The 2015 Digital Trends report# published by Adobe in partnership with Econsultancy highlights the role of culture in making decisions. Page 29 illustrates this point best (see chart above.) Understanding first, then using the data points extrapolated from that knowledge to inform programs.

Given the importance of social and content as expressed by brand marketers in the survey — which has a fairly high sample of respondents compared to 2014 (34% in North America, 23% UK-based, and 21% in rest of Europe) — it sounds like experimentation is becoming a more prevalent method to form a clearer understanding of customer journeys across channels.

Highlighted in the report is also the importance of learning new skills for digital teams. 

How would you rate your organization compared to the sample?

Taking some of the key questions, how would you respond as a team?

• Last year’s most exciting opportunity: what is the predicted versus actual delta?

• ‘We are going to be experimenting heavily with digital next year’

• Over the next five years, what is the primary way your organization will seek to differentiate itself from competitors?

If Customer service / customer experience – making it easy, fun, valuable and/or pleasurable to shop from us is your answer, go buy Badass: Making Users Awesome by Kathy Sierra and study the difference between context for you and your team and context for the customer (page 49.)

• Please rank the importance of these areas as building blocks for building a brilliant customer experience — the blocks (page 17 of the report) are strategy, culture, skills, technology, data (dead last, BTW.) Then outline the techniques you are going to use to start building those competencies and the capacity to influence them.

• Where does your organization place the highest emphasis in terms of improving the customer experience? (Page 18) Do you do this? Why/why not? (see previous point to work on it.)

• Most exciting opportunity – 2015 vs ‘five years’ time’ (page 22) A lot changes in five years — is your answer still the same when thinking about your answer to the first three bullets? Six months from now, will your answer change?

• Where does your approach to geo-targeting technology fall in the chart on page 26?

• How important will the following be for your digital marketing over the next few years? (page 29) What are the steps?

For each answer to the survey questions in the report it would also be interesting to ask:

1. Is it true?
2. Why/why not?
3. What kind of group/organization would we become if we thought and acted that way?