respondents described
who they are may be indicative of the
culture gap that must be overcome for
the role to attain its highest potential.
In our view, the CMT role must straddle both functions as a native, rather
than majoring in one and minoring in
the other.

26

Findings and analysis

Although most organizations may

have a CMT, they are certainly not
all alike or interchangeable.
The CMT role is pervasive, with Gartner
recently reporting that 81 percent of
large organizations now have a CMT.
But the roles are not alike.
The July 2014 edition of Harvard
Business Review defined the CMT
role noting, CMTs are part strategist,
part creative director, part technology
leader, and part teacher. Our survey
findings took this analysis one step
further, providing deep insight into the
ratio of those parts in the current cadre
of professionals.

79.7

11.8

Website
Testing and
Optimization

20.5

Marketing
Operations
Management

20.4

The Ability to
Persuade and
Negotiate

17.0

Marketing
Channel
Strategy and
Connections
Planning

Professional self-description: I think of myself as...

Mavens view themselves as professional marketers, business consultants, and
customer experience specialists. They are the oldest (43% are 45+ years old) and
have the highest mean salary ($149k).
80.8%
61.6%
41.1%
38.4%
27.4%

27

We asked our survey respondents

to rank their skills in relative, not
absolute, terms. We also asked them to
choose from monikers they might use
to describe themselves professionally.
Analyzing these data sets, we found
clear evidence that the population of
marketing technologists is fractured
around distinct areas of expertise.
We identified six different archetypes
of marketing technologists by identifying distinct clusters of skills (rank your
strongest/weakest skill) and attitudes
(I think of myself as). Sorted by size
within the overall population, the six
archetypes are:

THE MARKETING MAVENS

(26%)

Marketing Mavens: Self-reported skills

Marketing
Strategy and
Positioning

THE DATA DIVAS (17%)

The largest single group. The skills and

attitudes of this group show that more
than one in four marketing technologists have a much stronger marketing
orientation (and, conversely, a weaker
technology orientation) than we had
previously assumed. This groups key
skills are dominated by marketing
strategy and positioning, and (to a
much lesser extent) marketing operations. They think of themselves as marketing experts, business consultants,
and customer experience specialists.

The second-largest group loves its

data. Member skills are grounded in
marketing operations management,
CRM, data science, analytics, and
modeling. They scored themselves
highly in managing big data one of
the biggest skill gaps identified by the
overall survey population and they
are also proficient in data management
software/systems. With their expertise
in systems; tag management; CRM
tools; and data science, analytics,
statistics, and modeling, they know
how to acquire, integrate, and make
data perform. Sixty-eight percent of
members of this group said that they
are the primary marketing technologists
in their organizations the highest of all
the archetypes reflecting the importance of data-driven marketing.

THE CONTENT CURATORS

(16%)
If you want to tell a story and efficiently
disseminate it to your consumers this
is the group you want. With considerable expertise in content creation,
content optimization, marketing strategy
and positioning, and content and digital
asset management platforms, this
group helps your brand converse
with customers.

Data Divas: Self-reported skills

35.0

Marketing
Operations
Management

16.8

Data
Management
Software and
Systems

34.0

Customer
Relationship
Management
(CRM) Systems
and Platforms

31.7

Data Science,
Analytics,
Statistics, and
Modeling

17.4

Marketing Strategy
and Positioning

Professional self-description: I think of myself as...

Data Divas have much stronger sets of skills in database marketing, system integration, and data scientist related skills than the other archetypes. They were the
most likely to be the primary marketing technologists in their organizations (68%
reported being the CMT).
55.3%
53.2%
53.2%
51.1%
42.6%
42.6%
40.6%

A Marketing Expert
A Database Marketing Specialist
A Business Consultant
A Systems Integrator
A Data Scientist, Statistician, Analyst
A CRM Expert
A Customer Experience Specialist

Content Curators: Self-reported skills

45.6

Content Creation,
Copywriting,
and Content
Optimization

21.6

Website
Testing and
Optimization

39.8

Marketing
Strategy and
Positioning

24.6

Content
Management
and Digital Asset
Management
Systems

17.2

Website Design,
Including
Responsive and
Adaptive Design

16.0

The Ability to
Persuade and
Negotiate

23.4

Marketing
Channel Strategy
and Connections
Planning

Professional self-description: I think of myself as...

Content Curators specialize in content creation, content management, and the customer experience. They are also the youngest, with 42% being under 35 years old.
64.4%
57.8%
53.3%
46.7%
35.6%

A Marketing Expert
A Content Management Expert
A Writer or Content Creator
A Business Consultant
A Customer Experience Specialist

A Marketing Expert
A Business Consultant
A Customer Experience Specialist
An Entrepreneur
A CRM Expert

RESEARCH

28

Infrastructure Architects: Self-reported skills

46.8

Enterprise
Architecture,
Tech Selection,
and Lifecycle
Management

31.6

11.4

Front-end
Technologies
(e.g., HTML5,
Javascript, and
CSS)

9.0

Software
Design,
Programming,
and Coding

Content
Management
and Digital Asset
Management
Systems

23.3

17.1

Software
Development
Operations and
IT Operations

Visual Display
of Data Iincluding
Infographics and
Dashboards

Professional self-description: I think of myself as...

Infrastructure Architects are much more aligned with technology. Information
technology, systems integration, and even developing/coding scored highly. They
are also the most male (89%) and 40% had an undergraduate technology degree
(versus a 25.3% average across all archetypes).
73.3%
64.4%
60.0%
35.6%
33.3%
33.3%

THE INFRASTRUCTURE
ARCHITECTS (16%)

THE MEDIA AND MARKETING ANALYZERS (10%)

This is a classically trained cohort

of technologists, with expertise in
developing enterprise marketing
platforms. With a deep understanding of technology architecture and
selection, software development, and
content and digital asset management
platforms, they describe themselves as
the IT specialists, systems integrators,
and business consultants that deploy
marketing technology at scale within
an enterprise.

A rare breed in our survey, this type has

significant skills in research, consumer
insights, and strategic planning. They
think strategically about segmentation
and connections planning.

13.5

Marketing
Channel
Strategy and
Connections
Planning

47.3

Marketing
Strategy and
Positioning

E-commerce
Technologies
and Platforms

29.8

Front-end
Technologies
(e.g., HTML5,
Javascript,
and CSS)

21.5

Software
Design,
Programming,
and Coding

17.0

Website
Design Including
Responsive and
Adaptive Design

13.6

Content
Management
and Digital Asset
Management
Systems

12.9

Design and
Development
of Mobile Apps
and Platforms

17.0

GIS,
Geomapping,
and Geotargeting

72.4%
51.7%
44.8%
37.9%
31.0%

The existence of these archetypes

shows us that todays marketing technologists do not have equivalent competencies. In fact, the differences in the
ratio of skills between the archetypes
are quite large.

This group pushes boundaries at the

intersection of technology and experience. They have remarkable proficiencies in the technologies (e-commerce,
front-end, and mobility) that directly
touch the customer experience.

One immediate implication for brands

looking to appoint a CMT is that they
must be more specific in creating a
job description the term marketing
technologist is simply insufficient.

Experience Engineers play a hybrid role blending depth in IT and SI (system integration) skills but also have breadth in the form of customer experience. They
have considerable skills in mobile app development, e-commerce technology, and
other core competencies, as well.

Lacking specifics when casting the role

will increase the odds of professional
failure. For instance, recruiting a Marketing Maven when the job situation
calls for a Data Diva or Infrastructure
Architect will require additional senior
team members with complementary
skills to build out a capable marketing
technology function.

An IT (Information Technology) Specialist

A Systems Integrator
A Business Consultant

39.0%

A Software Developer, Coder, or Programmer

31.7%

An Entrepreneur

31.7%

A Customer Experience Specialist

Advertising
and Marketing
Communication
Development

16.6

Market
Segmentation
and
Psychographics

Our final archetype is also the smallest. Media and Marketing Analysts bring
strengths in advertising, business, and customer experience. They tend to be
younger 45% are under 35 years old and are the most likely to have a graduate
degree 59% have a graduate degree, of which most (71%) are in business.

Professional self-description: I think of myself as...

39.0%

24.1

Professional self-description: I think of myself as...

THE EXPERIENCE
ENGINEERS (15%)

33.9

29

58.4

Marketing
Research,
Consumer
Insights, and
Competitive
Intelligence

An IT (Information Technology) Specialist

A Systems Integrator
A Business Consultant
A Software Developer, Coder, or Programmer
An Entrepreneur
A Customer Experience Specialist

Experience Engineers: Self-reported skills

46.3%
41.5%

Media and Marketing Analyzers: Self-reported skills

RESEARCH

A Marketing Expert
An Advertising Expert
A Business Consultant
An Entrepreneur
A Customer Experience Specialist

We recommend an outline of the

specific skills required, followed by
a determination of which primary
and secondary (or more, if needed)
archetypes fit best. Brands with stable
business models should be able to
define their needs succinctly (e.g., evolve
and manage the marketing automation
infrastructure). By doing so, they will
be able to focus on the archetypes
required, which will increase the likelihood of finding experienced candidates
who can fill the roles effectively. Of
course, employers concerned about
changing consumer behavior or digital
disruption to their core business will
need a unicorn with breadth and
depth across multiple or each of the
archetypes to lead the marketing
technology office. In this case, expect
the candidate pool to be much smaller
and the search to take longer.

30

Archetypes are split evenly

between marketing and technology
disciplines. Marketing archetypes
are more likely to operate as a
team, while technology archetypes
are more likely to play the role of
Chief Marketing Technologist.

FIGURE03

The six archetypes have two main

areas of focus
Our six profiles are evenly split between
marketing-focused and technologyfocused archetypes consistent with
the blended nature of the role.
Technology
48%

17%
Data
Divas

16%
Infrastructure
Architects

15%
Experience
Engineers

Marketing
52%

26%
Marketing
Mavens

16%
Content
Curators

10%
Media & Marketing
Analyzers

In our data, we found a roughly even

split between marketing and technology orientations (see Figure 3) 52
percent of the respondents are classified in one of the three marketing
archetypes (Marketing Mavens, Content Curators, or Media and Marketing
Analyzers), while the remaining 48 percent are in the technology archetypes
(Data Divas, Infrastructure Architects,
or Experience Engineers).
Interestingly, those with a marketing
orientation are far more likely to operate with a team rather than as the sole
marketing technologist. We hypothesize that marketing-oriented archetypes
need additional technology support
in order to realize the marketing
technology function.

MARKETING ARCHETYPES
(52% OF RESPONDENTS)
Marketing-oriented archetypes tend
to be self-taught in technology, have
more marketing academic training, and
be equally divided by gender. They
are slightly more likely to report to
the CMO than any other group (33.9
percent report to the CMO versus an
overall average of 31.4 percent).

TECHNOLOGY ARCHETYPES
(48% OF RESPONDENTS)

Marketing technologists most

likely work for the CMO. They also
have marketing titles.

Technology archetypes are younger, are

more likely to have STEM degrees, and
are more likely to report to non-marketing
leaders (e.g., the CEO, CIO, or others).

Our respondents report to a marketing

function most frequently. Just 8.6 percent of marketing technologists report
to the CIO; most report to the CMO
(31.4 percent), CEO/President (23.9
percent), or CDO (Chief Digital Officer)/CSO (Chief Strategy Officer) (5.3
percent). In sum, 69.2 percent report to
the C-suite. CMTs are similar, with just
5.5 percent reporting to the CIO.

A full 55 percent of the three technology archetypes reported that they are
the CMT, a moniker roughly equivalent
to the Chief Marketing Technology
Officer (CMTO). In contrast, only 35
percent a full twenty percentage
point change of the three marketing
archetypes report themselves to be the
Chief Marketing Technologist.

In our view, this distribution of reporting relationships is supportive of our

thesis that the marketing technologist
is broadly the equivalent of a CIO or
Chief Technology Officer (CTO)
dedicated to marketing, and the CMO
or CEO needs a trusted advisor skilled

Our hypothesis is that todays technology archetypes (Data Divas, Infrastructure Architects, and Experience
Engineers) possess more of the skills
needed to align the marketing team,
technology vendors, service providers,
and corporate IT. Our recommendation
for brands? Evaluate your CMTs ability
to be the glue between these teams,
including his/her ability to represent the
interests, viewpoints, and concerns of
the different stakeholders without bias,
to see the big picture while not missing
key details, and to show his/her gravitas as a cross-functional leader.

in technology and marketing on

his/her team.
Current job titles are predominantly in
the marketing domain (see Figure 4).
CMTs were 7 percent more likely to
have a marketing title. We also found
that the title of Marketing Technologist is rarely used and made up only a
small fraction (11 percent) of CMTs in
the field.
Given the title variance and reporting
to IT by exception rather than norm,
we recommend that the individual
tasked as the CMT: has explicit
objectives; is socialized with all concerned stakeholders; is tasked to align
marketing and technology concerns;
and owns the blueprint for how
marketing technology is deployed and
will evolve in the context of the enterprise technology estate.

FIGURE04

Participant job titles Overall and CMT

The most common title for a marketing technologist is a marketing title such as
Director of Marketing or Marketing Manager. CMTs are even more likely to have
marketing titles than overall respondents. And a formal Marketing Technology
title is quite rare.
Marketing Title

CMT

55.9%

CMO
Director/VP/Manager of Digital Marketing
Marketing Manager/Director/VP/Manager of
Marketing Technology

Overall

48.9%

Business Title 

CMT

16.5%

CGO/CSO/Director/VP/Manager of Strategy
Project Manager/Account Manager/Director/
VP/Manager of Business, Product, or Application Development/Strategist

Overall

23.2%

Technology Title 

CMT

18%

CTO/CIO/Director/VP/Manager of IT
Director of Market Automation
Director of CRM
Director of Analytics
Market Automation Specialist

Overall

16.8%
CMT

11%

Marketing Technology Title 

Marketing Technologist
Marketing Technology Consultant
Marketing Technology Manager

Overall

7.1%
0

31

RESEARCH

10

20

30

40

50

60

32

Only a quarter of todays marketing technologists have STEM

degrees. Predictably, technology
training is done on the job, not
in school.
Surprisingly, three in four marketing
technologists do not have a traditional
STEM degree. Approximately 25.3
percent have a STEM undergraduate
degree, while 18.8 percent have a
STEM graduate degree. Instead, the
most common academic majors for
marketing technologists (see Figure 5)
are business and business administra-

FIGURE05

Areas of study for marketing technologists

Marketing technologists are a highly educated group, with 92% having at
least a bachelors degree compared to 29.5% for the general U.S. population.
Undergraduate areas of study include liberal arts, and, at the graduate level,
skew toward business.
AREAS OF STUDY

Undergraduate

Business or Business
Administration

14%

Marketing

11%

Communications

41%
16%

Computer Science
Information Technology

12

Engineering

9%

Science or Math

4%

Social Sciences
(Economics, Sociology, Psychology)

10%

Art and Other Majors (Net)

31%

Graduate

14%

3%
2%
5%
11%

We are concerned that preparation in computer science

fundamentals, systems and algorithmic thinking,
statistics, and data science are hard to pick up on the
job absent curricula, coaching, and skill roadmaps for
which there is no industry consensus.

tion (13.7 percent of undergrads and

41.4 percent among graduates).

WHAT WERE THE PREVIOUS JOBS OF MARKETING TECHNOLOGISTS?

Once in the workforce, marketing

manager is the #1 job leading to a
marketing technologist role, followed
by web/CRM/automation platform
technology management. But when
we group all responses by domain
(see sidebar entitled What Were the
Previous Jobs of Marketing Technologists?), the technology/programming
domain emerges as the most common prior job focus, followed by the
business/management and marketing/
communications domains.

46.9%

Almost half of all the respondents had

a prior role in technology, and primary
marketing technologists skew higher
53.5 percent report having a technical/
programming role prior to their current
primary marketing technologist role.
Our conclusion? Todays talent has
cross-skilled themselves, especially
in technology, on the job. This is
understandable given the paucity of
cross-discipline academic programs.
However, we are concerned that preparation in computer science fundamentals, systems and algorithmic thinking,
statistics, and data science are hard
to pick up on the job absent curricula,
coaching, and skill roadmaps for which
there is no industry consensus. The
marketing technologist is, by its very
moniker, a technical and marketing
role, and those recruiting or planning
their own careers must have a strong
grounding in the fundamentals of both.
We recommend that both brands
looking for CMTs and aspiring CMTs
themselves evaluate their skills across
the archetypes to understand existing
gaps, and then create development
plans or source additional talent to fill
those gaps.

Technical/Programming
Background

01

02

Business/Management
Background
Business/management was
also a popular job category,
and we observed prior general
management roles described as
consulting, managing teams, and
project management.

37.3%

04

05

Web/CRM Management/Automation Platforms

02

14.5%

Web Developer/Programmer/Software Engineer

03

14.1%

IT/Tech Background

04

4.6%

E-commerce

05

3.7%

SEM/SEO/Search Engine Management

06

2.9%

Background in MobilePlatforms/Apps

06

01

02

03

04

05

06

07

01

Marketing/Communications Background
While marketing background/
marketing manager/marketing
is the single most common
(historic) role for marketing
technologists, the marketing/
communications category as a
whole ranked below technologyfocused prior roles.

20.7%

03

Technology/programming is the
dominant background for marketing technologists. Specifically,
we found focus areas in web/CRM
platforms, web development, and
general IT/technology.

39%

01

02

01

10.4%

Consulting/Management Consultant/User Experience Consultant

02

9.1%

Management Background/Manage a Team

03

9.1%

Account/Project Management

04

8.3%

Sales/Lead Generation

05

7.5%

Business Development/Strategy/Research Strategy

06

5.4%

Analytics/Business Analyst/Business Background

07

4.1%

Market Research/Research and Development

01

22.4% Marketing Background/Marketing Manager/Marketing

02

13.7% Digital/Interactive Marketing

03

4.6%

Digital Producer/Graphics/Animation/Video/Audio Engineer

04

3.7%

Communications/Market Communications/Database Marketing

05

3.3%

Background in Social Media/Social Platforms

03

04

05

- Sheldon Monteiro
We asked respondents How did you transition into the marketing technologist role? That is, what were your job responsibilities and role before your current marketing technologist role?

33

RESEARCH

34

Marketing technologists are strongest in core marketing skills, and

weakest in information security and
system performance/resilience.
Our respondents say their strongest
skills are marketing strategy/positioning, followed by marketing operations
management and website design
(including responsive and adaptive
design). At first glance, this is great
a mix of strategy, operations, and technology, in that order (see Figure 6).

FIGURE06

Current job skills: Strongest skills

In these data, we were particularly surprised at the strength of marketing
strategy/positioning and the relatively balanced set of current strengths
across disciplines.
38.1 Marketing Strategy/Positioning
15.6 Marketing Operations Management
13.3 Website Design Including Responsive and Adaptive Design
12.3 The Ability to Persuade and Negotiate
12.2 Marketing Channel Strategy/Connections Planning

FIGURE07

Current job skills: Weakest skills

We were startled by the importance of several of the skills on which marketing
technologists evaluated themselves poorly. Information security, particularly,
is of growing importance, yet was the weakest job skill in the study.
0.6

In-venue/In-Store Experience Technology

0.6

Physical Computing and the Internet of Things

0.5

Tag Management and User Management (United User Profile)

0.4

Loyalty Programs

0.4

Media Planning and Buying

0.3

International Marketing/Translations/Legal Issues

0.3

Digital Ad Networks and Real-Time Bidding

0.2

System Performance and Resiliency

0.2

GIS, Geomapping, and Geotargeting

0.1

Information Security/Firewalls/Encryption/Data Recovery

Our concern? Operations the second

strongest skill is ranked 2.5 times
weaker than strategy, while technology
website design (responsive and
adaptive) is ranked almost three
times weaker. Given the demo or die
mode in which most digitally native
competition operates, marketing
technologists must be as proficient in
the details of execution (operations and
technology) as they are in strategy.

In the future, desired skills span

marketing, business, and technology, but mind the data gap.
We asked our respondents which job
skills were the most important for the
future success of marketing (see Figure
8). Of the top five skills important for
the future, two are marketing-related,
two are technology-related, and one
is business-related. This supports our
view that the marketing technologist
must span marketing, technology, and
business. However, the technologyoriented skills are narrower than
wed anticipated.

System performance and resiliency,

advertising technology, and several
omnichannel-enabling technologies
(e.g., in-venue/in-store experience technology, physical computing and IoT,
tag management, and geotargeting) all
featured in the lowest ten self-assessed
current skills, with information security
dead last (see Figure 7).
Of all our findings, we were concerned
with this one the most. In our view,
marketing technologists must envision
and lead the delivery of omnichannel
experiences that are integrated, scalable, and reliable. This, in fact, is a core
mandate of the role. Further, the bottom
ten list also included some core marketing topics, such as loyalty programs,
internationalization, media, and ad-tech.
In light of recent massive security
breaches in many industry verticals, the
extreme scale with which digital businesses must operate during periods of
high demand, and the need for brands
to imagine and create immersive and
pervasive communications and experience, the lack of needed skills in these
areas is worrisome.
Our recommendation? Understand
your weakest skills and source help
from specialists to mitigate risks and
avoid blind spots. Consider immediate
audits in gap areas and strategy
retainers for forward planning.

We also compared responses for skills

ranked important in the future to those
for skills they have today. By doing
so, we identified specific skill gaps and
their magnitudes (see Figure 9).

The most significant skill gaps are seen

in target market identification; CRM
systems and platforms; data science,
analytics, statistics, and modeling; and
big data and marketing segmentation.
The list indicates that leveling up is
required on both the marketing and
technology sides. But by far, the most
significant absolute gap is in big data:
techniques and technologies for handling data at extreme scale.
We recommend a careful analysis of
skills needed for the future of your
business, and building these skills
through development, talent sourcing,
and retainers. In particular, given that
data centricity will dominate marketing
for the foreseeable future, we suggest
additional emphasis on acquiring data
science and data management competencies within the marketing technology function.

FIGURE08

FIGURE09

Most important future job skills

Marketing Technologist skill gaps

When we asked respondents for

the top skills for future success, the
top two skills which emerged were
traditional marketing skills, although
technology skills rounded out the next
two slots.

When we compared the most important skills with their current strengths/
weaknesses, we identified a set of skills with the greatest gaps, shown below. Its
notable that the biggest gaps span technology, marketing, and business skills.

Marketing Strategy/Positioning

62.1%

IMPORTANCE TO
FUTURE SUCCESS5

GAP

STRENGTH OF
TODAYS SKILLS6

Target Market Identification

-20

22

Customer Relationship
Management (CRM)
Systems and Platforms

-7

10

JOB SKILLS

Target Market
Identification

44.3%

Website Design Including

Responsive and Adaptive

43.9%

Data Science, Analytics,

Statistics, and Modeling

-6

12

CRM Systems and

Platforms

43.9%

Big Data: Techniques and

Technologies for Handling
Data at Extreme Scale

-27

34

Market Segmentation
and Psychographics

-8

17

The Ability to Persuade

and Negotiate

42.9%
0

20

40

60

80

Importance to Future Success: Lower numbers are more important.

Strength of Todays Skills: Lower numbers are stronger.

35

RESEARCH

36

GROWING UNICORNS: SAPIENTNITROS

CMTO UNIVERSITY
With the shift from analog to digital,
from communications to experience,
from story yelling to the Storyscaping
approach, companies need a new breed
of technologist. This new breed sees
around corners, paints the big picture,
and gets marketers, ad types, and
marketing. They are scrappy innovators who also understand scale and
complexity, and who are awesome at
influencing people.
For all the hand-wringing about Chief
Marketing Technologists (CMTs or
CMTOs), talent that gets both marketing
and technology is rare. While marketing
technology talent is in very high demand,
there is an enormous industry skill gap.
SapientNitro decided to do something
about it by creating a CMTO University
within our agency.
The CMTO University is an internal leadership development program dedicated
to growing some of our best technologists and focusing on three core topic
areas: technology, marketing, and communicating with influence. It is a yearlong experience that combines elements
of a corporate leadership development
program with the rigor, challenge, and
learning of an executive MBA.

37

Modeled as a cohort-based program,

our students are selected through a
competitive application process which
includes a formal application from the
prospective student, agency business
sponsorship and references, and a reference interview with a SapientNitro
client who has worked closely with
the applicant and can attest to his/her
prowess. SapientNitro technologists
hailing from any of our global offices at
the Vice President, Director, and Senior
Manager career levels are eligible to
apply. Participants are required to commit to investing an extra ten to fifteen
hours every week over the course of the
program year, in addition to their demanding jobs. In our most recent cohort,
fewer than one in three applicants who
applied were admitted into the program.
The curriculum includes four intensive workshops, conducted in different
SapientNitro locations around the globe,
with interim periods between the
workshops (see Figure 10). Each intensive and interim has a specific focus;
activities include group projects, weekly
individual assignments and discussions
through an online collaboration tool,
and semi-weekly virtual classroom
sessions (with presentations) held over
the weekend.

Sessions are taught by SapientNitro

thought leaders across the globe, industry and academic external experts,
and by the participants themselves as
their skills and knowledge are honed.
Throughout the program, participants
are assessed for progress, share feedback with their peers, and receive personalized coaching from the program
faculty. The curriculum is designed and
delivered in collaboration with Hyper
Island, a leader in digital learning and
executive training.
Students must also complete an independent study project, the capstone
experience of the CMTOu program.
Similar to a thesis, the independent
study demonstrates competency in a
specific aspect of critical marketing
technology as well as the opportunity to
creatively communicate thinking.

Participants select a topic and then design, plan, and complete this work with
the assistance of internal and external
advisors, including several industry
luminaries. Each student is required to
present in public at a conference held
during the final intensive.
This program also imparts the tools to
ensure that the graduates continue to
stay on top of whats next a critical
skill in the digital world as many marketing technologies become obsolete and
new ones rise in importance. Our clients
reap the benefits through the work we
produce, and our participants see the
impact of their collective transformation
throughout the program, both in the
curriculum and on client work.

FIGURE10

Program Schedule
The CMTOu is a year-long, internal leadership development program. The curriculum
includes four intensive workshops, conducted in different SapientNitro locations
around the globe, with interim periods between the workshops.

Intensive (4+ days, over weekend)

E-meet (3 hours, Sunday, virtual)

CHICAGO

ATLANTA

LONDON

INDIA

Marketing Fundamentals
for a Digital World
Group Dynamics
Influence Skills

Marketing Deep Dive,

Culture, Practice
The Storyscaping Approach
Influence Skills

Authentic and Fearless

Communication
Pitching and Story Practice
Design Aesthetics

Conference Thought
Leadership Presentations
Evangelizing the CMTO Role

OCT
FIRST INTERIM

JAN
SECOND INTERIM

APR
THIRD INTERIM

JUL
FOURTH INTERIM

Marketing Technology Breadth

Physical Computing
Marketing Theory

Marketing Technology Depth

Individual Development
Planning

Independent Study
Work Emotional Intelligence
Marketing Theory

Complete Independent Study

External Conference Proposals
Plan for Influencing SapientNitro

38

Conclusion
The rise of the Chief Marketing
Technologist is bridging the worlds of
marketing and IT. In these data, we see
a new picture emerging of the marketing technologist. This first-ever analysis
of the professional population gives
us a remarkable view of six discrete
archetypes, their skills, and where in
the organization they sit. Importantly,
we have a clear view of the skills and
attitudinal gaps which employers must
recognize when hiring and that the
profession (and, ultimately, academia)
must address.
We can logically infer from the data that
marketing technologists are cultivating
their skills on the job. Thats great news.
But, it should be deeply concerning to
both marketing technologists and the
brands that rely on them that the largest
skill gaps are in areas of significant
opportunity (e.g., targeting, CRM, and
data) and high risk (e.g., information
security, performance, and resiliency).
Academia has yet to create programs
for hybrid talent that must operate
at the intersection of marketing and
technology. The need for marketers
who understand technology, data, and
algorithms is as pressing and urgent as
the need for technologists who have
a grasp of marketing, advertising, and
the art of growing customers. Against

this backdrop, we believe it is critical

for organizations to invest in ongoing
training and skill development to grow
marketing technology talent.
As an agency, our clients often ask
us to play advisory CMTO roles. To
fulfill the demand, we founded our
own CMTO University. We decided to
challenge, rather than coddle, our best
technologists. We go deep by teaching
marketing, business, applied influence,
and persuasion skills, modeled in the
style of an executive MBA. For businesses that want to thrive, and increasingly
those that want to survive, grooming
leaders with relevant skills to operate
with competence and confidence in
the age of the customer is the single
biggest investment we can make in
our future.

Sheldon Monteiro
Global Chief Technology Officer,
SapientNitro Chicago
smonteiro@sapient.com

Hilding Anderson
Director Research & Insights,
SapientNitro Washington, D.C.
handerson@sapient.com

Scott Tang
Head of Global Consumer & Industry
Research, SapientNitro Chicago
stang@sapient.com

About the survey

The survey was an online questionnaire distributed through two primary channels
chiefmartec.com and the 2014 Boston MarTech conference (August 1820). Survey responses were collected from August 15 to September 8, 2014. The majority
(76 percent) of respondents were based in the U.S., while 24 percent were based
outside the U.S. (mostly Europe and Canada).
A total of 280 surveys were completed. The distribution of the sample appears to
be representative of the marketing technology community, as defined by the blog
and attendees from the 2014 Boston MarTech conference. SapientNitro sponsored
the study and worked alongside Decision Analyst, a market research firm, to
design and execute it.

39

42

Planning (and Doing) Innovation

John Cain & Zachary Jean Paradis

52

Where Have All the Brave Brands Gone?

Kim Douglas

60

Reaching Maturity: Analytics Is Only as

Good as Its Data
Simon James

OUR PERSPECTIVES

PLANNING
(AND DOING)
INNOVATION
JOHN CAIN & ZACHARY JEAN PARADIS
With contributions from Joel Krieger, Adrian Slobin and Pinak Kiran Vedalankar

These days, nearly everyone touts the importance of innovation, yet most companies struggle with how to replicate it regularly. And the rise of the interconnected
and increasingly digitized world has raised even more questions about innovation
and agility questions about how new technologies might be rewriting the rules.
Clients frequently ask us how to produce meaningful innovation in their businesses.
Amidst tremendous choice and change, the questions remain: What is innovation?
And how can we use it to deliver results?
Put simply, innovation is the process of creating value for people through new
or improved products or services. And while companies do innovate regularly,
many still struggle with the everyday obstacles of using innovation effectively.
An understanding of how to support constant innovation systemically through
internal processes, culture, methods, and tools is required. This, along with the
incorporation of different approaches, can lead many firms to creating stronger
value through innovation.
Organizations should consider introducing a portfolio of innovation approaches to
maximize agility across the finding and vetting of opportunities, the scaling of
responses, and the optimization of details. Here we will address a few of the common
myths that hinder organizations from integrating meaningful and continuous
innovation, and recommend a set of approaches for developing your innovation mix.

OUR PERSPECTIVES

44

Innovation myths
Its worth debunking a few of the
common myths about innovation,
starting with the idea that innovation
only pertains to the introduction of
breakthrough or disruptive products or
services. This is not always the case.
Incremental innovation (the improvement of current products, services, and
processes) can be hugely valuable.
A second myth suggests that innovation requires a focus on key, new
products. But ranges and types of
innovation can flow from different types
of attention to people, business, or
technology. Instead of one imagined
scale and a single object, we see varieties of scales and differentiation in the
focus of innovation: external to internal,
product to system, and incremental
to disruptive.

FIGURE01

Different innovation approaches offer different attributes

There is a range of innovation approaches available depending on your objectives.
For some, incremental approaches focused on optimization and platform evolution
make sense. For others, labs, pilots, and start-ups are a better approaches. Each
has different criteria for planning, scaling, and agility.

Analytics &
Optimization
Evolve
Platform

Hybrid
Agile
Build/Evolve
Platform

Labs &
Pilots
Identify New
Platforms

Incremental

(Lean)
Start-up
Identify New
Businesses

Breakthrough

Planning
Scale
Agility

Analytics &
Optimization

45

Hybrid Agile

Labs & Pilots

With so much innovation present in

the innovation process itself, the third
myth is that there is a single approach
to innovation. As youll see, there is
actually a range that enables different
types of agility to increase the hit rate
of innovation at every level.

Innovation approaches
Along the range from incremental to
breakthrough, we see four main approaches to innovation in large organizations (see Figure 1): analytics-driven
optimization, hybrid agile, labs and pilots, and the spinout of a (lean) start-up.

Analytics and optimization

Analytics and optimization are often
seen as necessary evils rather than
opportunities for innovation. Driving
value from this approach assumes rapid
implementation of changes and a team
with a test-and-learn attitude. Aggregating a series of apparently minor A/B analytics-driven tweaks in a programmatic
way can be shockingly beneficial. Its a
tremendous way to evolve your current
business and platform to maximize performance. SapientNitros Global Lead
of Analytics, Simon James, calls this the
war of marginal gains.
For a recent client, our analytics teams
identified more than 100 potential
improvements to digital touchpoints,
which we projected to result in a total
uplift of over $46 million. For a separate
client, we hypothesized that a persistent
shopping cart would improve customer
satisfaction and increase conversion.

The brand actively improved this (and

several other original recommendations), driving an additional $25 million
in annual revenue. These incremental
innovations only come if the analytics-driven approach (along with the
team) is understood, valued, and
included in the innovation portfolio.

Hybrid agile
The second approach, hybrid agile,
seeks to deliver the benefits found in
agile development, while also permitting the long-term horizons typical in
large companies. Unlike more traditional agile (e.g., Scrum), hybrid agile
is a better fit for large programs with
dependencies across multiple groups.
We often see large organizations
with heavy planning processes built
around quarterly (or even less frequent)
releases. Internal teams are doing more
in each release, thereby accumulating
risk without value with every unreleased
change rather than splitting the risk and
value introduced over smaller releases.
Moving to a hybrid agile approach might
break a set of what would originally be
three releases over eight months to one
release per month (see Figure 2).
For a top retailer, we led a program
to redesign across the brands digital
touchpoints, re-platform its core capabilities, and move the organization from
a quarterly release cycle to a monthly
hybrid agile model. The hybrid part
of hybrid agile allows for the introduction of milestones around each agile
delivery release (ADR), which enables
reprioritization both within and between

ADRs. Key enhancements were introduced within a month of re-launch,

increasing conversion and sales while
simultaneously minimizing risk for
later enhancements.
The bulk of major enhancements or
platform builds that companies execute
would be best achieved through a
hybrid agile approach. Ultimately, these
enhancements can flow from different
types of innovation, such as identified
customer needs, industry improvements in core capabilities, or internal
process evolution.

FIGURE02

Typical release schedules versus a hybrid agile approach

Moving from a typical quarterly release schedule to a monthly hybrid agile
approach reduces risk and speeds the release of enhancements to the market.
Ultimately, this allows more innovation, sooner.
Typical Release Schedule
Release 1
Release 2
Release 3

Release 1

Release 2 Release 3

Release 4

Release 5

Release 6

Release 7

Release 8

Hybrid Agile Release Schedule

(Lean) Start-up

OUR PERSPECTIVES

46

SECOND STORY

Labs & pilots

The next two approaches share similar
intents, but assign differing levels of
autonomy and responsibility to teams.
The lab approach marries a dedicated
team to a distinct physical environment,
purpose-built with state-of-the-art tools.
As an organization, a lab understands
opportunity spaces in a usefully ambiguous way, organizing explorations around
an open-ended hunt with high standards,
but loosely defined goals (see Figure 3).
This can be a tricky line to walk, and doing
it well requires a willingness to kill your
darlings before the rabbit hole gets
too deep.

FIGURE03

Lab-based approach for a partner innovation lab

Lab-based approaches use a traditional top-down methodology. Hypothesisdriven, they are organized around an open-ended hunt for solutions. Unlike
the Second Story approach (see Figure 5, right), this traditional approach
starts with the hunt, not the technology.
Opportunity
Spaces

Ask
Driven

Context Building

Self
Directed

Knowledge Artifacts:
Basic Knowledge

Idea
Driven

Hunt

Discovery
Idea Generation
Test, Learn, Iterate
Package

Knowledge Artifacts:
Learning & Perspectives

Over the past two years, SapientNitro

has invested in a series of labs across
five North American offices, building
off of capabilities from our acquisition of Second Story.
Second Story was, initially, a small
interdisciplinary design studio that
was tackling critical areas with
explicitly lab-based approaches and
obsessed with the intersection of
digital and environments blended
physical-digital worlds which were
becoming ever more prevalent and
not well understood. Needless to
say, this is a critical new space for
those in retail, hospitality, financial
services, and sports.
With the expansion across North
America, Second Story is poised
to help a much broader set of our
clients innovate.
Second Storys approach is different
because it recognizes that there are
few, if any, best practices which
exist in this new world of blended
physical-digital environments. They
have deep relationships with display
and other pertinent hardware manufacturers, as well as a blend of architects, content strategists, designers,
and technologists.
Rather than rigidly trying to solve a
business challenge, they leverage an
understanding of an organizations
mission, and use this to explore how
technology and story can be woven
together in an environment to address business problems and provide
distinct value. This approach can
produce incredible results, but it also
forces clients and teams to accept
less-bounded problems.
For example, Second Storys labbased approach for a consumer brand
addressed the unique challenge of
explaining what technology and
benefits exist under the skin of a
product in this category.

Rather than creating a big touch screen

to walk customers through the product
details, Second Story created a series
of functional spike solutions based on
the latest capabilities found in the lab.
While there were hits and misses, one
specific interaction suggested a pattern
not just for the specific industry, but
also for the future of retail itself.

customers in. This not-yet-interactive

scene then transformed once a customer
picked up the product. As he/she turned
the product to inspect different aspects
of its construction, corresponding information was displayed on the screen
behind it.

The chosen solution (see Figure 4)

embedded gyroscopic sensors in the
products (such as an electronic device or
jewelry) on wall shelves and connected
them to a screen sitting behind the
physical display.

In this way, the actual product for sale

the electronics device or piece of jewelry
became the primary interface for the
interactive experience. This birthed
the core in-store design paradigm of
product as interface, and were seeing
the relevance of this notion play out in a
variety of categories.

When no products were touched, the

display cycled through videos and imagery that activated the space and drew

Second Storys lab-based conditions for

success enable this type of innovation
to occur.

FIGURE04

Second Storys product-as-Interface

proof of concept
One specific innovation created in
the Second Story lab was a product-asinterface proof of concept. In this example, the shoe controlled a digital interface that highlighted relevant features.

FIGURE05

Second Storys lab-based approach incubates by creating spike solutions in areas where there are no best practices
Second Storys lab-based approach starts with technology experimentation for example laser projection and product
scanning and then links it to an overall experience vision, which ultimately links to a business challenge. This flips the
traditional approach of business problem to application on its head, helping to ensure that the chosen vision is achievable,
while still being cutting-edge.

APPROACHES TO INNOVATION
Incubation Focused

SPIKE SOLUTION

DESIGN/IMPLEMENT
THE EXPERIENCE

(Lets Experiment with Pico

Projectors on different surfaces:
I bet some will look cool!)

SPIKE SOLUTION
(Laser projection looks awesome.
Lets figure that out.)

UNIQUE EXPERIENCE VISION

(We can use these technologies to
bring traditional utilitarian e-commerce paradigms into the physical
space as a delightful experience!)

BUSINESS CHALLENGE
(This may help us combat Amazon
by using one of our greatest
strengths: the store.)

SPIKE SOLUTION
(Lets learn how to scan stuff
because scanning is a fascinating
technology.)

Executable Idea
Drive Adoption

47

48

Inventing something entirely new is

not the only worthwhile output of a lab.
In a retail lab, we examined a start-up
that claimed its technology could
drive a recommendation engine that
would radically increase revenue on
our clients massive e-commerce site.
The lab was able to quickly create a
large-scale, working proof of concept
with the technology to determine if the
start-up was everything it said it was or
if it was too good to be true. Unfortunately, it proved to be the latter. The
lab protected a tremendous amount of
resources by being able to evaluate the
new platform.

SapientNitro is involved with various

sector-focused client labs that are
seeking to identify new platforms or
adjacent businesses germane to an
industry. Weve helped retailers explore
retail, insurers explore health, and
banks explore financial services, all
with the explicit intent of discovering
technology-based platforms or adjacent
businesses.The opportunity spaces
and hunts explored have been focused
on the context of the industries
themselves, combined with the latest
technology, and applied to the problems and opportunities that we see in
peoples behavior.

Lean start-up
The last approach is focused on a single opportunity space. Lean start-ups
are undertaken with the idea of creating
both a business and a product. A
great example of a successful start-up
stemming from a large organization is
giffgaff, spun out of the UK mobile
telecom, O2, in 2009. Leaders at 02
recognized an opportunity for a mobile
carrier built on a new business model.
Created in late 2009, giffgaff is a
SIM-only mobile network targeting
price-sensitive, digital-savvy customers
who avoid traditional networks. The
network attempts to reward its customers
for doing much of the work normally
done by employees namely, customer
service and promotion.1

This customer-driven business model is

something O2 could not execute within
the company itself given its managements focus on incremental growth.
As a separate entity, however, it had a
definite market impact. And giffgaff
continues to be successful. Its financial
performance was helped by a loyal
customer base and it was named Best
Telecom Provider in 2014.2
Most major corporations could use this
lean start-up approach when they
identify a key opportunity within the
market, but dont see a way to pull it
off within their current structure.

Wikipedia. "giffgaff." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giffgaff.

VENATOR
Venator is SapientNitros internal
innovation team. Its a small, highly
specialized group that integrates
business, technology, user experience, and data science expertise with
a core mission to identify, create, and
invest in breakthrough innovation.
Venator, Latin for hunter, focuses
on discovering key innovation trends
and understanding what impact
they will have on the intersection
of technology and story. The group
is a driving force for stewarding
clients to see around corners toward
whats next.
The inspiration behind Venator
came from co-running an innovation
center with a client. We realized that
a similar model, operating independent of any single client, could act as
a vehicle in defining our industrys
future. The team focuses on three
main areas:
Sourcing and assessing innovative
start-ups to discover companies
that are solving business problems
in new and unique ways, but are
likely not on the radar of our
corporate clients.
Engaging in research and development activities that employ
emerging technologies to explore
key topics of interest that are
trending and relevant to our
clients thinking.
Evaluating potential strategic
investments in start-ups that
SapientNitro should consider.
The opportunity areas that Venator
focuses on include a set of concepts
and enablers that run across our
business and clients (see Figure 6).
Venator regularly collaborates with
leading venture capital firms and
the investment community, top universities, and corporate innovation
labs. The team will also collaborate
internally with other hubs of innovation, such as the Second Story Labs,
Instrumented Intelligence, and
client teams.

We see Venator as another key differentiator that reinforces our position

as a new breed of agency, breaking
boundaries where technology and
story meet. With the momentum of
our recent recognition as a leader
in the Forrester Innovation Wave,
Venator has become more relevant
than ever before.

FIGURE06

Set of concepts and enablers

Venator focuses on exploring opportunity spaces areas or trends that
we believe will have a substantial impact on our digitally-enabled world.
Opportunity spaces are on two levels: Concepts, which are high-level
categories that combine different emerging technologies toward a solution,
and Enablers (the emerging technologies themselves).

CONCEPTS
Digital Augmentation
of Physical Worlds

Virtual Reality

Inspiration
& Discovery

Participatory
Economy

Internet of Things

Alternative
Distribution

Advanced
Analytics/Insights

Real-Time
Experience
Optimization

Customizable
Products/Services

Multisensory
Recognition

Machine
Learning

Robotics

Sensors

Non-Conventional
Interfaces

Cognitive
Science

Wearable
Computing

3-D Printing

Location
Detection

ENABLERS

2
Which? Tech Daily. Why giffgaff is our Best Telecom Services Provider 2014." http://blogs.which.co.uk/technology/
phone-networks/why-giffgaff-is-our-best-telecom-services-provider-which-awards-2014/.

49

OUR PERSPECTIVES

50

Six innovation principles

Conclusion

While each approach is capable

of attacking opportunities with
differing scales, time horizons,
and concreteness, there are six
innovation principles that can be
applied in any context:

Every day, large organizations struggle

with how to maximize innovation, not
realizing that their struggle stems
primarily from the singularity of mindset
and process with which they approach
problems and opportunities. What
they might need, in fact, is a portfolio
of approaches that enables different
altitudes of investigation and types
of agility.

PORTFOLIOS NOT PROJECTS

Innovation in large organizations is
maximized by understanding which
problems align with which approaches.
Consider how your set of opportunities
aligns to potential teams and approaches.

MOVE THROUGH THE

INSIGHT
MAKE
MEASURE CYCLE QUICKLY
At every level of innovation, the
faster a team can move to drive
change and then measure its
effect, the better it will perform.

BEST PRACTICES
DO NOT DRIVE LEADERSHIP
If your goal is to drive leadership or breakthrough
innovation, then perhaps asking your teams or
partners to produce best practice reports is not
the best solution. Breakthrough innovation comes
from focus directed at your customers ecosystems
and larger journeys, the exploration of new technologies, or the experimentation of new business
models. It doesnt necessarily come from what
your competitors are already doing.

INNOVATION MUST
BE PEOPLE-CENTRIC
(EVENTUALLY)
Innovation can be effectively
driven by technology and
organizational work, but
it is ultimately realized by
understanding how it solves
problems for people.

Each of the four approaches has its

benefits in specific scenarios. Focusing
even obsessing over analytics and
optimization can garner real rewards.
The hybrid agile approach can be
used to accelerate delivery of complex
enhancements more quickly. Labs and
pilots are good ways of exploring new
technology platforms and collaborating
with start-ups. And the ability to spin
out start-ups allows for the quick testing of entirely new business models.
There is no one-size-fits-all to innovation;
however, by varying their approaches,
companies can maximize the potential
hit-rate of their innovation investments.

NOT EVERY TEAM

MEMBER IS READY
OR WILLING TO MOVE
AT LAB PACE
Labs may sound exciting, but
they can be tremendously
difficult. They require constant
reprioritization, and ask team
members for a level of rigor and
focus that many cannot or do
not wish to invest.

John Cain
Vice President, Strategy and Analysis,
SapientNitro Chicago
jcain@sapient.com

Zachary Jean Paradis

THINK BEYOND THE

FOUR WALLS OF YOUR
ORGANIZATION

Director Experience Strategy,

SapientNitro Chicago
zparadis@sapient.com

Dont think that a problem has to

be solved only within your team.
The culture of experimenters in
the innovation space lends itself
to collaboration and idea-sharing.
Creating an innovation network is
an important component of creating an internal innovation offering.

51

OUR PERSPECTIVES

52

WHERE HAVE
ALL THE BRAVE
BRANDS GONE?
KIM DOUGLAS

What do Robin Williams, the World Cup, and Ebola all have in common? They
were Googles three most searched terms in 2014. Not a single for-profit brand
found itself in the top ten because of its marketing campaigns. Wondering why?
Well, it might surprise some marketers to discover that consumers are not likely
to go to the Internet for advertising.
Brands and agencies that are committed to finding ways to enter their consumers
always-on worlds have a special sort of bravery. They see in new technologies and
media a call to step away from the familiarity of trusted messaging and media
strategies, and to start experimenting with new, non-traditional marketing initiatives
that thrive in the digital environment. Responding to that challenge means that they
must welcome digitals unique opportunities versus simply repurposing existing
assets from traditional channels.

Brands that treat the Internet like a traditional advertising medium

often irritate, rather than engage, people.
As with the launching of any new medium, the first instinct is to adapt current media
successes to the new channel. This horseless carriage thinking is why we still
find YouTube pre-rolls (reformulated TV commercials) and banner ads (reformulated
print ads) all over the Internet. But brands are slow to admit that these placements
do not always work as well as they had hoped. Accepting disappointing returns on
time, creative, energy, and media investments is not the brave course to follow.

53

OUR PERSPECTIVES

54

In a recent study of online ad viewership, over 50 percent of viewers

across all age brackets found both
targeted and non-targeted ads to be
equally intrusive. Also noteworthy, the
survey revealed that only 10 percent
of respondents believe that online
video advertising (despite its ease in
audience targeting) is actually tailored
to them correctly.1

Brave brands see

in new technologies
and media a call
to step away from
the familiarity of
trusted messaging
and media strategies,
and to start
experimenting with
new, non-traditional
marketing initiatives
that thrive in the
digital environment.

Consequently, brands that fail to meet one or another of the consumers need
states are struggling to make tried and tested offline advertising principles work
in new, and very different, digital environments.

Four consumer need states

In our experience, there are four predominant needs that drive consumers to
the web: information, service, entertainment, and social interaction.

INFORMATION

SERVICE

These numbers arent new. Statistics

and insights like these have been
readily available for brands to digest
and apply for some time now, yet adaptation to the changed environment has
been slow.

Google it!

Can I do it online?

Information gathering is the highest rated

category of peoples time on the web.

This is probably the consumer request

heard most frequently by brands.

91% go online to research

Consumers expect:

Perhaps this is because brands are

overwhelmed by the barrage of digital
opportunities; theyve gone from running print and broadcast campaigns to
maintaining multiple social, digital, live
streaming, print, and broadcast messages (often for the same budget).
Often then, it seems that brand
managers find themselves coping
by becoming managers of agencies,
rather than acting as marketing entrepreneurs pursuing clear visions of their
brands futures.

82% go online to educate themselves

To perform offline functions online

89% go online to remain informed

2

ENTERTAINMENT

SOCIAL INTERACTION

Just for the fun of it.

Making connections.

84% of those surveyed claim to use

the web primarily for entertainment,
explaining why, every 60 seconds of
every day:

Consumers look to the web to socialize,

express themselves, and advocate
personal belief systems.

YouTube adds 72 hours of new videos

Instagram users upload 48,600 photos4

Power to the people

Unfortunately for marketers, consumers
have increasingly more control over
how, when, and even if they see an
advertisement online. A few clicks is
all it takes to skip a YouTube pre-roll,
hide a sponsored post on Facebook,
or choose to pay for ad-free streaming.
In short, digital audiences are not captive (and they know it), and they have
the power to opt in and out of interruptive messaging.

Brands to provide any service any

time of day

On a global scale, there are two-thirds

as many active social media accounts
(2.08 billion) as there are active Internet users (3.01 billion people).6

And 15,000 tracks are downloaded

from iTunes5

Ruder Finn. RF Intent Index. http://www.intentindex.com/. Updated quarterly, accessed May 15, 2015.

Mashable. Internet Users Send 204 Million Emails Per Minute. http://mashable.com/2014/04/23/data-onlineevery-minute/.

3,4

5
Apple. iTunes Store Sets New Record with 25 Billion Songs Sold. https://www.apple.com/sg/pr/library/2013/
02/06iTunes-Store-Sets-New-Record-with-25-Billion-Songs-Sold.html.

We Are Social. Digital, Social & Mobile Worldwide in 2015. http://wearesocial.net/blog/2015/01/digital-socialmobile-worldwide-2015/.

PR Newswire. Younger Viewers Find Targeted Ads

More Invasive Than Older Viewers. http://www.prnews
wire.com/news-releases/younger-viewers-find-targetedads-more-invasive-than-older-viewers-267164601.html.

55

OUR PERSPECTIVES

56

So, what does a courageous

brand look like?
To be brave, brands need to re-evaluate
their roles in both the online and offline
lives of their consumers, a step often
involving accepting difficult truths.
Core organizational structures and
the traditional funding practices of
marketing are being challenged at the
same time as demands for results are
increasing. Its akin to changing the
wheels while the car is moving, and it
requires that brands become more
flexible with their roles.
Brave brands should envision how digital technology can facilitate always-on
story systems, creating an optimal
range of roles in consumers experiences. For instance, if your business
relies on selling products, it is worth
considering how your digital experience
can provide a service layer that serves
another need state. And vice versa. If
you offer a service, think about what
products can bolster that service to
deliver scale and growth.
Brave brands have removed their fingers from the triggers of purely traditional advertising scatterguns. They
have embraced consumers newfound
powers and have taken the time to understand need states before engaging
consumers in a dialogue.
Nike, for example, has repeatedly
revolutionized its original brand offering
over the past five years, shifting from
ads to hardware and now to apps. Initially focused on producing ads about

sportswear (as well as sponsorship),

Nike started by building the Nike+
FuelBand, its proprietary hardware
that directly provides consumers with
relevant information about themselves.
And as wearable devices continue to
proliferate, Nike has now pivoted again
toward software creation apps that
live on other brands hardware to
enhance its digital platform and engage
its customers. With the launch of the
Apple Watch, the Motorola Moto 360,
and many others, Nike has an opportunity to put its brand on the wrists
and in the real lives of aspiring and
serious runners alike.
Similarly, Spotify challenged Apple in
music streaming by offering a music
product more deeply founded upon the
sharing economy, and capitalizing on
social network integration, peer recommendations, and a freemium on-ramp
monetization model. It has become a
one-stop shop for listening to, sorting,
and sharing music across devices,
besting Apples iTunes in terms of revenue for some record labels at least in
its European home market.7

Both Samsung and Cheerios found

social media success with quick-witted
(and subsequently viral) responses to
the 2014 Oscar Awards and 2015
Super Bowl. The Samsung ad a
photo by Oscar host, Ellen DeGeneres
had twelve A-list stars in it and leveraged the events real-time audience
to generate 3.3 million retweets and 2
million favorites. It also briefly crashed
Twitters servers. The photo was taken
by a device made by Samsung (the
main sponsor that year) and they
claimed it was unplanned.

Wilson at the goal line to seal a win

in the 2015 Super Bowl game for the
Patriots. At that moment, Cheerios
tweeted an image of its renowned
cereal (shaped like an O), along with
the caption Everyone's mouth right now.

Cheerios also cleverly chose a real-time

moment to promote its trademark product: When New Englands Malcolm
Butler picked off a pass by Russell

All of these brands have found success

by identifying a gap and inserting themselves authentically into consumers
online conversations.

FIGURE01

Both Samsung and Cheerios accomplished their marketing not through

traditional ads, but rather by being
ready to seize a momentary opportunity during live cultural events and
appealing to consumers delight in
social interaction.

Lufthansas Travel Companion platform built for the Apple Watch and for the
iPhone and iPad is a great example of digital technology facilitating always-on
Story Systems. The watch app, in particular, is a seamless, hands-free way of
providing upcoming flight information such as the terminal, boarding time or
seat number.

Focusing on a different need state,

Red Bull has reimagined modern
media practices by avoiding paid-for
interruption entirely and moving into the
production of entertainment itself. The
brand has become a major producer
of content through initiatives such
as Red Bull Rampage, Red Bull Stratos, and regular live experiences that
generate tremendous digital activity
and engagement.

7
Macrumors. Spotify Approaching 10M Paying Users, Revenue May Soon Surpass iTunes in Europe.
http://www.macrumors.com/2014/04/25/spotify-10-million-europe-itunes/.

57

OUR PERSPECTIVES

58

Five points for creating a brave brand

Brands and their agencies should approach the Internet holistically.
The process of creating an effective online presence shouldnt be seen
merely as a list of tasks or channels that have to be checked off.

UNDERSTAND
CONSUMERS NEEDS

Most paramount is to genuinely understand the needs of the consumer.

Over the past decade, weve seen the
refinement and application of many
new methods of consumer research.
The first step for a brave brand is to
develop a rich understanding of its
consumers met and un-met needs,
attitudes, and behaviors. For this, brave
brands use a mix of online and offline
methods, including instrumented intelligence (directly measured activity on
smartphones and in physical spaces),
ethnography techniques, instant online
surveys and focus groups, and many
other methods.

RETHINK YOUR
BRANDS OFFERINGS

Your brands products and/or services

should acknowledge consumer needs.
If those are not being met, rethink your
brands strategy the center should be
around the consumer. Indeed, a great
brand will build a world around the consumer, ensuring that all touchpoints are
interconnected to create a seamless
experience. At SapientNitro, we call
this our Storyscaping approach.

59

THINK PLATFORMS,
NOT ADS

Investing in new digital platforms

requires a different timeline than
traditional media spend. It took Nike five
years to build the different elements of
the Nike+ digital platform connecting
wristbands, an owned online platform,
social network functionality, and thirdparty hardware and sensors.
These types of opportunities in digital
require a multiyear vision and ongoing
investment. Digital platforms typically
live on for months or years, making it no
trivial thing to shut down the products,
services, and communities that people
love. Successful Storyscapes have
long-term visions that deliver on a wider
brand purpose, and their business case.

DO SOMETHING
SIGNIFICANTLY
DIFFERENT

Do not be satisfied with a 2 percent

increment here or a 3 percent growth
spurt there. Creating a great brand via
the Internet is not solely about technology, platforms, or software. Instead,
commit to a different relationship with
your consumers online and beyond.
Brave brands combine consumer
insight with strategy to rethink how and
where the firm can best compete
and then support that positioning with
investment not only in traditional media,
but also in technology, new product
development, and digital modernization.

TEST, LEARN,
AND ADAPT

The greatest lesson of successful online branding is to be immensely agile.

Test, learn, and build organizational
changes around this new way of
behaving. Use every step and misstep
to guide your company forward, and
consistently strive to be ahead of your
brands sector. Otherwise, despite the
transformations, your brand will find
itself struggling to keep up.

OUR PERSPECTIVES

Conclusion
Traditional advertising has been called
selling through yelling, and one of
the reasons why brands struggle is
because they continue to focus on
pushing messages out. Today, making
an impact requires a relationship with
pull. This approach strengthens brands
connections with their consumers
and the benefits it can bring; loyalty,
relevance, and engagement are the
rewards for those brands brave enough
to reduce their traditional message
out approaches.
In the age of the interconnected, brave
brands need to be acutely empathetic
with their consumers a timeless
concept in new contexts. Brands with
a successful and welcomed digital presence understand how their products
are integrated into peoples lives and
are taking critical risks to evolve their
ways in. More so, they are aware of
digitals current role and the future role
that it could play in enhancing consumers experiences and interactions.

Kim Douglas
Vice President, Managing Director,
SapientNitro Singapore & Hong Kong
kdouglas@sapient.com

60

REACHING
MATURITY:
ANALYTICS IS
ONLY AS GOOD
AS ITS DATA
SIMON JAMES

There has never been a better time to be a data analyst. There has never been
more data. There has never been more boardroom attention. There has never been
more human interest in both our own data and that of other people.
So, for all the talk of geeks inheriting the earth and Harvard Business School
proclaiming data science to be the sexiest job on the planet, why is it that little
physical evidence exists of brands mastering the application of data analysis to
their business practices? Even Tesco, perhaps the brand most synonymous with
data analytics, has not been immune to market forces driving down both its market
share and stock price over the past five years.
Creating competitive advantage through analytics is difficult both to achieve and
sustain. Leadership is a critical issue. The person accountable for analytics within
an organization often does not hold a decision-empowered position or is not connected enough to make an impact on business strategy. A second issue is one of
adoption. Having the correct strategy and gaining broad-based adoption of it are
two separate issues. A third issue is one of transformation. Few companies can
communicate the process of how they turn data into information, information into
insight, and insight into action.

OUR PERSPECTIVES

62

Analytics is a means to an end

Data analytics is a means to the desired outcome of positive, commercial
impact. If the investment in analytics
cannot be tied back to real business
impact, then something is likely wrong.
Interestingly, people expect data analytics to prove the return on investment on
marketing activities, but few measure
it on the data analytics themselves.
For those students of calculus, you will
appreciate that this is a second order
differential problem. For everyone else,
this explains why companies data analytics functions are often underinvested,
understaffed, and misunderstood.

SapientNitro works collaboratively with

our clients to determine the scope and
shape of analytics services that will
succeed within their corporate culture
and service their business needs.
Broadly speaking, there are three target
operating models that data analytics
functions might form (see Figure 1).
Each has its strengths and weaknesses,
and it is often the culture, not strategy,
of the business that dictates which
solution is most appropriate. The three
models are:
Centralized: One big analytics
group servicing the entire organization.

A model for success

Hub and Spoke: A center of excellence supported by champions embedded within each business unit.

It starts with consultancy. Before

anybody starts adding up all the ones
and zeros, or working out how to
tag a mobile app with tracking code,

Decentralized: Each department or

business line conducts analytics independently and in a selfsufficient manner.

The centralized model benefits from

having only one point of failure, easy
knowledge sharing, and the most
latitude for capacity planning. However, centralized teams risk creating a
bottleneck and making prioritization of
projects more political. Conversely, the
decentralized model benefits from implanting knowledge at the point of use
and giving individual business units full
autonomy. However, this model hinders
knowledge sharing and risks effort duplication. In the middle stands the hub
and spoke model, which is usually the
most popular, trading off the positives
of the other options while minimizing
the negatives.

Without this appreciation, data analytics is doomed to remain a cost center,

missing out on the link to revenue
growth. This explains why many client
analytics departments are fundamentally understaffed, and why companies
like us provide analytics services in
such volume.

LEARNING FROM THE LEADERS

FIGURE01

Todd Yellin, Vice President of Product

Innovation at Netflix, was a bright spot
at 2015s SXSW Interactive Festival. He
shared highlights of how Netflix leverages data to produce insights and drive
product innovation. For example, Netflix
design and algorithm teams have run
more than one thousand A/B tests with
tens of millions of users to continually
improve the customer experience. They
have had many successes and, even
more importantly, many more failures.

CENTRALIZED

HUB & SPOKE

DECENTRALIZED

PROS
Single point of ownership
Center of excellence
Clarity of responsibility

PROS
Hub provides leadership
Spokes provide self-service
option/ownership
Flexible and scalable

PROS
High degree of local ownership
Embedded in business
Hard to govern

He talked about "mountain testing" an

approach to testing major experience changes as one technique to counterbalance
incremental testing and optimization.

CONS
No centralized learning
Hard to act consistently

While incremental testing can get you to

the top of your current mountain faster
and faster, there are risks. Sometimes,
the focus on optimization can inad-

CONS
Risks ghettoization
Not embedded in business
Bottleneck

Having a clear target operating model

with a widely communicated purpose is
a key driver of success. Yet leaders in
the field of analytics go further. They understand their investments in analytics,
from direct labor costs and software to
licensing and agency fees. They also
know what commercial impact this
work delivers and can, therefore, set
their level of investment intelligently.

CONS
Requires matrix management

vertently lead you to forget about, or

ignore, any attempt to climb a higher
peak in the range.1
For example, Netflix spent many months
designing and building a beautiful,
colorful experience that their research
said kids should love. But it couldnt be
tested piecemeal they had to build the
new experience and then test it across
millions of visitors. In this case, the
experience simply didnt perform. And,
although they scrapped it, they were
able to use the data to avoid a major
investment in a complex redesign when
they launched in Japan.

Netflix created
mountain
testing to test
major experience
changes, not
just incremental
tweaks. #SXSW

There's an important lesson in this for

us as marketers: Know when to test
incrementally and when to look for new
mountains to scale. Be bold, take risks,
fail, and learn.

1
IPA UK. "Netflix and Buzzfeed on Test and Learn. http://austin.ipa.co.uk/post/113699851588/netflix-and-buzzfeedon-test-and-learn.

63

OUR PERSPECTIVES

64

The Analytics Value Chain

The diversity of types of analytics
from advertising effectiveness to
experience optimization to business
cases for digital transformation is
significant, as is the breadth of techniques applied to solve a vast array
of commercial problems.
SapientNitro has developed a unifying
framework of analytics that we refer to
as The Analytics Value Chain (see
Figure 2).
In this value chain, there are five incremental steps to achieving the highest
levels of analytics maturity:

INSTRUMENTATION
How to capture data from networks,
interactions, and behavior.

REPORTING
How to organize data into information.

ANALYSIS
How to generate insights from data.

OPTIMIZATION
How to programmatically apply insights
and fine-tune the process.

ADVANCED ANALYTICS
How to innovate and apply more advanced concepts (multi-variate statistics,
machine learning, algorithmic work) to
push analytics into new territories.
Everyone wants to maximize the strategic and commercial value of their data.
But we also understand that high-performing analytics is only possible with
strong fundamentals in place because
analytics is only as good as its data.
When analytics falls short, it is rarely
for reasons of technique or logic
it is likely due to incomplete or erroneous data.

Instrumentation: The foundation

Instrumentation is fundamental to good
data. Short-sighted instrumentation is
the number one reason why companies
fail at analytics its a productivity killer.

FIGURE02

The Analytics Value Chain

The Analytics Value Chain emphasizes the fundamentals of instrumentation and reporting before optimization and advanced
analytics. Analytical techniques are constantly evolving; this innovation helps brands move from lower value to higher value
positions. But as advanced techniques become widespread, they are commoditized and the process starts again.

CLIENT VALUE
Innovation

CONSULTING

INSTRUMENTATION

REPORTING

ANALYSIS

OPTIMIZATION

ADVANCED
ANALYTICS

Poor instrumentation creates problems

down the line, and wastes valuable analytics resources creating workarounds
and post-hoc remedies.
With the rise of the Internet of Things,
the number of touchpoints that can be
instrumented to capture data is growing exponentially. This expansion makes
data capture more difficult and stresses
the need to automate data capture
wherever possible.

Reporting: Too often a placebo

Most client briefs end at the reporting
stage. This often proves to be a critical
mistake. The world is full of reports
that no one reads. They can be like
an industry placebo a sugar pill of
numbers. The very fact that reports are
being physically produced often gives
the illusion that all is well. Sadly, as
Churchill might have framed it, reporting is not the beginning of the end, but
the end of the beginning. Once you
have accurate and timely reports, the
fun really starts. Everything to this point
is preamble.
For a number of retailers, daily reports
are used to set priorities for the next
twenty-four to forty-eight hours. For
example, we generate a daily scrum
report and align the team based on
what happened the previous day. This
information then feeds retail operational
decisions when to discount or move
stock, what trends to jump on, and the
impact of weather-related shifts. The
way these retailers operationally tweak
their business on a daily basis can be a
valuable model for many other verticals
e.g., financial services, service
companies, and automotive.

Analysis: Real value creation

begins here
The analysis phase is where real value
is created. Drilling into the information we have, falsifying hunches, and
thoroughly following disciplined trains
of thought in our analysis, we look for
unstated problems and try to solve
them. Its worth reiterating that if you
dont get instrumentation correct, you
have neither the time nor the data to do
the analysis (see Figure 3).
For some clients, the analysis phase
can reveal signals coming from the
data. For example, imagine a scenario
where 3 percent of customers through
their behaviors can signal that they
were likely to switch to another provider.
Once you understand those signals,
the analysis phase can help the business make decisions about whether to
take steps to retain the client.

FIGURE03

The problem with (big) data

Big data is the problem, not the solution, for most companies. In this rough
sketch, the author notes that while the amount of data increases rapidly, the
amount of insight from that data does not.
35 Zettabytes2

Data

Insight3
2020
Approximate numbers.

I made this up but trust me, Im a professional.

Commoditization

65

OUR PERSPECTIVES

66

Optimization: Programs of change

Finally, the
optimum
application of
analytics is to see
what isnt there.

Often, we formulate individual insights

into programs of change. These programs represent closed-loop learning
where hypotheses are tested and
iterated upon, and improvements in
performance are achieved through the
accumulation of marginal gains. These
optimization programs offer bottom-line
impact on everything from advertising
campaigns to digital experiences, and
ultimately, commerce conversion.
For one client, our analytics team
identified more than 100 potential
improvements to digital touchpoints,
which resulted in over $46 million in
additional, incremental revenue.

Advanced analytics: Seeing what

isnt there
Finally, the optimum application of
analytics is to see what isnt there.
We apply our knowledge of bleedingedge technologies, techniques, and
data to create solutions for problems
that brands didnt yet realize they had.
For example, our ability to make sense
of unstructured data with speed and
at scale is providing new insight into
areas where data analytics had
previously shone no light.

In one case, we helped a client identify

spot pricing opportunities in the oil
industry by identifying rigs, tankers,
fields, and refineries along the predicted paths of hurricanes (see Figure 4).
For a grocery retail client, we optimized
the layout of their dark stores (stores
that only take e-commerce orders) to
minimize transaction times and pass
those time savings onto consumers.
These are examples of applying tried
and trusted techniques to new sets of
data in innovative ways.

FIGURE04

Hurricane path prediction

Advanced analytics combine new data sets with existing business problems to
deliver innovative solutions. Using predictive models, real-time location data, and
market information, we were able to identify spot pricing opportunities by predicting likely weather-related production changes.

Realizing your potential

The promise of data analytics is real.
And data analytics as a driver of growth
is here to stay. Bridging the gap between the promise and value realization is best achieved by a systematic
approach. Linking effort to commercial
outcome and implementing analytics
across the entire value chain provide
the best chances for success. But in
order to achieve success, you need to
set yourself up for it. This means not
only ensuring that analytics is plugged
into the highest levels of your organization, but also appropriating data-driven
decision-making as a company-wide
issue and adoption measurement as a
key metric of success.

Simon James
Vice President, Global Lead Performance
Analytics, SapientNitro London
sjames2@sapient.com

67

OUR PERSPECTIVES

68

70
80
88

Chinas Wired Women and the Future

of Global Consumption
Evelina Lye, Padmini Pandya & Sue Su
Banking in the Customer Experience Era
David Poole & Jon Day
Thinking Beyond Smartphones:
Building In-Store Experiences
Ryan Scott

INDUSTRY VOICES
& GAME CHANGERS

CHINAS WIRED
WOMEN AND THE
FUTURE OF GLOBAL
CONSUMPTION
EVELINA LYE, PADMINI PANDYA & SUE SU
Wired Woman [adjectival noun]
Digitally confident, hyper-connected,
socially influential, and device-laden
ber online shopper.

Women are fast becoming one of the largest economic forces in the world. Its
estimated that women control $20 trillion in annual consumer spending, a figure
that could climb to $28 trillion by 2020.1
Within this group, there is a growing percentage of highly influential, digitallyempowered women shaping trends for online behavior. We call them Wired
Women. And nowhere are these women more digitally savvy than in China, where
a staggering 15 percent said they would rather give up seeing their families for a
month than their mobile phones.2
The Chinese Wired Woman embodies a growing female demographic who is
educated, financially independent, successful, connected, opinionated, and
sociable. She is deeply digital, and the new arbiter of cool and influence. On the
other hand, she is also profoundly involved in the management of familial matters
and turns to digital platforms for the benefit of others as much as she does for
personal purposes.
Chinas Wired Women comprise 18 percent of the female Chinese population:
Thats about 115 million women who are at the forefront of digital adaptation,
evolution, and trendsetting for the rest of China.3 Social media has given them the
ability to stay connected with their friends, family, and colleagues on a daily basis,
all while tapping into the collective intelligence of the broader online population.
The countrys tech scene is hastily trying to meet their voracious digital appetites,
and the size of the market means that where Chinese Wired Women go, so does
Chinese innovation.
Harvard Business Review. The Female Economy. https://hbr.org/2009/09/the-female-economy.

MSLGROUP. Women Online: The Social Wisdom of Wired Women Around the World. 2013.

Warc. How to Reach Digital Divas in China. 2013.

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

72

Warc. How to Reach Digital Divas in China. 2013.

MSLGROUP. Women Online: The Social Wisdom of Wired Women Around the World. 2013.

73

74

According to research done by Microsoft, Chinese Wired Women are early

tech adopters and more comfortable
sharing information online than any
other nationality. Consequently, the
rest of the world will be playing digital
catch-up if it doesnt pay attention.
Savvy brands that understand Chinas
Wired Women are set to take advantage of one of the biggest opportunities.

FIGURE01

Singles day

The worlds biggest online discount

shopping event is (mostly) Chinese.
$9.34 bn

$5.75 bn
$4.16 bn
$3.49 bn

$2.65

$2.29
$1.51

$1.20

2013
Cyber Monday
Black Friday
Singles Day

2014

For example, Alibaba (Chinas largest

e-commerce company) made sales
worth $9.3 billion in 24 hours on Singles Day, the worlds biggest online
discount shopping event, in 2014. To
put that into perspective, American
consumers spent a total of $2.9 billion
over Black Friday and Cyber Mondays
two-day online sales bonanzas (see
Figure 1) roughly what China spent
in eight hours. Jack Ma, Alibabas
Chairman, went on national television
the next day to personally thank
Chinese women for their patronage.
I havent looked at the data yet, but I
can guarantee that many women [made]
purchases for their children, husbands,
and dads and moms, he said.6

With so much spending power,

how can brands access Chinas
Wired Women?
The Chinese Wired Woman cares
about her family, the community, and
how the rest of the world sees her.

She wants to be beautiful; financially

successful and independent; and a
good daughter, wife, and mother. And
the Internet has become an important
perhaps the most important way for
her to achieve this.
Brands that want to find success with
Chinas Wired Women need to understand what it is this audience is looking
for. To start, weve identified three of its
key consumer behaviors: self-education,
demonstration, and management.

Self-Education
Chinas Wired Women want it all, and
that requires a lot of input, from goods
and services to the provision of advice.
The Internet has become the most
important channel for them to selfeducate. More than half (57 percent)
will compare products and prices
on social media before they buy (a
percentage that soars even higher for
highly involved categories), and 60
percent of Chinese women consult
online reviews at least once a month.8
For example, the biggest beauty Internet Word of Mouth (iWOM) platform
in China, kimiss.com, has 2.2 billion
views and 95 million users.9

The Guardian. Alibabas Singles Day Sale in China Breaks Online Records. http://www.theguardian.com/business/
2014/nov/11/alibaba-singles-day-sales-china-break-records.
7

8
MSLGROUP. Women Online: The Social Wisdom of Wired Women Around the World. 2013; McCann Truth Central.
Truth about Beauty. 2012.

Kimiss.com. Home page. http://www.kimiss.com.

75

That means that China is now the

largest online beauty market in the
world, with a record number of sales on
mobile devices. Mobile now accounts
for 49 percent of beauty brand term
searches on Baidu, and Este Lauder
reported that over 70 percent of its
online sales in China come from cities
with no brick-and-mortar distribution.
E-commerce and mobile-optimized sites,
therefore, are a must for brands wishing
to capture this enormous opportunity
and extend their reach to tier 3 and 4
cities across China.
But its more than just choosing what
to buy. Chinas Wired Women also use
the Internet to modify their behaviors.
Brands must therefore recognize Wired
Womens desire for knowledge and
help curate the conversation online. By
encouraging their customers to honestly discuss experiences and results on

impartial social media and third-party

beauty sites, brands can earn more
credibility than they do with paid
celebrity endorsements.
Indeed, brands that have been able
to engage with the real concerns of
Chinese Wired Women have found
great success. For example, the
effects of pollution on ones health
and skin is a real concern for Chinese
women. Dior recognized this and built
a campaign site that gave product
recommendations based on the pollution index. In just two months, the site
received 200million impressions and 4
million clicks.14
Similarly, Lancme created an extremely successful social forum for its
fragrance, Rosebeauty. With 4 million
users, the platform allows for self-education about the brands products
through a mix of conversation, virtual
testing, and professional advice. Both
Lancme and Dior prove that if you can
adapt and customize your information,
then Wired Women will follow.

56%
consult health tips
through the Internet.11

63%
change their beauty
routines at least every
two months based on
information online.12

69%
of mothers take parenting
advice from parents and
experts online.13

The beauty industry and the Internet

seem to go hand-in-hand, and Chinese
Wired Women are especially review
hungry: 60 percent will consult a

6
Forbes. $9.3 Billion Sales Recorded In Alibabas 24-Hour Online Sale, Beating Target By 15%. http://www.forbes.com/
sites/hengshao/2014/11/11/9-3-billion-sales-recorded-in-alibabas-24-hour-online-sale-beating-target-by-15/.

beauty review each month. Furthermore,

two-thirds of Chinese Wired Women
rely on online recommendations to
purchase a beauty product, compared to just 40 percent in America.10

McCann Truth Central. Truth about Beauty. 2012. http://truthcentral.mccann.com/portfolio/truth-about-beauty/.

10

MSLGROUP. Women Online: The Social Wisdom of Wired Women Around the World. 2013. http://mslgroup.com/
news/2013/20131112-wired-women.aspx.
11

McCann Truth Central. Truth about Beauty. 2012. http://truthcentral.mccann.com/portfolio/truth-about-beauty/.

12

Babytree. New Mom Generation Survey. 2014.

13

Advertiser Network (China). Dior Intensive Repair Cream. http://www.advertiser.cn/i/2578.html.

14

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

76

Demonstration

Wired Women
are constantly
multitasking,
and brands can
make this easier
by offering
experiences and
tools that simplify
these womens lives.

FIGURE02
Luxury e-commerce site, Vipshop, reports that 80% of its customers are female,
a far cry from 1995 when 90% of the Chinese markets luxury buyers were male.
In addition, more than 60% of Vipshops purchases are made on mobile devices.

Chinas Wired Women are keen to

portray idealized versions of themselves
online, so dont be surprised if you see
a woman in a coffee shop arrange herself and her food for the perfect picture
before eating. And that photos need
for retouching before being uploaded
probably explains the 100 million
users on the countrys most popular
photo editing app, Meitu-xiuxiu, and the
subsequent 600,000 retouched photos
shared online each day.15
This demonstrative, best self trend
extends far beyond selfies. Management consultants Bain & Co report
that female shoppers now make up
over half of all Chinese luxury buyers,
representing an enormous growth
from 1995 when 90 percent of luxury
buyers were male.16
The luxury e-commerce site, Vipshop,
reports that more than 80 percent of its
customers are female, accounting for
90 percent of sales. And 60 percent of
those purchases are made on mobile
devices (see Figure 2). Even the choice
of mobile is an important statement:
According to the newest results of
Hurun Reports Chinese Luxury
Consumer Survey, the gift of an iPhone
or iPad is now preferable to a Louis
Vuitton bag or Herms belt for wealthy
Chinese women.17
Recognizing this desire for self-demonstration, Burberry has brought its VIP
customization service to China through a
partnership with mobile platform, WeChat.

15
199IT. Meitu-xiuxiu official data: In late January 2013,
the mobile terminal Meitu-xiuxiu showed 5.6 million daily
active users. http://www.199it.com/archives/92739.html.

Bain & Co. Luxury Goods China Market Study. 2013.

http://www.bain.com/offices/middleeast/en_us/press/
press-releases/2013-luxury-market-study-release-bainmiddle-east.aspx.
16

By allowing customers to watch

fashion shows in real time and buy
items through their mobile devices,
Burberry proves that integration can
fully engage and satisfy Wired Womens always-on needs.

Apps targeted to women, such as Meet

You or Dayima (which have over 100
million downloads between them), are
treading on a similar path. Originally
just cycle trackers, they now provide an
abundance of health information and
have become full biology trackers.19

Management

In addition, LMBang (which literally

means hot mom) started as a social
networking site for moms, but has
expanded into fashion, health, and
lifestyle tips to keep Wired Women
engaged past the baby conversations.20
O2O, on the other hand, lets them
browse beauty photos for makeup,
nails, and other services; read reviews;
and book appointments all within the
app. While that keeps them perfectly
coiffed, Shao Fan Fan connects them
to personal chefs who come to their
homes to cook for them no time in
the kitchen necessary.21

Chinese Wired Women may have it all,

but having it all often means doing it
all. Professional, wife, mother, elderly
caretaker, friend, unique individual a
Wired Woman has to maintain multiple
personalities both on- and offline. That
makes her smartphone her most
valuable asset, with apps and additional functionalities popping up to give
her access to the goods, services,
and information she needs most. Is it
any wonder that the productivity apps
flooding the Chinese market are also
some of the most prolific advertisers?18
Wired Women are constantly multitasking, and brands can make this easier
by offering experiences and tools that
simplify these womens lives. Apps,
such as WeChat, have recognized the
opportunity this provides. WeChat is far
more than just a messaging app, now
allowing users to video call, share files,
shop, find friends, split bills, and book
appointments from one digital location.
In some ways, WeChat has become
its own operating system, combining
Facebook, chat, Apple Pay, Twitter,
credit card payments, and more into
one app (see Figure 3).

As these examples show, the opportunity for brands goes beyond beckoning
Wired Women to buy, buy, buy! By
presenting these women with real value,
making their lives easier, and saving
them time, brands are reaping the
devotion and patronage of an everexpanding market.

FIGURE03

WeChat activities conducted

by WeChat users in China,
(% of respondents)
22

WeChat is far more than just a messaging app, now allowing users to
video call, share files, find friends,
and book appointments.
Voice messaging
84.5%
Text messaging
83.3%
Moment*
77%
Group messaging
61.7%
Shake-shake
51.2%
Search people nearby
48.7%
Games (free)
39.4%
Subscribe to official accounts
of brands/products/services
22.3%
Shopping
21.7%
Payment via WeChat
19%
Games (paid)
12.9%
Purchasing stickers
10.5%
*A photo-sharing feature.

TechNode. Productivity Apps among the Biggest Chinese Ad Spenders in Overseas Markets. http://technode.com/2014/07/17/q2-2014/.

18

Tech In Asia. Womb wars in China? Womens health app Meet You nets another US$30M in funding. https://www.techinasia.com/womb-wars-in-china-womens-health-calendarmeet-you-nets-another-us30m-in-funding/.
19

Tech In Asia. Mothers Id like to fund: Chinese social network for moms gets $20 million. https://www.techinasia.com/chinese-social-network-app-for-moms-gets-20-million-funding/.

20

SmartShanghai. [Tested]: The Personal Chef iPhone App. http://www.smartshanghai.com/articles/dining/tested-the-personal-chef-iphone-app.

21

eMarketer and China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC). 2014 China Social Media Users Behavior Report. July 1, 2014.

22

17
Jing Daily. Apple ascends to top of gift list for Chinas
rich in austerity age. http://jingdaily.com/apple-ascendsto-top-of-gift-list-for-chinas-rich-in-austerity-age/.

77

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

78

Conclusion
Theres little doubt that Chinas
Wired Women are among the worlds
most important digital consumers.
And their numbers are growing: 115
million women accounting for online
spending in the region of $2.2 trillion.23
Wired Women are increasingly sophisticated and demand more than just a
tactical sale. Brands must tap into their
key desires, acting as conversation
curators, self-demonstration facilitators,
and time management enablers. And,
while Chinese women stand at the
forefront of these trends, they are far
from alone.
Wired Women can be found all over
the world, with their desires further
shaping the way the Internet works.
While entering the Chinese market is
an intricate step in terms of management and supply, multinational and international brands alike can apply these
learnings from Chinas Wired Women
to their strategies in preparation for
the future.

Globally, the potential rewards are

huge, but to take advantage of this
enormous opportunity, brands must
understand Chinese Wired Women
first. Is your organization ready to
transform digitally in response to the
Chinese Wired Woman and others
to come?

Evelina Lye
Regional Marketing Lead,
SapientNitro Asia Pacific
elye@sapient.com

Padmini Pandya
Strategic Business, Planning,
SapientNitro Asia Pacific
ppandya@sapient.com

Sue Su
Manager, Marketing Strategy & Analysis,
SapientNitro China
sue.su@sapientnitro.com

Warc. How to Reach Digital Divas in China. 2013.

23

79

80

BANKING IN
THE CUSTOMER
EXPERIENCE ERA
DAVID POOLE & JON DAY

Banking is getting better faster, easier, more mobile, more connected, more
transparent, and more personal. And, for many banks, there has been a very public
and intentional renewed focus on customer advocacy on rebuilding the trust lost
during the financial crisis. Yet, despite years of ad campaigns, a full 63 percent of
consumers believe banks only care about their own interests.1
We believe banks must bridge the divide between what they say they do and what
they actually do with a new service orientation that responds to customers needs,
wants, and desires. The future of banking is about enabling customers to realize
their dreams.

Understand your customer and simplify your product set

Earning public trust is a matter of the customers banking experience living up to
the brands promise. This hinges upon a detailed understanding of the customers
changing expectations, particularly the need for purpose. We are seeing leading
banks flip the current simple view of the customer, and endlessly complex view of
the product set, on its head.

CG42. Retail Banking Brand Vulnerability Study. http://cg42.com/2013-retail-banking/.

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

82

FIGURE01

Changing priorities
Banks that thrive will simplify the
product set and develop a complex
and nuanced understanding of
the customer.

Simple understanding of
the banking customer
Complex product set

Complex understanding
of the banking customer
Simple product set

The successful bank will have a refreshingly simple product set built around
relationships, and a more nuanced
understanding of customers and their
needs for breakthrough experiences
(see Figure 1). The bank of the future
will act on its wealth of customer data
a shift in emphasis from systems
of record (data stores) to systems of
engagement (informing customers).
Seventy-five percent of global banks
are now investing in a customer-centric
business model, marking a profound
transformation of their business and
culture.2 Banks recognize that people
dont buy a loan. They buy a car the
loan is the enabler. Yet still, banks often
lead with the product. Bank brands
continue to speak to their consumers
in a siloed, product-based way in part
because the banking culture is riskaverse and overwhelmed by disruption,
regulations, and the economy.

In the past, banks and their agencies

have been unremittingly focused on
technology, product, and process, and
the motivation to invest in new capabilities has historically been to reduce
costs or increase sales. For example,
significant savings were realized as
customers shifted from teller to ATM,
from ATM to online, and from online to
mobile where each advance reduced
the cost of service.
This is, of course, valuable. But it
comes down to why they set out to
improve the banking experience. Banks
should shift from driving costs down to
driving consumption up. Although their
first thoughts are to cut costs, banks
can choose to delight customers (see
Figure 2), thereby resulting in new revenue streams and efficiencies that are
by-products of customers empowerment in money management.

Most banks focused on fixing the

foundational aspects of usability and
usefulness will, over time, shift toward
experience as they earn the right
to delight. Winning customers will
require going beyond the zero-sum
game of rates and products; it will
require a new focus on experience
and delight. It isnt just about features; it is about the emotional connection or what we, in the experience
practice, call sense.3
As rates and features are further
commoditized, banks seeking to
remain relevant must deliver customer
experience with the extraordinary
power of delight and enjoyment
(see Figure 3). Forrester estimates
that addressing the enjoyability
metric is worth $81 million in annual
incremental revenue to banks.4 Not to
mention that the number one reason
for opening or closing a bank account
is the experience gap.5

FIGURE02

Invest in customer delight

What customers say they want from a bank

Customers care about the lowest rates and seek a bank which helps motivate
them understanding their needs and helping them reach their financial goals.
They also prefer a product that is easy to use. Most customers dont express
interest in having a delightful banking experience, yet it remains essential to
the future of banking.
WHEN IT COMES TO CHOOSING A BANK,
IT IS IMPORTANT THAT THE BANK

RANKING

AVERAGE
SCORE

Offers the best rates and terms

2.51

Understands my needs

2.73

Helps me reach my primary financial goals

2.97

Offers products that are easy to use

3.10

Makes banking delightful and enjoyable

3.57

Source: SapientNitro online survey to our proprietary U.S. community, n=422

The delightful omnichannel banking

experience does not yet exist and
remains a white space for the first
bank to deliver. These experiences
require significant investment; however, banks current technology spend
is increasing at a slower rate than
other industries (see Figure 4). Even
as banks prioritize their money toward
omnichannel solutions, their overall
IT budgets are growing slower than
retail, manufacturing, or business services. Banks also tend to have older
technology stacks, further reducing
flexibility and increasing costs.

FIGURE03

A significant gap
With different objectives, banks have different priorities than customers rates
and operational costs being just two examples. But both aspire to have delightful
experiences for their customers and themselves.
Banks wants

Customers wants
ASPIRATIONAL

Delightful

Delightful

Conversion to sales

Ease-of-use

EXPERIENCE GAP

Best rates, meets my needs, and

helps me reach goals

Reduce operational costs

FOUNDATIONAL

FIGURE04

2015 U.S. industry tech budget spending in billions4

Banks current technology spend lags behind the U.S. average, standing at 4.1
percent to 5.9 percent respectively.
$1,382
5.9%
$1,305
6.0%
$147
$1,231
5.3%
$131

7.1%

$148

7.4%

$140

5.5%

$159

$299

$278

$254

9.7%
1.2%

$75
$134

6.3%

$217

2.2%

7.4%
2.9%

$76
$143

7.5%

$221

4.1%

5.3%

2013

$231

6.3%
2014

Percentage change from

2013 to 2014

$78
$153

$305

$287

$272

$168

2015
Percentage change from
2014 to 2015

Manufacturing

Utilities and Telecommunications

Retail and Wholesale

Finance and Insurance

Business Services

Public Sector

Media, Entertainment, and Leisure

3
We define five dimensions to help quantify the essential elements of experience (see Insights 2014: The Bottom Line on Experience). Sense is defined as the extent to which
a person discerns a meaningful, emotionally relevant story.

Forrester Research. The Business Impact of Customer Experience. https://www.forrester.com/The+Business+Impact+Of+Customer+Experience+2014/fulltext/-/E-res113421.

Ernst & Young. Winning through customer experience: EY Global Consumer Banking Survey 2014. http://www.ey.com/Publication/vwLUAssets/EY_-_Global_Consumer_
Banking_Survey_2014/$FILE/EY-Global-Consumer-Banking-Survey-2014.pdf.
5

PwC. Retail Banking 2020. http://www.pwc.com/et_EE/EE/publications/assets/pub/pwc-retail-banking-2020evolution-or-revolution.pdf.

2

83

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

84

Like a fantasy football team (see Figure

5), we can imagine creating a fantasy
finance team with the best touchpoints
in the industry. Our favorites include
Capital One 360 Cafes, Mints personal finance management, the cardless
ATM and Touch ID of RBS, safe-tospend by Simple Bank, Wells Fargos
cross-selling, the high cap on Ally
mobile deposit, and USAAs customer
service. Pick your own favorites and
imagine them tightly integrated to
deliver on your brands promise.

FIGURE05
Many bank brands excel in customer experience in one or two touchpoints.
Imagine if we could combine them to create a nearly unbeatable team.

Capital One
360

mBank

Branch

Mobile

Site

Email

Commonwealth
Bank

Mint.com

Apple Pay

RBS

Social

PFM

Payment

ATM

Wells Fargo

Cross-sell

85

Ally

USAA

Mobile
Deposit

Customer
Service

Fidelity
Investments

Bradesco

Wearables

Robot Teller

To deliver banking in the customer

experience era, banks are looking
inward as well. The internal organization
of banks traditionally built around
products and strongly siloed has inhibited strategic change. Weve started
to see the development of entire new
ways of aligning and organizing talent
from RBSs journey managers, to U.S.
Banks new omnichannel organization,
to TD Banks Direct Channel organization. Banks are developing structures
that help their employees look across
products and focus on the customer
experience. Banks are restructuring
to implement their customer-centric
business strategies.

FIGURE06

Deciding where to invest

The traffic light model for deciding
what banking capabilities to invest in.

WAIT AND SEE

PASS

CRITERIA
Capability untested in this
banking market
Low public awareness

CHANNEL EXAMPLE
Branch: Robot teller
Mobile: Microsoft HoloLens
Desktop: Games
ATM: Custom card printing
Call center: Voice biometrics

Build your world

FANTASY FINANCE EXPERIENCE

BMO

Reorganize to make it possible

Simple

Garanti

Integration

When looking at the ambitious

capabilities in the fantasy model, it is
impractical to invest in everything. In
our conversations with banks, we often
work down into the weeds with discussions regarding individual components
of the consumer experience components such as the website, mobile
payment, the branch, and the role of
social. Theres a tendency to focus on
novel technology in an attempt to keep
up with competitors who offer features
such as swipe balance, video ATMs, or
Apple Pay. However, we recommend
starting with table stakes features, focusing less on being first to market and
more on how to package the features
together. Then, using the following
traffic light model (see Figure 6),
assess whether to invest in additional
new features.

ON THE VERGE

TEST

CRITERIA
Offered by banking innovators
Delivering results in other industries

CHANNEL EXAMPLE
Branch: Beacon
Mobile: Smart watch app
Desktop: Massive Online Open
Courses (MOOC)
ATM: Cardless transaction
Call center: Virtual assistant

TABLE STAKES

INVEST

CRITERIA
Demanded by customers
Driving switching behavior
Offered by competitors
Available as white label service
(e.g., Yodlee and Mitek)

CHANNEL EXAMPLE
Branch: Video conference
Mobile: Quick swipe balance
Desktop: Budgeting or Personal
Financial Management Tools (PFM)
ATM: Biometric security
Call center: Single customer view

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

86

FIGURE07

Desired future-state descriptions

The future of banking must have a
service orientation and respond to
customers needs, wants, and desires.
Banks should seek positive descriptions, whether the nature of the
engagement is a transaction, a
product/service, an educational
opportunity, or advice.
TRANSACTION
That was as easy as it could possibly be.
PRODUCT/SERVICE
I understand my options.
EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITY
I feel more confident.
ADVICE
I know I made the right decision.

Conclusion
Crucially, these touchpoints work best
when part of a cohesive world inspired
by an organizing idea, implemented
in a way that feels like a humanized
expression of the brand. The sum of
these parts needs to live up to the bank
brand promise wherever and whenever
customers come calling. Great brands
sell themselves, not their products, and
this shines through every interaction on
each channel. When this is successful,
customers react in a positive manner
regardless of the channel through
which they interact with the brand
(see Figure 7).
While individual touchpoints (e.g.,
mobile, ATM, etc.) between banks
and their customers have advanced in
isolation, a seamless, holistic packaging
of these touchpoints has yet to occur.
Its their combination that will accelerate the vision of humanized and
enjoyable banking.
The time has come for the omnichannel
financial experience. The question is
whether a bank, retailer, or technology
company will do it first.

David Poole
Senior Strategist, SapientNitro Boston
dpoole@sapient.com

Jon Day
Director & Global Lead, Financial
Services, SapientNitro Toronto
jday@sapient.com

87

THINKING BEYOND
SMARTPHONES:
BUILDING IN-STORE
EXPERIENCES
RYAN SCOTT

Retailers and venue operators have always faced massive challenges, but the
latest wave of disruption has made many of them yearn for the simpler days of
sales-per-square-foot reports, staff turnover mitigation, product planograms, and
endless campaigns to curb shrink.
Declining in-store traffic, an emboldened competitive set, and new technologies
beacons, mobile payment, till-less checkout, and other technologies have kept
folks up at night in the home offices and back offices of nearly every retailer.
And retailers have responded. In the past five years, weve witnessed and
participated in significant digital experimentation and pilots.

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

90

A SERIES OF NEW
TECHNOLOGIES
In some ways, were just getting the
right set of technologies to enable an
affordable and sophisticated in-venue
experience. Here are seven of the most
significant and promising developments.
BEACONS
In the last two years, beacons have
grown in popularity and sophistication. There are few clothing
retailers, for example, who have not
done at least a pilot with them. And
the metrics, in our experience, are
promising coupon-based beacon
messages have driven an average
5% to 10% increase in purchases of
a promoted item.

91

For many retailers, mobile apps have

been a first area of focus. We believe
that while this makes sense pre- and
post-visit, there is a more limited role to
be played by mobile tools while in the
store. Barcode scanning, wayfinding
(for some audiences), product information and reviews, and gift registry
management are some effective
applications. But brands should take
care that they dont push their best
customers toward a heads-down
shopping experience.

These approaches maximize traditional

retailers key advantages most significantly, the physical environment and
employee interactions (sales associates boost conversion significantly) to
create compelling brand experiences
and loyal customers daily.

Instead, retailers should look beyond

these small, bring-your-own-device
approaches and really rethink the
venue. Interactive screens, in-store
analytics, sales associate tools, and
full-fledged digital experiences have the
potential to bring customers into the
physical space, and then create a
compelling experience that ultimately
results in improved conversion and a
positive return on investment (ROI).

The limits of a mobile-only

strategy

Major installations include Macys

installation of 4,000 beacons in all
U.S. stores (in collaboration with
Shopkicks Loyalty platform), the
2015 SXSW Interactive Festival, and
MLBs 2014 World Series.2
But for all that, beacons remain
primarily marketing & promotional
tools; beacon installations arent yet
solving essential, unmet customer
needs. Until they do, they will remain
a promising technology still in the
experimental phase.
DROPPING HARDWARE COSTS
The annual drop in hardware costs
of consumer electronics means
that we have now reached the
point where in-venue investment
in digital displays can generate a
positive ROI. For example, in 2009, a
60-inch Pioneer Kura Plasma TV was

And with e-commerce representing

only 9 percent of all commerce interactions in the U.S., retailers who integrate
the digital and physical worlds will have
a significant competitive advantage.1

Obviously, mobile remains table stakes

for supporting customer engagement,
but retailers need to get away from the
idea that theyre going to win in-store with
just a bring-your-own-device strategy.
There are important use cases. As we
noted before, the customer will check

$10,000, while by 2015 a similar

display was $1,000. Similar patterns
are seen in the support hardware,
as well. For the first time, retailers
are installing tens or even hundreds
of screens in a given location at an
affordable price.
REAL-TIME COUPONING
Coupons have long been an essential
method of shaping demand at little
direct cost to the retailer. But only
recently have retailers embraced
digital couponing. And leading
retailers have moved beyond just
digital delivery of flyers to the creation of bespoke coupon apps tied
to that users online ID. This allows
personalized coupons, as well as
closed-loop data and analytics, to
precisely measure promotion and
store performance.

prices, read reviews and ratings, and

maybe even use wayfinding in-store.
Weve also seen success with digital
couponing, beacons announcing promotions, and mobile tools supporting
wedding, baby, and college registries
(see Target Registry, next page). There
has also been some success in live
sports and entertainment events by
both the MLS (Major League Soccer)
and MLB (Major League Baseball)
offering game-related statistics, orderfrom-your-seat technology, and streaming video of recent highlights during
live games.
But other applications including shopping lists embedded in the mobile app,
product videos and other promotional
data, and traditional e-commerce product
exploration have had less success.
Weve seen great companies design
great apps that dont get the usage

INSTRUMENTED STORES
Analytics data from in-venue
displays equipped with cameras
are being combined with sensors
(in-store and in-the-cart) and mobile
data (including couponing data) to
create a greater understanding of
in-store activity. These measures
enable segmentation by age, gender,
family size, and other metrics to
provide stronger insight.
SALES ASSOCIATE
CLOSED-LOOP MARKETING
Longer-term, we believe there is significant opportunity in connecting
sales associates to customers. What
if retailers sent notifications to sales
associates based on nearby activity
on an online channel? For example,
if a high-value customer has a large
basket or recently had a major

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

they deserve particularly in pure

retailers because customers find little
compelling reason to use them either
in-store or at home. Even if the hook
is present, there is still strategy work
to be done around promoting the app,
enticing guests to download in the
moment, and removing barriers from
getting the app open and used.
Therefore, many retailers are starting
to ask the next provocative question:
How can we enhance our in-store
experiences sufficiently to deliver a
modern, digital, and personalized
shopping experience that enables the
sales associate and creates the desired
experience in the store?
The next level of in-venue engagement
will mean broadening the aperture
on digital possibilities beyond customers smartphones.

issue on the website, a local sales

associate could reach out to help or
assemble the entire basket for instore pickup. Leading retailers could
consider bringing the sales associate
into the loop, offering the customer
an integrated experience.
APPLE PAY AND MOBILE POS
The continued growth of Apple Pay
now supported by 700,000 retail
locations in the U.S. and the launch
of the Apple Watch (with integrated
payment) represents the long-awaited
mainstream adoption of mobile payment tools. In-venue, sales associate
point-of-sale (POS) tools are also
showing signs of promise.
AUTO-REPLENISHMENT
Originally for the B2B space,
auto-replenishment is coming to

the retail customer. Amazons Dash

Button, for example, is an inexpensive networked button that enables
the instant reordering of a variety
of single products (e.g., laundry
detergent) when linked to a Prime
account. Partnering manufacturer
brands (including Whirlpool, Brita,
and Brother) are also integrating
replenishment services into their
hardware, so that replacement water filters, for example, are ordered
when needed based on a customers
actual usage.

1
Forrester Research, 2015. Notes from Forresters
Forum for Marketing Leaders, April 2015, New York.
2
ZDNet. Macys rolls out retails largest beacon
installation. http://www.zdnet.com/article/macysrolls-out-retails-largest-beacon-installation/.

92

Four in-venue, killer models

We are finding that the in-venue, digital experience is a powerful tool to
deliver demonstrably richer interactions. In assessing what is working well
across venue categories, we see four powerful models for breaking out of
the face-to-phone lockstep. These examples take advantage of the reality
that venue operators may control their floors, walls, and employees more
than they do their customers mobile phones.

The connector: Targets gift registry

The network: SportCheks digital transformation

Sometimes it requires an ambitious
redesign to deliver on a vision. Coming
off a number two rating in the 2014
SapientNitro In-Store Digital Retail
Study, Canadian retailer SportChek
doubled-down on in-store digital,
completely gutting and rehabbing their
West Edmonton flagship store. In the
end, they installed 470 digital screens
and integrated touch, gesture, translucent displays, and radio-frequency
identification (RFID) technology into
the in-store experience.
In its first full year of operation (20142015 YTD), the store posted a 50
percent year-on-year sales growth, and
SportChek is seeing a similar trend at
its just-opened, similarly-configured
Vancouver location.3
SportCheks West Edmonton flagship
store features 470 screens and has
seen a 50 percent year-over-year sales
growth through 2015.

The West Edmonton store renovation

added 21,000 square feet, and now
allows customers to experience the
products in-use with dedicated spaces
for a video gait analysis tool, dynamic

bicycle fitting, a climbing treadmill, and

a golf simulator.4
Digitizing the store is about redefining
the experience to create value for the
customer, SportCheks VP of Digital
Solutions, Frederic Lecoq, noted.5
Lecoqs five keys:
Content is key in the new
media world.
Move from broadcast to unicast
by replacing print flyers with
digital flyers.
Every impression should be the
result of a calculation.
ROI and spending effectiveness
not marketing spend drive
the business.
Remodel the POS into point
of experience.
The future of retail is all about content,
data, and connectivity. Be nice to your
tech people, Lecoq concluded.

3
Retail Touchpoints. Adobe Summit: Convergence of Brick-and-Mortar. http://www.retailtouchpoints.com/topics/digital-marketing/adobe-summit-the-convergence-of-brick-andmortar-and-digital-takes-center-stage.

Driving additional sales should be a top

goal when it comes to next-generation
in-store tools. Targets latest generation
of registry tools does just that, enabling
guests to easily create and maintain
baby, wedding, and college lists for
themselves, family, and friends.
Launched in 2014, the Target Registry
app runs on iPad Minis and is installed
in more than half of Targets stores
nationwide.6 Guests can set up their
device in-store or at home, and then
use their own device or scanners
placed on dedicated carts to maintain
their shopping lists. Sales associates
offer personalized help to guests in the
baby registry locations.7
While specific ROI numbers are not
publicly available, the registries have
been successful enough to push
the new platform from pilot to nationwide rollout.

Targets gift registry kiosk allows guests to manage their online baby and wedding
registries, while also connecting them to sales associates.

Target.com Help Site. Target Gift Registry. http://www.target.com/gift-registry/.

Star Tribune. Target Launches two new apps, updates others. http://www.startribune.com/target-launches-two-new-apps-updates-others/278273561/.

Medical Motion. Gait Analysis Training Medical Motion Partners with SportChek. http://www.medicalmotion.pro/component/content/article/210-gait-analysis-training.

Adobe Marketing Summit on March 9-13th, 2015.

93

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

94

The lure: Best Buys Samsung Gear VR Experience

Unfortunately, no one can be told what
the Matrix is, Morpheus notes in the
1999 film The Matrix, you have to see
it for yourself. Virtual reality (VR) is an
experience that is difficult to describe
unless youve put on the goggles.
Available in select Best Buy stores
nationwide, the Samsung Gear VR
Experience allows customers to demo
the Gear VR headset paired with a
Samsung phone.8
Best Buys survival in the highly
competitive home electronics space is

dependent on convincing tech-savvy

customers to visit its web and physical
properties regularly, and to convert
them while they are there. Demonstrating the latest in gaming and entertainment technology from VR to the
latest TVs is a key element of Best
Buys strategy.
In-store technology like VR is particularly important for getting visitors further
into the store and for making the store
more of a destination for its younger,
connected customers.

The informant: Ionos platform

Navigating large stores and complex
venues (such as airports, stadiums, and
hotels) can be daunting experiences.
And people are not always comfortable
asking for help when faced with new
or complex environments. Large-scale
displays can provide interactive wayfinding and general information, as well as
branded communications.
With beacons and Bluetooth technology, these screens now have an active
dimension, directly reminding passersby of a range of options. Better yet,
those message programs can be intelligently segmented by demographics,
driving new behaviors in data-driven
ways all while delivering a muchneeded customer service.
And the results from these new
screens have been significant, with an
initial pilot seeing 2,500 unique interactions per week across five directories
on the property. Analytics indicate a
40/60 male/female split on usage,
with 46 percent of users being young
adults. Phase 2, now in development,
will add locations and introduce new
form factors and screen designs in
additional parts of the facility.

In-venue touchscreen technology like this display at the TD Garden in Boston,

Massachusetts, not only provides context and location-aware recommendations,
but also provides real-time data on traffic volume, age, and gender.

The Samsung Gear VR Experience allows customers to spend time in virtual worlds in the store, driving trial of the
technology, as well as store traffic. For many visitors, this is the first time they experience VR.

The Verge. You can try Samsungs Gear VR in dozens of Best Buy stores. https://www.theverge.com/2015/2/6/7991803/samsung-gear-vr-demo-best-buy-stores-feb-8th.

95

INDUSTRY VOICES & GAME CHANGERS

96

What does it take to

carpe venue?
First, you cant rely solely on mobile for
your in-store strategy. Instead, focus on
connecting and blending your channels
to provide real value and customer tools.
In-venue digital screens are the right
tools for delivering product information,
guidance, and sales engagement in
the store.

Everything a
retailer does
from a design
standpoint should
be validated by
data. And nearly
everything in
data influences
the design.

97

Second, scale should drive ROI, not

break it. As hardware costs collapse,
in-venue experiences can now have a
positive ROI. Simultaneously, you likely
already have the mature dot com infrastructure and the associated content to support these experiences.
Brands can leverage their existing investments in content to deliver great
experiences. The cost side can be addressed, as well. Look for hidden operational costs that digital can eliminate.
Third, adopt the appropriate technology. Avoiding a stove-pipe mentality
is essential. An in-venue screen is not
another website, but rather a completely different technology stack. Initial,
pro-duct-based solutions have proved
too siloed and closed off, too proprietary, and too tied to playlists and channels (blanket content distribution).
Instead, consider extending your existing enterprise digital ecosystem as
the system of record. Use the rest of
your digital ecosystem to inform and
complement your in-venue experiences.
Digital platforms enable microtargeting
based on location in the store, time of
day, and advertising/monetization algorithms. Longer term, it may be wise to
consider beacons and mobile extensions.

Finally, close the loop on your analytics.

In-venue experiences can be instrumented just like the web and the ROI
lives in the analytics. For example, every
in-venue installation could include cameras and software to recognize gender,
age, and other baseline data. Retailers
must link online and mobile activity
with physical store activity and sales.
These data can then be linked to the
massive online analytics database, as
well as augmented with cutting-edge,
in-store instrumentation using infrared,
beacons, Wi-Fi, and other technologies
to identify in-store activity. Everything
a retailer does from a design standpoint should be validated by data.
And nearly everything in data influences
the design.

Conclusion
Brands have a unique opportunity to
deliver compelling in-venue experiences. However, they must look beyond
their mobile apps in order to build experiences that compel visitors to look up,
not down, and engage in-store.
This is an exciting time for retailers
and operators to get aggressive and
embrace the opportunity. Whether you
choose the network, the connector,
the lure, or the informant, make sure
to carpe venue!

Ryan Scott
Vice President, Global Strategy Lead
Digital Marketing, SapientNitro Boston
rscott@sapient.com
A special thanks to Sarah Traylor for her
contributions to this article.

100

Virtual Reality in Retail

Gary Koepke & Adrian Slobin

106

Applied Analytics: Creating Serendipity

Neil Dawson

110

Motion and Animation

Parvez Ahmed

116

The IoT: A Revolution Is Under Way

T.J. Mcleish

TRENDS AT THE
INTERSECTION OF
TECHNOLOGY & STORY

VIRTUAL REALITY
IN RETAIL
GARY KOEPKE & ADRIAN SLOBIN

One day, we
believe this kind
of immersive,
augmented reality
will become a part
of daily life for
billions of people.
- Mark Zuckerberg

Announcing his $2B, 2014

acquisition of Oculus Rift.1

Virtual reality (VR) is in the midst of a rebirth. A new set of enabling technologies
including faster processor speeds and higher-resolution graphics are driving a
second wave of adoption and experimentation. The result will be a transformative
technology that reaches far beyond gaming to reshape multiple industries, from
retail to travel to hospitality.
One of the most significant opportunities, we believe, is in the retail space.

When Retail Meets VR

We believe virtual reality is going to fundamentally transform the human experience
of shopping and, in doing so, lift sales for those retailers who get ahead of the curve.
Brands have an opportunity to stake out an innovation leadership position by building custom virtual reality experiences that engage customers beyond physical and
digital brand experiences. We call this v-commerce. V-commerce will be the next
evolution of e-commerce, as retailers and brands create fully immersive, contextual
shopping experiences that go beyond the flat world of 2-D e-commerce.
Along with the inherent excitement it fosters, virtual reality adds an enticing layer
of information and comfort to the e-commerce experience. Consumers can be
presented with a range of data regarding the products or services they are about
to purchase, complemented by their ability to step into the future into their future
selves with said products and services.

Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg Post. https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101319050523971.

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

102

With virtual reality removing the barrier

of too little information or interaction,
consumers are likely to develop a
confidence in their purchases that then
translates into increased comfort with
(and affinity toward) the brand providing such distinct experiences. They
are more likely to reach the renowned
euphoric state of discovering a great
buy, one that they not only wish to
brag about, but will also remember and
come back for.

Potential applications
Even though widespread mobile adoption still feels a bit distant (see Figure
1), were already seeing opportunity
areas for major brands in v-commerce.
By building a customized virtual reality
show world, sports apparel and equipment brands like Nike, Adidas, or New
Balance have the potential to show
their consumers how workout apparel

FIGURE01

moves on an athletes body, or how a

famous golfer tests out clubs. In the
world of VR, consumers can immerse
themselves into the story of a sports
product, discover where the leather
from a basketball is made, or learn
how to use a specific piece of workout
equipment from a top athlete.
Home improvement retailers such as
Home Depot or Ace Hardware can
create experiences that allow consumers to try power tools, experience
different lighting and landscapes, or
even see how their kitchen will look
after a $20,000 renovation versus a
$50,000 renovation.
Outdoor gear retailers such as REI,
North Face, or L.L. Bean can create a
show world that allows consumers to
see what that new tent looks like all set
up on a camping excursion. They can
climb inside, manipulate the weather
conditions, and test the gear with
other products.

Toy retailers such as American Girl can

transport their consumers to the civil
war era when their American Girl doll
lived, while Disney can send consumers to the ice wonderland of the
popular animated movie, Frozen.
In the future of mass virtual reality
adoption, mobile-heavy flash retailers
like Gilt Group or Groupon can prompt
users to grab their headsets and enter
an immersive experience to purchase
limited edition products, swipe through
options, see how items fit on a mannequin, see how products complement
each other, or learn details about
designers. For services, consumers can
step into a show world that simulates
what a spa may look like before they
decide to purchase the experience.
The opportunities are there for anyone
looking to tell their story in a more
intimate and personal way. From travel
to automotive, real estate to sporting
events, the potential is nearly limitless.

Other interesting developments

The future of VR adoption

Within the next 12 months, VR enabled mobile devices will be announced by every major smartphone manufacturer.
In 3 to 5 years, we anticipate full adoption.

There have been a number of other

recent developments enabling the
development of v-commerce at scale.

WE ARE HERE
TODAY

1-2 YEARS OUT

VR ADOPTION

FULL MOBILE ADOPTION

IN-HOME AND MOBILE ADOPTION

Sixense VR

Sixense VR

Sixense VR

Mobile Phones
Samsung Gear VR
Google Cardboard
Valve/HTC Vive Dev Kits
Facebook/Oculus Rift Dev Kits
Sony Morpheus Dev Kits

All Smartphones
Samsung Gear VR
Google Cardboard
Oculus Crescent Bay
Valve/HTC Vive
Sony Morpheus
Razer OSVR

All Smartphones
Samsung Gear VR
Google Cardboard
Oculus Crescent Bay
Valve/HTC Vive
Sony Morpheus
Razer OSVR
Microsoft Hololens
Magic Leap
Apple VR

Samsung Milk VR
Facebook 3600
YouTube 3600

Samsung Milk VR
Facebook 3600
YouTube 3600

Samsung Milk VR
Facebook 3600
YouTube 3600

103

Facebook and YouTube are

now supporting 360 video
Facebook and YouTube have opened their platforms to 360-degree
video, and consumers now have
access to affordable 360 cameras
such as the Ricoh Theta and Kodak
SP360. Furthermore, widespread
drone usage enables soaring vistas.

3-5 YEARS OUT

the next eighteen months, expect

to see an explosion of 360 content
of widely varying quality with creators now having a place to put it.
Further investments in mixed
reality platforms
With the launch of Microsofts HoloLens, mixed reality or augmented
reality platforms are showing some
signs of life, even with the shutdown of Google Glass.
Creation of developer ecosystems
Were already seeing signs that VR
companies are investing in developer ecosystems. Oculus, among
others, has a robust developer
program. Look for continued investment from Samsung, Google, and
Facebook into nurturing the VR
developer ecosystem. Perhaps
more than any other factor, the
success of VR will depend on its
developers and world creators.

FIGURE02
Merrell ran a VR experience at the Sundance Film Festival to highlight the
traction of Merrells new Capra hiking boot. The experience took visitors to the
Dolomites, a mountainous region in Italy, and allowed them to walk through the
region, cross a rope bridge over a chasm, and walk along a rock wall.2

For agencies and brands already

shooting TV and digital content, it
is a small step to 360 degree and
then into VR. The bottom line: Over

Merrell. Inspiring Awesome Experiences in Park City at Sundance. http://blog.merrell.com/us/en/events/inspiring-awesome-experiences-park-city-sundance/.

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

104

Actions to be taken now

Conclusions

For retailers looking to stay ahead of

the curve, there are three actions they
should take soon.

Virtual reality is a transformational medium. It also allows for creating entirely

new types of experiences and the use
of our Storyscaping approach to fully
immerse consumers in virtual worlds
that are real to them emotionally and
psychologically, the impact of which we
are just starting to explore.

Start testing and playing

For most retailers, the appropriate
focus in VR is on testing and learning how to create great, original
experiences in these new worlds.
Apart from maintaining a purview
over notable use cases, retailers
should look toward their consumers
and identify ways in which their
shopping experiences could benefit
from VR. The next step is finding
the appropriate partners for testing
those hypotheses, assessing the
results, and iterating along the way.
Leading retail brands should be in
the test-and-learn phase now, so
that when full adoption arrives in
three to five years, they will already
have this platform in place (for both
in-store and v-commerce).
A focus on mobile adoption
The immediate opportunity in VR
is mobile adoption, so place VR on
your mobile roadmaps.
Evaluate your technology
integration points
Just like with web and mobile, VR
must integrate with your backend
technology. From a technology
perspective, planning for integration
will be essential, so that consumers
get a rich, personalized experience
enabled with current inventory
and pricing. If there is one thing
we learned from the latest mobile
disruption, it is that integration
must be accounted for early in the
design process.

105

But the mass adoption of virtual reality

is coming. Within the next twelve
months, VR enabled mobile devices
will be announced by every major
smartphone manufacturer. In twelve to
twenty-four months, we will start to see
more experiences built for mobile VR
usage. Then in three to five years, we
expect to see full adoption.
Brands should start getting ready now.

Gary Koepke
Vice President, Chief Creative Officer
SapientNitro North America
gkoepke@sapient.com

Adrian Slobin
Managing Director and Digital
Strategist, SapientNitro Minneapolis
aslobin@sapient.com

APPLIED
ANALYTICS:
CREATING
SERENDIPITY
NEIL DAWSON

Our surroundings and experiences influence the way we perceive the world: how
we think and act, the choices we make, and our general sense of taste. This
multitude of individual tendencies creates what sociologist Pierre Bourdieu calls
habitus, a cumulative pattern of the everyday that unconsciously informs our
judgment toward selections of likeness.
The personalization of the digital space lies parallel to our habitus, as algorithms
filter and strive to serve us relevance. As Mark Zuckerberg stated, A squirrel dying
in front of your house might be more relevant for your interests right now than people dying in Africa. The filtered content, much like the aforementioned disregarded
options, remains invisible a process that we cannot influence.

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

108

The act of filtering

Lets take the case of Spotify, which
introduced a new approach to music
discovery by acquiring Echo Nest, a
music intelligence software. Echo Nest
combines multiple filters to analyze
music on an audio level and cultural
level.1 The former deepens our music
discovery by giving us more of the
same, while the latter broadens our music discovery. But again, the addition is
filtered and thus limited (see Figure 1).
So how can we make our digital experiences more diverse? Dismissing filters
per se is not the solution; without
them, we would be overburdened by
abundance and too much choice would
paralyze us.2 Thats where serendipity
comes into play.3 Serendipity is important for diversifying tastes and (commercially speaking) driving users.

The digitization of serendipity

Serendipity in its purest form is not
reproducible in the digital space. As
soon as people start to choose serendipity (i.e. shuffle music playlists), their
experiences can no longer be seen,
strictly speaking, as serendipitous.
Nevertheless, we believe that the idea
behind serendipity is worth pursuing.
While we cannot reproduce serendipity
in its purest state, we might cultivate
a state of controlled serendipity.
Controlled serendipity can be a tool
for making the bubble of algorithmic
filters, in which we are currently
browsing, permeable.

The challenge now is to start reframing

our digital experiences in order to create a state of controlled serendipity.
And there are numerous ways of doing
this. One solution is to filter only a
certain percentage of our digital experience based on relevance (e.g., 80
percent), while the balance (e.g., 20
percent) remains unfiltered and diverse.

FIGURE01

Introducing serendipity
Digital content is often filtered based
on past patterns and connections,
making discovery difficult.

Another example is algorithmic. Instead

of only filtering according to relevance,
different criteria such as whether
something is challenging, important,
or represents other points of view
could be applied. These criteria can
vary according to platform types and
their purposes.4
Regardless of strategy, we consider
controlled serendipity to be important
in ensuring that users are exposed
to as many distinct experiences as
possible. And we believe it to be commercially relevant in an overcrowded
marketplace, where companies are
keen to deliver unique and memorable
user experiences.

But we can cultivate a state of

controlled serendipity by introducing filters to intentionally introduce
diversity into our digital experience.

As Sir Tim Berners-Lee so eloquently

put it, We need diversity of thought in
the world to face the new challenges.

Neil Dawson
Chief Strategy Officer,
SapientNitro London
ndawson@sapient.com
A special thanks to Michle Schwarzer
for her contributions to this article.

Filters broadening music

discovery to a limited extent.
Filters deepening music
discovery to a limited extent.

Using rhythm, tempo, and timbre for the former; and by reviews, ratings, and tweets for the latter.

Barry Schwartzs notion of the paradox of choice explains that the more choices we have, the fewer choices we make.

Definition according to the Oxford Dictionaries: The occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.

For example, search engines, social networks, news platforms, or e-commerce websites.

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

110

MOTION AND
ANIMATION
PARVEZ AHMED

Motion provides meaning.

Motion respects and reinforces the
user as the prime mover. Primary
user actions are inflection points
that initiate motion, transforming
the whole design. Motion is
meaningful and appropriate,
serving to focus attention and
maintain continuity. Feedback is
subtle yet clear. Transitions are
efcient yet coherent.
- Google Android Design Guidelines1

Motion and animation have long been part of online experiences. From ASCII-based
video on green screens to AOLs Youve Got Mail icon, animations have been
in the repertoire of digital designers for years.
However, it was only in 2011 that the latest wave of browsers officially recognized
CSS unlocking sophisticated web animations without the restriction of a plug-in.
But now, with improved browser-based animation support, shrinking screens, and
more processing power, motion design is poised to become a cornerstone of the
modern user experience in a way that it was not in the past.
Whether used on digital displays in venue, on desktop computers, or on smartphone apps, motion and animation are changing the user experience.
1

Google. Material Design. http://www.google.com/design/spec/material-design/introduction.html.

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

112

So how will motion and animation

play out over the next few years?

Why use animation?

When done well, motion imbues an experience with functionality, as well
as personality and style. Such meaningful, animated interactivity gives the
user interface, regardless of platform, a competitive edge.

Experiences will be designed to use

animation and motion from the start

Motion design delivers this edge in three areas:

Whether designing for laptops, smartphones, or smartwatches, designers

(especially traditional web or e-commerce
designers) will make much more frequent use of animation. However, this
will not always be easy.

EMOTION
MEANING
Motion adds meaning. It allows
users to acquaint themselves
better with the interface and find
their way around. Motion can help
direct focus, as well.

Motion can invoke and provoke

deep emotional engagement with
users. Subtle movements can
tell sophisticated stories.

To aid the creative process, storyboard

animation and prototyping animation
skills will become critical.

CONTEXT

USER
EXPERIENCE

By combining these characteristics,

marketers can create dynamic and
compelling animations that allow for
much-improved storytelling.

113

Animation requires a new mindset.

Designers moving from a traditional,
flat website design will learn that
animated experiences require designing in multiple, additional dimensions.
One animator compared it to working
with clay: the designer builds a 3-D
space, and then polishes and paints it.
It is a craft an art form that requires
working with time and space.

Motion can set context. By mimicking

real-world physics like gravity and inertia,
designers can help users anticipate what will
happen. Motion can help create a naturalfeeling interface, full of digital interactions
that feel spontaneous and genuine.

Storyboard animations will be used to

capture not just the wireframe showing
the before and after state, but, critically,
the transition between states. Storyboarding the between states enables the
design of animation, while also unlocking its emotional and persuasive power.

Together, these new techniques unlock the emotion and persuasive power
of animation.

The best stories will use animation

and motion but you wont notice it
The more motion and animation
becomes widespread, the less youll
notice it. Instead, skilled designers will
use these new capabilities wisely and
in very intentional ways. By combining
technological capabilities with natural
movements (see Figure 1), animation
allows for seamless interaction between users and platforms.
Exemplary transitions will stem from
e-commerce websites, whose flat
experiences will slowly be replaced by
more dynamic experiences infused with
the meaning and context provided by
motion (see Figure 2).

FIGURE01

Natural movements
Together, storyboard animation and
prototyping animation techniques
allow designers to mock-up and then
actually create animations with emotional and persuasive impact.

FIGURE02

Anticipation: Motion prepares the audience for the action about to occur
On this hypothetical retail example, when the user taps on a tile, the tile flips
around to reveal more information. The successive progression of the tile from
point A to point B directs the users attention and hints at what is about to happen.
Point A

Point B

And increasingly, prototyping animation will now be a design process as

much as a technical one. Designers are
collaborating with developers during
the creation of low-fidelity proofs of
concept in HTML, CSS, and Javascript.
These New tools allow designers,
marketers, and developers to iterate
and generate new ideas together.

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114

Furthermore, more tools will follow the

animated likes of Yahoos News Digest
app, which uses subtle animation effects
[such as squash and stretch (see Figure
3)] to reduce user fatigue and encourage
more engagement.
And as motion and animation increasingly affect meaning, emotion, and
context, narratives will become the foci.
Analogous to film, a medium built upon
motion and animation, Story Systems
a key part of our Storyscaping approach
will be experienced through a blend
of these technologies and narratives.

FIGURE03

Squash and Stretch

The Squash and Stretch function can be used in mobile tools to unmask new
content with the combined effect of transition and alpha opacity.
For example, when users finish reading the initial set of content, they slide up
from the bottom of the feed to find more stories. A short message can be used to
suggest more content.
This method simplifies the release to refresh style and is unique in comparison
to the navigation in other apps (such as Flipboard, Pinterest, or Instagram) where
feeds scroll forever and exhaust users.

Motion and animation will make

huge data sets understandable
and accessible
Brands continue to use motion and
animation to create experiences, as
they have for a long time. But today, the
ability to interpret and render massive
datasets in real time is a major restriction. So far, big data has been difficult
to animate in real-time, often requiring
experiences to be carefully scripted or
simplified. The result is less flexibility in
these experiences, as well as greater
difficulty in data interpretation.
But technology, with faster processors
and cleaner streams of data from the
Internet of Things, will increasingly
enable the intake of data. It will then
enable real-time conversion of that data
into visuals, which will in turn be better
understood using motion and animation
built upon the latest capabilities.

Conclusion
Motion design is becoming a valuable digital asset for both experience
creators and users. As designers
and developers incorporate animation into user interfaces, they unlock
its immense potential to push the
boundaries of digital storytelling and
interactive experiences. And, while they
are redefining what is possible in user
experiences, motion and animation are
reshaping the digital expectations for
better marketing.

Parvez Ahmed
Experience Technologist,
SapientNitro Detroit
pahmed@sapient.com

115

THE IOT:
A REVOLUTION
IS UNDER WAY
T.J. MCLEISH

The most profound technologies are those

that disappear. They weave themselves into
the fabric of everyday life until they are
indistinguishable from it.
- Mark Weiser

The Computer for the 21st Century, 1991.

Much (perhaps too much) has been written about the Internet of Things or
Internet of Everything. But the idea itself has been around for decades. Marshall
McLuhan described the content of a light bulb in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man in 1964. Decades later, Mark Weiser described physical manifestations and uses of ubiquitous computing in The Computer for the 21st Century.

TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

118

However, the actual technology to

make the IoT practical and affordable
has only been around for a few years.
Together, the advent of simple communications protocols (like Bluetooth
low energy); the continued evolution
of processing power, speed, size, and
energy efficiency; advances in machine
learning and management of vast
real-time data streams; the proliferation of prototyping platforms easing

FIGURE01

Samsung & SmartThings

Samsung has committed $100M in funding for the creation of an open Internet
of Things to which all things are to be connected by 2020.

IoT development; and the ubiquity of

smartphones driving down the cost of
technology have all created the opportunity to act on those decades of pentup ideas.
That acting on these ideas is relatively
easy shifts who can act. One doesnt
need a big lab with armies of engineers
and mountains of money. Crowdfunding (like Kickstarter) has had a big
effect on what is being developed and
who is developing it. Numerous great
ideas, and several not so great, are being pursued. A revolution is under way.

A higher profile
The movement of big and visible companies into the IoT space has attracted
a great deal of attention. Apple, with its
recent launch of the Apple Watch, has
many people believing that wearables
are ready to go mainstream. The much
anticipated release of its IoT platform,
HomeKit, along with the first wave
of home products compatible with it,
suggests that Apple believes IoT to be
ready for the mainstream, as well.
Samsung acquired the IoT home
platform, SmartThings (launched on
Kickstarter in August, 2012), on August
14, 2014, and has committed $100
million in funding for the creation of
an open Internet of Things to which
all things are to be connected by the
end of 2020 (see Figure 1). Google
acquired the home IoT innovator, Nest,
on January 13, 2014, for over $3
billion. Facebook has Parse (2013),

which recently released a software

development kit (SDK) for IoT development (see Figure 2). Microsoft, Intel,
Cisco, Amazon, and Huawei are in the
mix, as well. In fact, it might even be
easier to list the companies that havent
made a claim on IoT.1

Why all the fuss?

IoT is a new computing platform and
the expectations are that it will have
an impact similar to the introduction
of PCs in the 80s, the web in the
90s, and smartphones in the 00s.
The expectation is that it will transform
our world. How exactly? Well, the
hype today points to the Apple watch,
while reality points to the agricultural
industry (where exemplary investment
in IoT innovation is occurring). No one
is really sure of the full impact on business-to-consumer (B2C) interactions,
but everyone is getting ready and no
one wants to miss the boat.

FIGURE02

Facebook & Parse

Parse is an SDK that connects hardware, such as the Arduino Yun microcontroller, with cloud-based databases. This would allow, for example, regular storing of
sensor readings or images from a security camera in the cloud.

At SapientNitro, we consider the digital

ecosystems created by connected
IoT environments to be Story Systems
and platforms consisting of enabling
technologies, connections planning,
and systems thinking. The platforms are
essential to our Storyscaping approach.

ARDUINO
YUN

However, big questions remain. How

does one design useful IoT services?
How does one then sell these services?
How does a brand exist in an IoT
service? Is there a place for contextual
advertising? Is there something better?

Cnet. Samsung snaps up SmartThings, embracing Internet of Things. http://www.cnet.com/news/samsung-snaps-up-smartthings-embracing-internet-of-things/.

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TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

120

Trends to watch

INSIGHTS AND LEARNING,

NOT AUTOMATION

Furthermore, as the number and diversity of devices proliferate, platforms will

have richer sources. Valuable insights
about your home and life are a marked
improvement from simply claiming
that you can control your home from
anywhere the current benchmark for
the connected home.

As we approach 5 billion connected

devices, each sending real-time data,
the ability to ingest and interpret that
data will place the emphasis on robust
insights and analytics on a huge scale.2
Quality, affordable analysis will become
more important. And were starting to
see firms respond.
One symptom is the shift in language
from automation to insights and
learning. Take, as an example,
Amazons Echo description: Always
Getting Smarter. Echo's brain is in the
cloud, running on Amazon Web Services so it continually learns and adds
more functionality over time. The more
you use Echo, the more it adapts to
your speech patterns, vocabulary, and
personal preferences.3 To a learned
house: Works with Nest. Its about
making your house a more thoughtful
and conscious home.4

We are also seeing new products and

services for IoT focused on analysis
and learning. Arrayent an IoT
platform that enables trusted consumer
brands to implement connected products and systems offers an insight
cloud. Similarly, Elgatos Eve claims
that consumers can gain insights that
help [them] improve [their] comfort, and
make [their] home a smarter place.

SERVICES, NOT JUST THINGS

Leaders in the space realize that the

IoT is not about things. It is about
services. Mark Kuniavsky of PARC calls
the new physical objects of the IoT
service avatars, shifting the emphasis
away from thing and onto service.
Simon King of IDEO describes an
increased physicality to brand expression. Brand expression lives as service in the connected environments we
are building all around us. An observation from CES (Consumer Electronics
Show) 2015 is the shift in language
describing IoT offerings from home automation to insights and learning, which
is far more provocative and useful.
As the IoT matures into a robust
platform for the development of new
services and products, we expect to
see the rise of apps and app platforms.
Similar to a decade ago with smartphones, the savviest companies are
already trying to offer useful services on
top of their things. From IFTTT (which
stands for if this, then that and is a
company focused on DIY automation
tools) to AT&Ts Digital Life platform,
applications which link data from multiple sources and provide great additional value will propagate.

Gartner. Gartner Says 4.9 Billion Connected Things Will Be in Use in 2015. http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/
id/2905717.

Amazon. Amazon Echo. http://www.amazon.com/oc/echo/.

And just as smartphone creators did

not anticipate the incredibly diverse
range of applications for what is (oddly)
still called a phone, the range of applications built for the connected home
will surely be far beyond what we can
imagine now.

ALLEGIANCES, PARTNERS,
AND PLAYING WELL
TOGETHER

The inability of many devices to communicate with each other is an obstacle

for their widespread adoption. And
there are several solutions being
pursued.
Apples HomeKit and HealthKit follow
a model not unlike the brands mobile
app development model. To acquire
certification, your app must pass
Apples scrutiny, thus guaranteeing
high-quality and compatible apps for
these connected platforms.
Furthermore (and as we noted earlier),
Samsung has pledged that, by 2020,
every single product that it sells will be
connected to the IoT. Similarly, Nest
Labs has a growing network of strategic partners with whom it is collectively
building out compatibility, the resulting
products of which get the Works with
Nest certification.

PRIVACY

That machine learning is key to

services enabled by the IoT, and that
learning takes data and time (and a
machine likely in the cloud), raises
some privacy concerns around how
collected data is used and how the
learnings are shared with others. Weve
witnessed different privacy approaches
being followed.

Predictive behavior,
enabled by machine
learning, is the key
to business models
of most B2C IoT
products.
- Mark Kuniavsky,
Principal Scientist, PARC

Consumers have justifiably grown

sensitive to privacy concerns. When
Mattel announced that Hello Barbie
would be recording childrens conversations and storing them online,
serious concerns were raised about the
product.5 Indeed, the voice-recognizing
technology (ToyTalk) does record voice
as it is necessary to learn. And Mattel
clearly states, We do not use the
content of the Recordings to contact
children or for advertising purposes in
its privacy policy.6 But it is not easy to
remove suspicions.

Stop Mattels Hello Barbie Eavesdropping Doll. Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. http://org.salsalabs.com/
o/621/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=17347.

ToyTalk. Privacy Policy. https://www.toytalk.com/legal/privacy/.

Nest. Works with Nest. https://nest.com/works-with-nest/.

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TRENDS AT THE INTERSECTION OF TECHNOLOGY & STORY

122

Apple approaches this more stringently

in their HomeKit and HealthKit connected platforms. HomeKit apps must have
the primary purpose of providing home
automation services, must provide a privacy policy, must not use data gathered
for advertising or other use-based data
mining, and must limit the use of data
gathered to improving the user experience and/or the apps performance in
providing home automation functionality. Similarly, HealthKit apps may not
use the user data gathered from the
HealthKit API for third party disclosure, for health-related human subject
research for advertising or use-based
data mining purposes (other than for
improving health), or for the purpose of
health research.6
Nest Labs policy is more porous. They
pledge to be transparent about the
different types of information [they]
collect and how [they] use [the information]. And to ask your permission
before sharing your Personally Identifiable Information with third parties for
purposes other than to provide Nests
services, and to do so only when [they]
think [the third parties] will provide you
with a welcome additional service.7
SmartThings, on the other hand, welcomes appropriate advertisers, as seen
in this example from their privacy policy:
For example, we might share with our
Advertisers the fact that a moisture
sensor that you have connected to our
Services has detected a flood in order
to show you ads or offers for local
plumbing services.8

The varying success of these different

approaches will have a big impact on
the kinds of services IoT enables. How
do we use machine learning to discover
new things? What is the line between
privacy violations and good advice from
a service? How much trust do people
have in the brands they are adopting,
and how is useful information shared
back to the user inside and outside of
the system? These are all significant
questions that remain to be answered.

Conclusion
The evolution of the IoT is perhaps the
most transformative trend of the next
decade. As billions of devices connect
to networks and begin talking to each
other, vast new potential is unlocked.
The IoT will continue to disrupt entire
industries and change how businesses,
cities, and homes work. For advertisers
and marketers, this ubiquitous computing platform offers a greater chance to
get closer to our customers, and also
allows us to offer personalized stories
that better engage them.

T.J. McLeish
Director of Experience Technology
and Emerging Analytics,
SapientNitro Chicago
tmcleish@sapient.com

Apple Developer. App Store Review Guidelines. https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/.

Nest. Privacy Statement. https://nest.com/legal/privacy-statement/.

SmartThings. Privacy. http://www.smartthings.com/privacy/.

123

126

On Engagement
Rick E. Robinson & Donald Chesnut

THE
EYE-OPENER

THE EYE-OPENER

128

The two most

engaging powers
of an author are
to make new
things familiar
and familiar
things new.
Samuel Johnson,

English author

What does engaging

really mean?

Nearly a decade has passed and no

one seems to know exactly what
that means.

Engaging. It is something that anyone

designing an interaction or an experience would love to hear someone say
about their work: That was really engaging or I was so engaged with that!

So weve begun looking at behaviors

from our own usual starting point:
consumer experience.

But to evaluate a brand or designs

claim to be more engaging is to be
faced with a different question entirely.
While it might be easy to judge that
something is two inches thinner, three
times as fast, or now has 10% more!,
what is there to measure in a claim that
one experience is more engaging than
its precursor or a competing alternative? Is there a way to meaningfully
evaluate engagement in away that makes comparing experiences possible?
As researchers, were convinced that a
metric for engagement can be built.
There have been a host of previous
attempts to define engagement, but
few have held up to careful scrutiny.
In 2006, the Advertising Research
Foundation itself endeavored to end
the confusion and establish an industry
standard definition: Engagement is
turning on a prospect to a brand idea
enhanced by the surrounding context.

FIGURE01

Engagement by definition
Engagement is whats known by
language wonks as a floating signifier
a term that absorbs meaning rather
than emitting it also called an empty
signifier. A rather long history of rhetorical abuse is required for an ordinary
word to achieve such a status. But we
think the term may be worth salvaging.

Engaging, at least denotatively,

means something like the act of
being involved. Connotatively, it has
the capacity to mean quite a bit more.
This piece doesnt intend to solve the
problem of engagement or create a
new industry standard, but rather to
simply offer a user-centric, measurable,
and practical perspective that can help
compare experiences and act as a
building block for future engagement studies.

The parameters of engagement

In order to understand engagement, we need to set some parameters around what it is.

ITS A GOOD THING

In all research literature,

being engaged is a positive
and valued characteristic
of interaction. But there
arent many clues on how to
identify the conditions that
support it.

129

ENGAGEMENT
TAKES TWO

By definition, engagement
is an interaction between
two distinct entities. Interaction is what makes the
whole topic significant and
of interest.

PEOPLE ARE
REQUIRED

We are only concerned with

engagement that has a
human on at least one side
of the interaction. (A clutch
engaging a drive shaft is
pretty thrilling and all, but
we dont know how the car
feels about it. Yet.)

MEASUREMENT
MATTERS

Being able to measure

something you are explicitly
trying to change is a necessary precursor to planning,
managing, and making
strategic decisions around
experiences. (Or at least to
doing it well.)

PAST

Engaging is a verb
We think that engagement has
attained its current buzzworthiness on
some pretty fair merits. It isnt an exotic
commodity, but rather a sensible way to
talk about an everyday life experience.
(see Figure 1). An experience that creates meaning is an interaction not only
between a person and a place, kiosk,
or screen, but also between that persons current identity and the person
that they are in the process of becoming. From eating and writing to working
and bowling, people are constantly in
the process of creating themselves,
moment by moment.
Some of these moments are quickly
forgotten; many hardly claim any attention
in the first place; and some are entirely
unpalatable. These are actively
whether physically or psychologically
avoided. But there are some moments
that bring about a net change in a persons sense of self in his/her identity.
These are the moments that seem to
be worth building. And to do so means
being able to keep track of where, why,
and how they happen.

THE EYE-OPENER

PRESENT

FUTURE

The way in which something even

something as seemingly simple as
stopping for a cup of coffee is experienced is, in many ways, a messy process. Its multiply determined, vaguely
influenced, and an overall complicated
mix of both habit and thoughtfulness.
But, ultimately, it is interpretable you
make sense of it and ascribe meaning
to it. Humans are quite adept at this
ceaseless negotiation on the frontier
between the predictable and new, the
understood past, and anticipated future.
And when one for a complex set of
reasons including memories, emotions,
experiences, and social networks
bucks the pull of habit for a moment
and actually engages, that moment is
different. You can hear it, touch it, feel
it, and taste it more fully. Human senses
are inceptive interfaces which means
they dont simply record, but also
begin complex and active interactions
between the outside world and us.

130

Every new thing

learned, each
life experience, is
associated with
other experiences
The processes of
attention, interest,
and association are
dependent upon
the nature of the
person and the
external conditions
surrounding him.
- D.B. Lucas

the moment can be clearly demarcated

by its beginning and end, and ultimately
results in a change of some sort (usually a positive one).

FIGURE02

A moment in contrast to a second

or an hour is an experiential unit of
time. Its onset is marked by an abrupt
shift in one or more of the key indicators of attention and will most likely be
followed by an additional amount of
focused interaction with the object of
the experience.

It all begins with an engaging moment or an instance where a person invests in

an interaction. These moments accumulate over time, with their collective impact
on a persons life representing the longer-term notion of engagement.

So, how does it end?

The difference between an engaging moment and engagement

Engaging Moment

A person devotes time, effort, or

attention to an interaction with
another person, a place, or a thing.

We think the final moment of an experience is something we cannot see until

we look at the data retrospectively:
Something has to change. If everything
returns to the status quo ante, then it
is unlikely that it has been an engaging experience (see Figure 3 for more
about these deviant stimuli).

Psychology for Advertisers, 1930

Advertisers have been around

this block a few times
D.B. Lucas said, When we attend to
things we learn to react to them. Our
attention is accompanied by feelings
which are a manifestation of interest.
Every new thing learned, each life
experience, is associated with other experiences depending on the conditions
at the time. The processes of attention,
interest, and association are dependent
upon the nature of the person and the
external conditions surrounding him.
In Lucass early textbook (among the
earliest scientific investigations of
advertising), you see the intertwining of
context, emotion, and experience that
experience researchers are still after
today. Threaded in for good measure
is the importance of taking what might
best be characterized as a lifespan
perspective the idea that a moment

131

of attention has unique, individualized

precedents which condition what Lucas called the process of association.
Ninety years later, we have instead
of an evolved measure of the construct
a vast and divergent proliferation of
applications for a term that ought to be
a useful tool in our growing comprehension of an experiences qualities.
In this piece, we are proposing a way
to get closer to that evolved measure.

A measurable difference
There is a difference between the idea
of an engaging moment and the
longer-term notion of engagement (an
aspect of a relationship). Characterizing
something as an engaging moment is
a way of marking an instance in which
a person invests time, attention, and
effort into an interaction (see Figure 2);

Approaching metrics
empirically
We hypothesize that well be able to
more effectively look at engagement as
an outcome if we first figure out how to
see something measurable in engaging
moments. Through those measures, we
can look carefully at the conditions and
outcomes surrounding those moments.

What can we see?

What can we count?
What can we prove?
Granted, subjectivity plays a huge role
in experience, but we are looking to
quantify observable aspects of engagement the exterior markers of an interior state. We suspect that engagement
is a persistent relationship created by
many interwoven engaging moments
over time, and this is something we intend to experiment with more closely.w

THE EYE-OPENER

Engagement

The impact of engaging moments

on a persons life over time.

Something has
to change. If
everything
returns to the
status quo ante,
then it is unlikely
that it has been
an engaging
experience.
132

Theres always a story

Routine and change

Think of a person moving through the

world. At any given moment, that person is interacting with that world in particular ways that are already influenced
by past interactions. When you imagine
how those influences might connect
one interaction to another in ways that
meaningfully change this person, youve
created the right conditions for a Story
System. Understanding whether or
not the interaction is working if it is
doing what you intended, expected, or
needed it to do is where instrumented intelligence comes in.

The neuropsychology of perception,

psychology of attention, and phenomenological study of everyday life all agree
with slightly different terminologies
and framings that routine is an
indispensible part of getting along in
the world. Humans rely on routines
on scripts and frameworks for
everything from answering the phone
to reading, eating, bathing, and raising
a child.

Individuals move through time in ways

that can be meaningfully characterized,
despite being (in the infinite combinations of moments, histories, and situations) undoubtedly unique. Days have
rhythms and routines. Individuals have
life cycles, as do families and friendships. Arguments have arcs, as do
careers. A moment is given meaning
by scales that can vary significantly, but
that are ultimately limited by our senses
at one end and a lifespan at the other.

Routines are how we get to work

without actively thinking about which
coffee shop to enter or how to pay a
subway fare. Even so, in the midst of
routinely brushing your teeth or walking
to work or getting the cows in the barn,
you also notice things. And not just
new things. Our researchers believe
this phenomenon is the gateway to
understanding engagement.

FIGURE03

Noticing a deviant stimulus

A deviant stimulus, something outside
of the expected, gets an extra dose of
attention. This noticing marks the in
point of an engaging moment and can
ultimately lead to change.

The joy of deviant stimuli

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3
Deviant Stimulus
Day 4

Day 5

NOTICE

INTERACT

CHANGE

As you go through a day, journey, meal,

conversation, or shower, much of what
occurs will fit neatly in with what you
expect. Some things wont. In research
on perception, the thing or event that
isnt among what has become expected is known as a deviant stimulus.
The interesting thing for our purposes
is that those things which dont fit well
get at least a momentary dose of additional attention, and that is noticing
what we might think of as the in point
of an engaging moment (see Figure 3).

A single noticing event does not unvaryingly create an engaging moment.

Something about that which has been
noticed (recognizing and defining that
something is our ultimate question
here) elicits an additional expenditure of
time, effort, or attention on the interaction. The moment lengthens. The routine is disrupted. Additional attention to
an immediate context has the potential
to reveal new things to be noticed,
which can extend the moment
even more, and/or in new directions.

Lastly, something happens that is

difficult to assess in the moment, but
can be experimentally shown: we
change. We shift our expectations,
we broaden (or narrow) our definitions,
we add something to an idea, or we
reject something we had previously
held to be absolute. In short, in ways
large and small, the investment of time,
attention, and effort effects a change in
how we go through the world. Change
thus marks the out or end point of
an experience as much as it does the
in point.

Day 6

Day 7

133

THE EYE-OPENER

134

Instrumenting for moments

Sleep, Fitness Tracker

(Pedometer)

We believe there are ways of being

inside a moment ways that dont
involve self-recall, self-reporting, or
multimillion dollar functional magnetic
resonance imaging machines and
are testing out a wide range of inexpensive (mostly wearable) technologies that provide a continuous readout of different behavior indicators.

MEET TOM

Gadgets weve been tinkering

with during this proof-of-concept
phase include:

Weve settled
on a handful of
measuring gadgets
that assess time,
attention, and
effort.

Off-the-shelf activity trackers

(Fitbit Force and Basis Band)
Google Glass
GPS/location identification apps on
personal smartphones
Activity tracker apps on smartphones
and laptops
Multi-axis Accelerometer

Activity Tracker Apps

135

Passive data sensor package (also

on smartphones, in this case)
Weve currently settled on a handful
of measures that assess or are proxies for time, attention, and effort. And
weve tried a few direct measures of
what psychologists call activation
a heightened level of emotional intensity regardless of valence in order
to approximate the positive change
aspect of the definition. Theyre not
exactly what one would expect anyone and everyone to have, but they
dont require a trip to a NASA supply
hut either.

Testing, observation,
and inference

FIGURE04

Engaging moments arent as rare and

mysterious as some believe. They are
simply a different sort of everyday
event, one that can be both measured
and understood.

Weve had Tom recording data day

and night for several months.

Tom is one of the ur-nerds at SapientNitro (hes a real guy). We outfitted

Tom with a collection of gadgets that
report simple, observable phenomena back to us (see Figure 4). We put
together this collection of wearable
sensors as an initial pass at an instrumentation for engagement. The data
help us describe behaviors and relationships between activity, time, and
context. This is not out of a desire to
predict or control individual behavior,
but rather to begin to build a map of
various engagement landscapes from
a unique perspective built upon continuous, in-the-moment experiences.

THE EYE-OPENER

Tom has 2 credit cards, no cash,

and only 30 minutes before his
next meeting.
He is picky about coffee in a way
that few people are.
He values expertise in many things.
Hes an architect by training and a
computer scientist by inclination.
He lives in a major city with which
he is deeply familiar.

136

Converting and aligning data

Even a twenty-three-minute walk to a
local coffee shop generates several
million data points. The down-in-theweeds data tell us when a head turn
starts, the degree of movement, and
even the time spent looking at a payment app or text message. And thats
for one person. So, getting that kind of
data is only the beginning.
Constructs like engaged become
useful when we can build models
of them in the wild, as it were. By
carefully aligning data streams across
types, we can eventually zero in on a
configuration of event information that
allows us to label a moment as engaging with confidence, and eventually
identify the most conducive conditions
for engagement across various settings
beyond coffee shops.

Conclusion: A metric for more

Time. Effort. Attention. All focused on
an interaction that is in some small
way, at least new to the person doing

139

the focusing. An interaction that represents the deviation (from a pattern)

that is caused by something placed
into the world for the express purpose
of getting an individual to focus on it
for a moment. That may be less than
romantic, but it is a pretty good start at
really measuring engagement.
SapientNitro is creating tools to
measure engagement in real people
going about their everyday lives. Early
instrumentation studies indicate how
interactions beyond ads, websites, or
displays effect personal change. And,
to our clients, the possibility of impact
is very exciting.

Rick E. Robinson
Vice President, Marketing Analytics
SapientNitro Denver
rrobinson@sapient.com

Donald Chesnut
Senior Vice President, Chief Experience
Officer, SapientNitro New York
dchesnut@sapient.com

About SapientNitro
SapientNitro, part of Publicis.Sapient, is a new breed of agency redefining storytelling for an always-on world. Were changing the
way our clients engage todays connected consumers by uniquely creating integrated, immersive stories across brand communications, digital engagement, and omnichannel commerce. We call it our Storyscaping approach, where art and imagination meet the
power and scale of systems thinking. SapientNitros unique combination of creative, brand, and technology expertise results in one
global team collaborating across disciplines, perspectives, and continents to create game-changing success for our Global 1000
clients, such as Chrysler, Citi, The Coca-Cola Company, Lufthansa, Target, and Vodafone, in thirty-one cities across The Americas,
Europe, and Asia-Pacific. For more information, visit www.sapientnitro.com.
SapientNitro and Storyscaping are registered service marks of Sapient Corporation.
Book design & illustration: Allison Bistrong, Emily Caufield, and Cindy Jimenez.
Photo credit: Flickr Creative Commons Danny Fowler (Page 100).