Enhancing Customer Experience with Marketing Operations and Technology: Key Takeaways from Adobe Summit 2025

Business Development Director Justin Smyth and Marketing Technology Lead Marty Idziak discuss how organizations can enhance customer experience through the latest innovations in marketing technology and operations, including the ones that were unveiled in the summit.

How was the energy on the ground at Adobe Summit? Were there any surprising moments?

Out of all the summits I've attended, this one seemed to have the most energy and positive vibes. Many sessions and keynotes were well-received by industry insiders, with significant engagement on LinkedIn. The breakout sessions I attended were well-organized and thoroughly explored specific solutions across the Adobe stack, detailing how enhancements drive value.

I was particularly impressed by Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan Chase. He delved deeply into how Chase has implemented AI across all departments, especially for account security and fraud prevention.

As a Chase customer myself, I've experienced their robust security protocols firsthand—whenever something seems off, I receive multiple alerts via email and text asking me to verify transactions. This exemplifies how a large enterprise can use AI ethically and responsibly, prioritizing customer privacy and safety. It was compelling to hear about these real-world applications.

What was the overarching theme or focus that Adobe was trying to drive home?

AI was certainly a major focus, but there was also increased emphasis on the content supply chain. Adobe has been discussing the content supply chain and GenStudio for the past couple of years, bringing together performance marketing and introducing content analytics.  

This isn't just about typical website behavior analytics anymore, but drilling down into how effective your content is. If it's not performing well, you don't need to wait for typical cycles to replace it.  

The traditional model of moving from a creative brief through multiple ideation phases before finally developing something usable for a campaign workflow has been around for the better part of the last decade without significant enhancement. Now, with Adobe's proposed feature enhancements, that process is more tangible. For example, within a brief in Adobe Workfront, users can view creative from the most recent campaign, making the process more nimble and agile compared to static PDFs.

For medium to large enterprise businesses that struggle with this aspect, these improvements can be transformative. I know several clients who have Workfront but are completely lost because they're not leveraging it practically. When used properly, it genuinely moves the needle forward.

What are some challenges clients face in adopting AI tools or tools like Workfront in the Adobe stack?

The challenges arise from several different levels. Aside from costs, a significant struggle is not having the right solution design or requirements in place. Many clients think getting a shiny new tool like Workfront will solve all their problems. But in larger enterprises, some have multiple instances of Workfront, which isn't feasible. Each business unit operates on its own budget, so they maintain separate Workfront instances. When cross-collaboration is needed, they face challenges without a true line of sight at the milestone level.

This pushes organizations to consolidate and develop standardized processes that the entire organization can follow, down to nitty-gritty elements like naming conventions and consistent tool utilization. I know clients who would update Workfront after a campaign had already launched—what's the point of having such a tool if you're only using it after everything's completed?

These are major challenges, and they're not always related to Adobe or the product itself. If you don't have a well-mapped process that everyone adopts and adheres to, it doesn't matter which tech stack you choose—Adobe, Microsoft, Salesforce. It doesn't matter if you buy the entire Adobe stack; if your processes aren't refined, you won't get great results.

What trends did you hear from other enterprise customers, especially in verticals like tech, retail, and finance?

I attended several sessions that deep-dived into Customer Data Platform (CDP) implementations. One particularly interesting case was Marriott, one of Adobe's larger customers. They embarked on a pilot a few years ago implementing Real-Time CDP, focusing on four main use cases they developed around their Marriott Bonvoy loyalty program and co-branded credit card offers.

They leveraged Real-Time CDP extensively to harmonize online data with offline data. This allowed them to capture not only what customers do when booking through Bonvoy but also their activities at hotels and resorts—checking into rooms, dining at on-site restaurants, and other offline interactions.

They achieved massive adoption and managed to stitch together almost 200 million customer profiles with fresh data. This powers their usage of Adobe Experience Platform (AEP) in general, along with Adobe Journey Optimizer (AJO) to deliver in-app promotions through Bonvoy.

I can personally attest that they're one of the more mature customers in this space. A few weeks ago, I stayed at a Westin in Atlanta while accompanying my wife to a conference. As a Marriott brand now, they offer free Wi-Fi to Bonvoy members (otherwise charging $13-14 per day). After logging in with my Bonvoy credentials for free Wi-Fi, I was immediately targeted with a Bonvoy offer the next morning. They have customer targeting dialed in at every entry point, ready to serve up offers even at the smallest point of engagement, like logging in for Wi-Fi.

Did you see any examples around Adobe Experience Platform or in the composable stack world that stood out?

I attended a session showcasing use cases that leverage data and audiences from AEP to quickly create new content in the scaled-down cloud version of AEM they're now offering (I believe it's AEM Express or AEM Sites Express). It was impressive how quickly you could take a subset of data and generate a completely personalized landing page.

I also saw this in the Adobe Sneak session, where they demonstrated adding a page previously hosted on Sitecore directly into an AEM instance within seconds—something that normally took days and significant effort. While this capability is still in beta, it shows where they're heading: using AI to transform processes that previously took days or weeks into operations that take minutes or hours.

Were there any innovations that sparked ideas on how businesses can evolve in leveraging technology for reshaping better customer experiences?

At Wimmer, we are working with our clients to explore and consolidate AI solutions across different providers. In this instance, we can leverage Microsoft’s Copilot agents that they now have for all different Adobe platforms.  

For some of our customers who are more entrenched in the Microsoft ecosystem but missing parts of their stack where Adobe would be a good fit, this is a great way to evaluate the alignment between what Microsoft is doing with Copilot and how it makes migration or implementation easier through these dedicated agents, versus having to dig through documentation or figure out different integration paths.

There are many examples of heavy manual processes—such as document review—that can be completely automated with an agent. If you train the agent on what to look for within a document, such as signatures, it's smart enough to recognize document types. There are effective ways to leverage these agents to save tremendous amounts of manual hours.

I've been impressed with how Microsoft Copilot has evolved as an AI agent and solution over the last six months. That evolution will only continue, and aligning with Adobe's direction is a natural win-win that will benefit our clients.

Our clients could benefit from organizing their content and their execution strategy across different campaigns and channel touchpoints. With an evolved content supply chain, teams can support the end-to-end experience—from the initial campaign brainstorming to delivery across channels to customers.

If you had to guess on Adobe’s capability or tool that's going to be a game-changer in the next 6-12 months, what would it be?

I think it’s going to be Adobe Experience Platform (AEP) bundled with Real-Time Customer Data Platform (CDP). If we look at the vast amounts of data that large organizations have and how much of it is just sitting there not being acted upon, a tool like AEP can sift through loads of data. With the AI enhancements Adobe has built in, it can start to suggest new audiences and segments, giving you a whole layer of actionable data that wasn't available before—data that people didn't even think about using.

We collect all this data because we need to, but often there's no real-world application in the execution piece. I think that's the biggest driver that will then power the rest of the Adobe platforms that are AEP-based, like Adobe Journey Optimizer (AJO) and Customer Journey Analytics (CJA), to not only deliver experiences but also provide an additional layer of measurement beyond Adobe Analytics. This allows you to focus measurement within a customer journey, zeroing in on where you are most and least effective, and then optimize those pieces.

What would be your advice for businesses who want to get more out of Adobe? Where should they start?

I think businesses should double down on thinking about use cases and finding the right partner to maximize the potential of their investments on Adobe. Come up with three to four use cases that the business agrees upon where there's significant value. It doesn't have to be a complex campaign either—simple is better when you're piloting, and you can augment from there.

If we focus solely on the tools, yes, Adobe is one of the best in class in this space, but these tools across the board all do complementary things, with some offering different bells and whistles that others don't. It starts with identifying the actionable pain points in your business and understanding how you're trying to drive efficiencies and revenue growth.

Marriott knew from the get-go that their co-branded credit card offers and campaigns represent about 70% of their business, so three out of four of their use cases were centered around that. You identify the big fish in the pond and go from there. Once you have those identified, then you can look deeper at Adobe and determine which platforms you might be missing that could help you achieve success in these cases.

Any final thoughts on customer experience and digital transformation?

It's all about the customer experience. We see this as consumers now, so we expect it. There's an expectation of a certain digital experience already, and if you don't have it, you're already behind the curve. Customers have to start thinking broadly—if they're in a business that can be mobile-first and mobile-friendly, they need to be there sooner rather than later.

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As organizations continue to navigate the complex landscape of marketing technology and operations, the insights from Adobe Summit 2025 offer valuable guidance for enhancing customer experiences. By focusing on business use cases, streamlining content supply chains, leveraging AI-powered tools like AEP and Real-Time CDP, and fostering cross-platform integration, businesses can create more personalized, efficient, and effective customer journeys.

The future of customer experience is not just about implementing the latest technology but also about thoughtfully integrating these tools into well-designed processes that address specific business challenges and deliver measurable value.  

As Marty and Justin’s insights demonstrate, the most successful organizations are those that can balance technological innovation with practical implementation to create truly exceptional customer experiences. Whether you're looking to implement AI tools, streamline your content supply chain, or leverage real-time data insights, you're invited to join our upcoming webinar "Exploring Adobe and Microsoft's Marketing Innovations for Digital Customer Experience," can help you identify business cases, develop processes, and connect you with expert resources to help you grow. Register here.

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