Data and AI-driven marketing transformation: the engine that drives value creation management
Article｜2024-11-25
10 minute read
The tide of "digital Darwinism" is sweeping the global society and economy. If Charles Darwin, one of history’s most revered naturalist, applied his theory of evolution based on the survival of the fittest to today’s business landscape, he would see a world in which companies that lag behind in responding to irreversible technological evolution may lose their competitiveness at an accelerating rate. After all, survival isn’t guaranteed.
As a company that both creates and uses technology, Fujitsu is rapidly advancing digital transformation (DX) efforts that transcend national, regional and departmental boundaries. Linking DX to sustainable growth means that we are also working on company-wide reforms and pioneering new growth areas.
That idea has been on the mind of Taeko Yamamoto, EVP CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of Fujitsu. In this article, she presents a comprehensive overview of the challenges and benefits of Fujitsu's marketing transformation, including the use of technology and data to implement overall marketing optimization. She will also shed light on the purpose-driven branding strategy that she believes will determine the success or failure of global business development going forward. By combining the accumulated practical knowledge possessed by Fujitsu and our customers, Yamamoto is determined to extract “integrated knowledge” that creates enhanced, technology-derived corporate value. Learn how marketing will play a major role in making this happen.
The root of marketing transformation is purpose
If you ask a marketing professional about their mission in an organization, they are likely to respond that the essence of marketing is to create customers. Philip Kotler, a marketing scholar known as the ‘father of modern marketing,’ coauthored “Marketing Management“, in which he defined marketing as “identifying and satisfying a target market's needs and desires while making a profit.”
As the speed of change accelerates, the role of marketers in responding to needs becomes even more vital. Fujitsu's own marketing transformation has also progressed significantly over the past few years. It all started around 2020 when we began trying to understand the relationship between our purpose, Fujitsu Uvance, and marketing transformation.
To that end, we codified our purpose in 2020, pledging to ”make the world more sustainable by building trust in society through innovation.” Following that, Fujitsu Uvance was established in 2021 as a new business model to put our purpose into practice. We have identified seven key focus areas, and by combining technology with knowledge from diverse industries, we are driving business growth while solving societal issues across industry lines (Figure 1).
To build the new Fujitsu Uvance business model from the ground up, we had to create a virtuous cycle of business growth in which all our customers feel a connection with our purpose, while we demonstrate a deep understanding of their needs and accept their feedback to improve solutions and services. As the engine of this virtuous cycle, marketing needed to take a completely different approach to increase market awareness and develop new customer segments.
Source: Fujitsu
Data and branding are key
There were two main issues that needed to be addressed to encourage a virtuous cycle. First is data utilization. When developing a new business, it’s important to make marketing efforts as data-driven as possible by gathering information about everything from solutions and services to customers and markets. The second is branding. In Fujitsu’s case, when we announced Fujitsu Uvance in 2021, we didn't have a complete portfolio. We reasoned that structuring data in a way that builds the foundation for a mechanism leading to the development of new solutions by steadily accumulating results would be necessary for broadening the framework of cooperation with partner companies.
My sense is that many companies are taking on similar challenges to turn this era of change into an opportunity for growth. I feel that the more companies there are taking on the challenge of driving growth, the more essential marketing becomes. Partial change is not enough—only constant change will bring us one step closer to creating customers and achieving our purpose.
Marketing transformation determines a company's competitiveness
In this era of change, the key to transforming marketing to grow new businesses is data and branding. These measures not only improve the quality of marketing, but also serve as an important barometer for determining a company's competitiveness and corporate value.
Global trends are spurring investment in marketing technology
According to US-based research firm Gartner’s 2024 Tech Trends Survey (*1), which targeted 3,484 companies worldwide, including Japan, the United States and Europe, marketing ranked second among all software purchase priorities at 28%, behind only IT security (33%) (Figure 2). “Attracting new customers“ was the most common business challenge marketers faced in 2024, accounting for 35% of all responses. This suggests a growing need to invest more in marketing technology to attract new customers.
Source: Compiled by Fujitsu based on Gartner's 2024 Tech Trends Survey
Brand strategy has a big impact on stock valuation
According to a 2024 survey of 241 investment analysts and investor relations professionals conducted by Interbrand, a US-based brand consulting firm (*2), 76% of respondents answered that brand strategy has a medium-to-high impact on P/E (price-earnings ratio) fluctuations. This suggests that the success or failure of the brand strategy has a significant impact on the stock price and market evaluation.
These two studies highlight key global trends in marketing transformation. Investing in technology can increase productivity and create an environment for innovation. Enhancing brand strategies can deepen the market's understanding of the future of companies and businesses, and can be a source of trust for all stakeholders. We believe that implementing and diligently continuing these practices will play an increasingly important role in achieving sustainable corporate value.
Current status of marketing transformation in creating trust and value
We are looking to expand Fujitsu Uvance globally, leading us to develop a data-driven marketing mechanism and refine our brand strategy. We are halfway through our marketing transformation, but we are already beginning to feel the effects.
【Data】
Global standardization of pipeline management
“One CRM” is the cornerstone of data-driven marketing. It is an initiative to integrate CRM infrastructure and processes globally and to centralize business negotiation management and information sharing. The first priority was to standardize pipeline management, and in 2022 we started operations ahead of schedule.
In the past, pipeline data was decentralized by region and division. By making it visible globally and having it conform to the same standards across the business, we can perform order forecasting, cause analysis, and decision making in order to promote business, and reduce the burden of reporting. We have switched to pipeline management based on Fujitsu Uvance, making it easier to support business negotiations and monitor market trends and customer needs.
The transformation has just begun, but I feel that we are gradually gaining data to measure ROI (return on investment) and productivity. By feeding this information back to business divisions, we have begun to establish a system to promote a cycle of marketing-led business growth.
Improving systems, human resources and analysis capabilities
Our data-driven evolution is still in progress. For example, we need to improve our CRM (customer relationship management) and MA (marketing automation) tools to make them work better with existing systems. Human resource development is also important—establishing a system to ensure more robust data management and security is critical. At the same time, nurturing a deeper pool of experts is the foundation for data-driven marketing. Analysis capabilities must also be improved. We need to expand the scope of visibility of our dashboard and create an environment for deeper insights.
The true value of AI marketing
I am convinced that AI is a powerful ally for marketing.
In September 2024, I attended Dreamforce 2024, a conference hosted by Salesforce in the United States. We saw the potential of AI in Agentforce, an autonomous AI developed by the company.
Autonomous AI can obtain relevant information from internal and external data sources in response to customer inquiries, and then draft answers without human intervention. Call centers will also be able to access customer's past purchase history, analyze conversations and understand market trends, leading to optimal suggestions and solutions. I once again believe that the evolution of technology will enhance the true value of marketing and deepen customer understanding.
That’s why Fujitsu has developed its own AI platform, Fujitsu Kozuchi. In September 2024, we began global deployment of Takane, a large-scale language model (LLM) jointly developed with the Canada-based AI platform provider, Cohere. This will help us develop practical knowledge with cutting-edge AI in marketing, while continuing to research, preview, and implement that knowledge so that we can share our expertise with customers.
【Brand】
Developing value by delivering results to customers
With Fujitsu Uvance, based on the results delivered to a particular customer, we can create a solution that can solve a problem for another customer and expand it horizontally. Or we can leverage Fujitsu's technologies such as AI and quantum computing, along with alliances with partners, to develop new solutions. These are the ways we can promote our products and steadily build awareness around our achievements—and we’re still in the early stages.
According to Interbrand's Best Japan Brands ranking, Fujitsu's brand value in 2024 more than doubled from 2020 to over US $1.5 billion. Customer NPS (net promoter score), which is not disclosed in financial statements, has also continued to increase year on year. Given the volatility of our current era, I feel that nurturing a brand with a sense of urgency, while continuously infusing it with more substance will lead to the creation of customers and, in turn, to enhance brand value.
Centralizing marketing functions to deepen customer understanding
Let's take the example of a consumer who is a fan of a particular company’s seasonings and foods. It turns out that she is also interested in beauty and health. Now let’s say that the company wants to promote its beauty and health products to her. If marketing is siloed by division, data on the consumer’s seasonings, food and beauty and health preferences are not integrated, making marketing efforts extremely inefficient.
At Fujitsu, we have established a system in which we hold weekly meetings with each of our sales and business divisions to share data on market responses and the progress of our business pipeline. This is a fundamental step in developing our marketing strategy. If marketing functions are not accessible to the business units, marketing cannot be truly effective.
Building ecosystems as a platform provider
We alone can’t fulfill our purpose; it is essential to create an ecosystem that transcends industry frameworks among like-minded companies.
Our goal is not only to create an ecosystem, but to provide platforms that support that ecosystem. I believe that the use of data and technology can be a source of new value for our customers, and we are working with global partners and organizations to gain a foothold as a platform provider (Figure 3).
The ecosystem will be a hub that brings together the expertise of participating companies to solve complex societal and business issues. I believe that promoting this cycle leads to the creation of customers for Fujitsu and the creation of value for participating companies.
Source: Fujitsu
Conclusion
I was a member of the handball team in junior high and high school, and I spent much of my youth playing the sport. In handball, it is important to have explosive power, endurance, the ability to observe and understand the movements of teammates and opponents, and analytical skills to read the flow of the game. And sometimes we need to play with creativity beyond our imagination.
I think marketing has many similarities to handball: to remain sensitive to changes in customers and society, to develop an eye for the future by staying a half step ahead of change, to be creative enough to inspire customers and society. These will become even more important in marketing in an age of change.
As the boundaries between industries continue to blur, we expect to see further expansion of the movement to launch new businesses in search of growth areas. It is data, AI and other technologies that make the growth cycle of new businesses even more comprehensive and robust. I believe that the transformation of marketing efforts driven by data and AI with a clear focus on purpose will illuminate the path towards value-creating management.
Change never ends. And that’s why we will never stop making changes that contribute to the enhancement of corporate value. I’m excited to continue our collaboration with customers and partners to create an ecosystem that will bring about sustainable growth.
Taeko Yamamoto
EVP CMO, Fujitsu Limited
In April 2020, Yamamoto joined Fujitsu as Director and CMO. She took up here current position in 2022, working on branding and marketing changes across the company. After graduating from university, she joined Mitsubishi Corporation as a system engineer. Following that, she worked as a marketing professional at IBM Japan and Microsoft Japan. She also served as a director of the Japan Handball Association from 2019 to 2022.
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