Please note that while Adobe Journey Optimizer is expected to be released later in 2021, we have only been given a “roadmap” without any commitment to this specific application or its related features.
Whether you’re still catching up on sessions or watching highlights from Adobe Summit 2021, you’re sure to hear or read about Adobe Journey Optimizer. This Adobe Experience Platform Application will be a centralized app “that helps brands to easily identify, create, and deliver the next best interaction,” according to Anjul Bhambhri, SVP Adobe Experience Cloud.
Bhambhri’s description, in addition to the few related sessions, is enough to excite most anyone in the martech space, but there isn’t a lot of information on AJO available as of now. Based on what we do know, here is a general overview of what we hope to see when the application is released and why this tool is such a huge, necessary step in the right direction for martech.
Taking Direction with Integrated Data
Digital marketers know the importance of data collection and what can be done with it, but many aren’t taking advantage of the data already available to them – and that’s where Adobe’s proposed solution comes in. Rather than focus on amassing more and more data to react to from system to system, the idea behind this application is to communicate with consumers (not their data) on a 1:1 level, live.
Human behavior is unpredictable, journeys are not linear, and a complex flow on one platform isn’t enough to pinpoint where a person is on their journey. Adobe Journey Optimizer uses the stitched customer profiles from Adobe Experience Platform to help draft meaningful customer journeys by monitoring all action as it occurs, online and off. This provides a living customer profile and improved, organic communications with potentially millions of customers at a time.
Plus, whenever a customer’s journey is mapped, all the assets needed for approved, eligible messages will be available in AJO. The centralization of real-time AI insights, data analysis, Adobe Experience Manager Assets Essentials, and tracking has yet to be seen in any current stacks.
Why is it so special?
- Potential – The proposed use of real-time customer profiles to power 1:1 customer journeys would make it one of the most complete profiling tools around. Plus, if the predictive engagement tool is released later, that would give businesses a measurable way to retain and boost subscriber totals.
- Centralization – Audiences today live in an increasingly decentralized world. This is reflected in their actions and many of the applications we use daily, as people and marketers. Adobe Journey Optimizer, as it was announced, gives organizations a way to harness centralized data from our decentralized world and interactions with less effort since it accomplishes similar tasks from other applications in one space.
- Novelity – Up to this point, there hasn’t been an application that pulls in so much data from so many different sources for you to sift through while creating offers and targeting audiences – all at the same time. We have seen some of the capabilities in other applications, like Adobe Target and Adobe Campaign, but never have we seen so much of the data coming to one place for us to see and use at the same time. This groundbreaking solution could save marketing, sales, and design departments a lot of time while increasing personalization and targeting capabilities.
Since it is the first application of its kind, this opens minds up to a whole new realm of possibilities, for the Adobe Experience Platform Application and others. That leads us to the next section.
Adobe Journey Optimizer Use Cases for Marketers
Based on what we have seen at the Summit, here are the top use cases that marketers can exploit, right off the bat with AJO:
- Omnichannel Orchestration: Pair your real-time profiles from Adobe Experience Platform with powerful workflows to create 1:1 resonating messages.
- Power your personalization with AI: Use out-of-the-box AI-enabled features from Journey.AI to optimize the outcomes of your messages.
- Marketing Automation: Transform your approach to the age-old problem of automating your campaigns or transactional messaging with the power of real-time listening across any channel.
Key Benefits
- Add more fire power to your personalization efforts with integrated, real-time data from all your channels.
- Orchestrate and optimize journeys in a single place for improved customer engagement.
- Exploit Adobe’s intelligent services throughout the entire customer journey.
What Might It Change?
The announcement of Adobe Journey Optimizer came as a surprise, but is it a delightful one?
This is hard to say since AJO isn’t yet released, but we do know it will impact many of our roles and duties for the better. Instead of spending as much time integrating discordant systems until they run harmoniously, team members can spend more time innovating, creating other solutions for enterprise clients. Less time will be spent switching tabs back and forth and waiting for multiple programs to load, and marketers can spend more time focusing on customer interactions.
Nothing about the new application is set in concrete, but we at NextRow Digital certainly look forward to seeing AJO in action and being an Adobe partner providing implementation and support services. Contact us at +1-847-592-2920 or marketing@nextrow.com to learn about our Adobe-certified integration services.
