Adapted from the work of our Global Managing Director, Perry Kamel: Content Production has always been a reasonably well-defined, foundational, and very large component of the marketing ecosystem. Up-stream strategic and creative work (whom to target or engage with what propositions or experiences and in what creative ways to gain share, grow revenues, etc.) leads to down-stream communication, media, and content strategy, planning, and production (how to execute and drive impressions, or more recently how to drive and propagate engaging experiences). This is the basic structure which persists to this day. Electronic or interactive media, data-driven analytic planning with micro-segmentation and personalization, and programmatic execution and automation have merely compressed and accelerated the iterative cycles, while increasing target granularity from segments to micro-segments, personas and, increasingly, individuals. Beyond that, it’s all essentially the same basic construct. During the past twenty years (+/-), there has been an accelerating increase in the degree of precision targeting, speed of execution, interaction, and expansion in media channels or touch-points. Approximately ten+ years ago it became abundantly clear that these trends required an unsustainable volume of increasingly diverse content. Major Problem: delivery speed + target granularity + channel scope + iteration = massive amounts more content = massive increases in content production costs, complexity, and compliance problems. This fundamental problem drove the need for a major transformation in the Content Production market. Enter AvVenta: Jay Noce, a Founding General Partner of BravasLive, created AvVenta in 2005, and in so doing, he pioneered the “Decoupled Content Production” market. Jay may rightfully be considered the father of Decoupled Content Production. This was the first major reinvention of and disruption to the long-established Content Production market. The basic idea was that the production of content was a fundamentally different process from the strategic or creative design of content. Simply put, design was more artistic, and production was more industrial. There are exceptions, but generally speaking this is true; much like designing a car is quite different from manufacturing a car. Decoupled Content Production (The “New” Market) applied modern industrial methods, repeatable operating approaches, diversified and specialized resourcing models, and productivity optimization to maximize the speed, cost efficiency, flexibility and scalability of content production. This was a major shift away from and disruption to conventional Content Production models. At that time, driving scalability, speed and cost efficiencies was the primary value proposition. Decoupled Content Production enabled a reduction in the unit cost of producing content ($cost per deployable unit of content) of roughly 50% or more. Back then that was a significant impact which drove a transformational disruption in the Content Production space. Decoupled Content Production quickly became a buzz word and a “must have” among industry players. The market was fundamentally changed. Since then, the volume, velocity, and variety of content required to fuel modern marketing has continued to skyrocket. Continuing trends toward ever-increasing authenticity, more relevance, improved timeliness, location-awareness, and contextual sensitivity across ever-expanding touch-points have out-stripped the capacity of what has now become conventional Decoupled Content Production. Even a 50% reduction in unit production costs is a small fraction of what is required to sustain and scale today’s modern marketing methods. In fact, even the very best results that Decouple Content Production has to offer do not come close to what is needed. As a simple illustration of the magnitude of this problem, imagine a single piece of content with four key components (like a product shot, a background image, a headline, and a call-to-action or promo copy). In order to target, say, four segments (e.g., young, old, male, female), imagine that each component has four options (e.g., the background image might feature a dog, cat, beach, or mountain scene). This relatively trivial amount of targeting (4-by-4 = 4 objects x 4 variables each) requires 300% more content assets; and, this doesn’t even address life-stage, hobbies and interests, need states, propensities and preferences, etc., which are increasingly important for success in modern marketing. Additionally, this is just one piece of content! With the proliferation of communication channels or touch-points, content needs to be delivered through web, social, mobile, email, print, POS, OOH, and (increasingly) more channels in still, animated, audio, video, and interactive modes. Finally, to be “relevant” implies to “stay relevant,” meaning that all of this content needs to stay fresh and timely over time, across all these channels, to engage with increasingly granular micro-segments. 50% savings in unit cost no longer comes close. Marketers need orders of magnitude more cost efficiencies (10 times or more reductions in unit cost). But they also need the other side of the coin: Increased intelligence, productivity, and effectiveness to maximize results (revenue growth, market share gains, etc.), and not just cost savings. That combination requires a complete reinvention of the Content Life Cycle and related Content Production market, and it requires an unprecedented level of intelligence, openness, and agility. As noted, the fundamental driver of the Content Production market is the massive and accelerating growth in the volume, variety and velocity of content needed to sustain modern, data-driven, multi-channel, consumer-centric, experience-oriented marketing. Virtually all marketing technologies included in Gartner and Forrester market taxonomies (there are hundreds) are focused on analysis, planning, targeting, delivery, assessment, and optimization of marketing campaigns and interactive experiences. We have yet to find a single exception. The one thing all of these technologies have in common is that they all require content in order to fulfill their core mission. They serve no purpose without content. Content is still King. Not only is the volume of content increasing, but the diversity of content types is increasing. The diversity of media types is increasing (email, digital, social, mobile, print, POS, DOOH, video, etc.), and the types of engagement and types of content assets are increasing (e.g., structured vs. unstructured, prescriptive vs. reactive, branded vs. unbranded, communicative vs. conversational, static vs. interactive, etc.). This need for Intelligent Content Production is a “universal imperative.” The need is universal in that all enterprises have this need. It is imperative in that the need is vital, and not merely desirable (it’s a “must have,” not a “nice to have”). Given that Content Production is already such a significant component of the typical marketing budget, there is simply no room for increasing the production budget. Orders of magnitude more content is required for success and survival, and without adding more burden to the budget; and the content must be far more insight-driven to maximize effectiveness and results. It’s time for Intelligent Content Production. It’s time for BravasLive. We offer a unique combination of three ingredients that result in success for our clients. We fully embrace technology and service integration with Client Value as the galvanizing focus and applied vigorously with best practices. We offer a platform powered by the most advanced and comprehensive technologies on the market. And guarantee a value commitment of transparency with a clear and measurable value scorecard. These combined BravasLive pillars delivers unparalleled and previously unimaginable Client Value. Contact: perry@bravaslive.com About Perry Kamel: Perry Kamel has 25+ years of experience delivering high-value marketing innovations. Prior to BravasLive, Perry was a founding Managing Director of Accenture Interactive, CEO of Elateral, and Chief Marketing Officer for technology firms Ciena and Siemens ICN, as well as group Chief Executive for Siemens Next Generation Networks. As a former board member of the National Telecommunications Association and a McKinsey & Company alumni with extensive experience in applied innovation, Perry is no stranger to working with cutting edge technology solutions, and the organizational and operational aspects so vital to enduring success. As a recognized pioneer in multi-channel interactive marketing and content supply chain transformation, he also has several patents and successful start-ups to his credit.
It’s time for Intelligent Content Production. It’s time for BravasLive.