| | August 20198CIOReviewWhat do three of the top six largest companies in the world by market capitalization have in common? Personalization. Personalization as a Business DriverGoogle (Alphabet Inc.), Amazon, and Facebook all use personalization as a core component of their business's intellectual property, getting smarter every time one of their hundred million or billion plus consumers use their product. These companies also use the positive flywheel-like effect of personalization across a massive scale of consumer engagement. They do this to not only further evolve their business product and competitive moat, but to refine their opportunity to continually deliver more predictive and personalized product to their consumers.These three personalization powerhouses are also not just the youngest three members of the world's largest companies, but they are also the fastest growing. For reference, the other three are Apple, Microsoft, and Berkshire Hathaway.Companies of all sizes making personalization a core part of their business IP are also among the most successful and disruptive firms out there. For example: Netflix, Tesla, Uber, and Spotify are all rapid growth industry disruptors based on personalized services delivered through algorithmic learning and insights vs. one-size-doesn't-fit-all methodologies.Personalization as a Marketing StrategyIf personalization is good business, maybe personalization can also be good marketing?Many smart marketers have already started to ask that question, and many smart marketing technology brands, consultants, agencies, and providers are already starting to answer it. According to a recent McKinsey article by Julien Boudet, Brian Gregg, Jason Heller, and Caroline Tufft: "data-activated marketing based on a person's real-time needs, interests, and behaviors represents an important part of the new horizon of growth. It can boost total sales by 15 to 20 percent, and digital sales even more while significantly improving the ROI on marketing spend across marketing channels."Marketing technology providers like Google, Adobe, Salesforce, and Oracle are realizing this opportunity to boost sales and ROI for their customers by building tools and best practices to define and automate marketing personalization.At their recent client summit in Las Vegas, Adobe's Vice President of Technology, Amit Kamath, shared his thoughts for how the industry can identify and break legacy habits to better prepare their approach for the personalization era. He sees a primary challenge enterprises currently face, which is that they are organized around their own departments, channels, or products. However, a genuine consumer-first personalization perspective must break down these categories and work from the consumer outward across all channels and products.Mr. Kamath's suggested solution is to break down the idea of "intelligence in silos" and instead think holistically across these three categories of applied intelligence: MARKETING IN THE PERSONALIZATION ERAScott SymondsIN MYOPINIONBy Scott Symonds, Managing Partner, AKQA Media
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