Adobe Showcases ‘Reinventing Marketing’ Theme at 2014 Summit

by Darryl K. Taft

Brad Rencher, senior vice president and general manager of the Digital Marketing Business at Adobe, opens the conference with the theme of “reinventing marketing.” He said, “Marketers today want to reinvent themselves and the way they approach their work, but the majority need help to thrive in a digital world.”

Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen talks about the real-time enterprise. “The real-time enterprise moves at the speed of digital,” he said. “It is redefining the central nervous system that runs our business.” However, “to truly distinguish oneself through all the noise requires creativity—creative genius is still required. … Without creativity there is no inspired customer.”

More than 6,000 attendees from 33 countries attended the Adobe Summit, with representatives from eight of the top 10 Internet retailers, five of the top five media companies, nine of the top 10 commercial banks and a lot more on hand.

Legendary actor, director and businessman Robert Redford took the stage at the Adobe Summit to thank Adobe for its support of his Sundance Film Festival, which occurs annually in nearby Park City, Utah. Redford also spoke on a range of subjects enlightening the audience with the wealth of his experience. “Not taking a risk is a risk,” he said. “Change is needed.”

Ann Lewnes, senior vice president and chief marketing officer of Adobe, speaks with Robert Redford about taking risks, creating change and the role of creativity in his life.

Richard Sherman, the smack-talking but backing it up cornerback for the Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks, takes the stage to talk about his personal brand and how he markets himself. “To embrace opportunity, you must have a plan,” he said.

San Francisco-based sports anchor Colin Resch speaks with Richard Sherman, cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks, about his strategies and plans outside the football field, and how he uses social media to achieve them.

Adobe CEO Narayen said the successful enterprise must be heard above the noise. “Our tolerance for bad experiences is extremely short, and our expectations as consumers is extremely high,” he said.

Adobe’s Narayen and Senior Vice President Brad Rencher join Vishal Sikka, a member of the executive board of SAP for products and innovation to announce a strategic partnership with SAP, connecting the worlds of the chief marketing officer (CMO) and CIO and enabling the power of combined technology offerings across the entire enterprise to better meet the needs of customers.

Adobe introduced new core services for Adobe Marketing Cloud, which span all six solutions and deliver data, insights, context, profiles and more. New core services capabilities include the Master Marketing Profile, which gives companies a single view of their customers and prospects to deepen relationships and offer highly personalized experiences across all marketing channels.

Brad Brown, senior vice president of digital retail and customer support at REI, joins Adobe’s Brad Rencher onstage to discuss how consumers have changed and how to connect and draw customers into a company’s brand.

Jeff Titus, general manager of digital technology solutions and strategy for Audi of America, discusses how to bring new digital technologies to customers in a seamless way, how to innovate on the back end to bring things to market quickly, and Audi city—a virtual showroom.

Adobe’s Brad Rencher speaks with Julie Bornstein, executive vice president, chief marketing and digital officer of Sephora, about the social Web, getting instant feedback from customers and managing the digital business.

Yancey Strickler, co-founder and CEO of Kickstarter, described various innovative campaigns that have used Kickstarter’s crowd-sourcing platform to reinvent the way businesses are created. “We’re all capable of creating incredible things,” he said.

John Mellor, Adobe’s vice president of business development and strategy, delved into the changes marketers need to make to reinvent themselves for the digital age with the three P’s: process, people and products. He also introduced the results from the Adobe Digital Marketing Maturity assessment.