Prodigy served as moderator at the ANA's "Tracking & Analyzing Production Costs" panel hosted by the Production Management Committee on September 15. Committee members from Ford Motors, Mastercard and Verizon shared insights on their current production data journeys using Prodigy, the cloud-based production data platform with AI technology.
The panelists represented ANA committee members with production expertise in Automative, Financial Services and Telecom & Technology sectors, as follows:
Laura Busino, former Head of Content Production, US Integrated Marketing Communications, Ford Motor Company
Debra Hedgecock, Director Media Planning & Agency Relations, Mastercard
Brendan O'Malley, Sr. Manager, Broadcast Production – Verizon and Production Management Committee Co-Chair
Moderator: John Lipuma, Co-founder & CEO, Prodigy, Prodigy by PostAds Group
The meeting began with Prodigy's Industry Overview on the state of production data technology. Participants were briefed on the evolution of capturing project info manually with numerous data entry stakeholders (SaaS / Software as a Service) to the modern innovation of using AI and machine learning to capture and aggregate data using technology (SaaMS / Software as a Managed Service). This "game changing" platform is enabling marketers to accelerate their data journeys without requiring major change management initiatives in their production workflow.
Each panelist was asked the same three (3) questions:
1) How did you solve the issue of capturing accurate production data?
2) Why is production data important to your organization?
3) Who are your internal customers of production data and how are they using it?
Laura Busino, formerly of Ford, shared her experience of conducting an RFP to find a production data technology partner and how she came to choose Prodigy. A key factor in her decision was a seamless implementation plan with her agencies NOT being involved in providing data entry or learning a new software program. The idea of "plugging into" existing agency processes to obtain the necessary data components using AI and Prodigy's SaaMS model allowed her to quickly execute on her production data strategy. Key production KPI's such as Cost per Asset, Cost per Shoot Day, # of Deliverables per project, Spend by Supplier, Spend by Agency, Spend by Brand and Spend by Service Category were new business insights welcomed by her Content Production team.
Deb Hedgecock of Mastercard shared her difficulty gaining visibility into the many global productions happening in her 67 markets across North America, Europe, South America, MEA and Asia-Pacific territories. She credited Prodigy with creating a solution where markets can simply submit projects into the platform without having to worry about language translations, training international colleagues on new software or culling through regional reports every quarter - everything is collected and aggregated within Prodigy for real-time access to production data no matter where its produced. She also discussed using the tool for tracking and executing on Diversity and Sustainability KPI's, including integrating the work of Maidstone Films and AdGreen on quantifying carbon emissions and offsets on all productions.
Brendan O'Malley of Verizon described the work of his internal Broadcast Production team and their input into some of the design aspects of Prodigy's interface as an early adopter of the technology. Providing "brand-side" input into the look and feel of Prodigy helped Verizon transition from a previously ineffective SaaS solution to a best-in-class AI technology platform and freeing his team from data entry burdens. He also described how his team serves as the central aggregation point for Prodigy project submission (rather than using an agency "contributor" model) and using Prodigy's customized "Drag & Drop" portal to further automate project creation and budgeting functions within the platform. Verizon has expanded its use of Prodigy to include TV, Digital, Social and Experiential projects.
The session "wrap up" consisted of the Top 3 Key Takeaways for committee members:
1) Technology now exists to capture production data accurately with minimal change management for marketer, agency and supplier stakeholders.
2) Identify internal data customers and create reporting relevant to each group (CMO, Agency Operations, Marketing Effectiveness, Sourcing, etc.)
3) "Numbers move decisions!" Data empowers marketers to execute on strategic insights and implement new best practices with confidence.
To learn more and schedule a demo of Prodigy, please visit us at www.pagprodigy.com