The document discusses the concept of digital decoupling in global marketing, which involves separating creative elements from production and distribution to enhance efficiency and cut costs. It emphasizes the benefits of partnering with global digital marketing services to streamline operations, improve consistency, and access advanced analytics, enabling brands to reach more customers effectively. As marketing complexities rise, adopting this strategy is crucial for maximizing marketing budgets and improving campaign quality.

1. DECOUPLN
DECOUPLN
COUPLIGN
DECOUPLINGGlobal Digital Marketing Services

2. Doing more with less is a perennial challenge for most marketers. In an expanding global economy,
marketers need to reach more customers in more markets more quickly and with greater precision—
all while operating within tight budget constraints.
To balance the equation, marketers can multiply the impact of their marketing budget using
innovative ways to reach more customers, more cost effectively.
Digital content development and distribution is ripe for exactly this type of innovation, which is
why the practice of digital decoupling—separating the “creative” elements of marketing from their
production and distribution—is rapidly becoming a go-to marketing strategy for global brands.
This white paper will explore the business case for decoupling digital marketing services and identify
key success factors for selecting a Global Digital Marketing Services partner.
BY DECOUPLING GLOBAL DIGITAL MARKETING SERVICES
MULTIPLY IMPACT
MI PACT

3. Most companies spend a large portion of their
marketing budget on digital production, and are
likely paying the same high agency rates for both
creative and production work. Some may also
be paying multiple times for the same assets.
For example, multi-channel publishing and
distribution often requires different resolutions of
the same document, while reaching global markets
necessitates enlisting a wide assortment of
agencies and partners for translation, transcreation
and localization.
The power shift of digital decoupling begins with
significant cost savings through moving a large
portion of marketing operations to a partner that
specializes in production and distribution of digital
content, usually at a lower cost than creative
agencies. These Global Digital Marketing Services
partners have the expertise and global networks
that allow them to standardize key processes with
a “global factory model” that not only lowers costs
but also improves consistency, speeds cycle times,
and enables simultaneous global product releases.
Moving global production efforts to a single partner
that can manage multilingual content can also
dramatically improve efficiency. Global Digital
Marketing Services organizations have deeper
digital production and distribution capabilities
than what most traditional agencies can provide,
along with global capabilities for transcreation
and localization, raising the quality of campaigns.
They are often able to provide twenty-four hour
production with real-time support, regardless of
location, enabling immediate response to urgent
needs on a global scale.
Digital decoupling has been around for some
time—in fact, many global brands have already
decoupled marketing production from creative
services to reclaim as much as 40 percent for the
marketing budget.1
This allows them to redirect
financial resources to expanding their reach well
beyond what traditional approaches can deliver,
capitalizing on innovative technologies and
expanding multichannel marketing opportunities.
As global marketing complexity increases, digital
decoupling will become an important tactic for
streamlining marketing operations and reaching
more customers with higher quality content more
quickly and cost effectively.
THE BALANCE OF
POWER IS SHIFTING
B A EA NL C
1
World Federation of Advertisers, “WFA Survey Results:
Evolution of production and decoupling,” Summer 2013.

4. CO
NQUE
Of course, digital decoupling has deeper benefits
than merely cutting costs and increasing efficiency.
As the digital world continues to increase its influence
on consumers, digital marketing strategies are taking
center stage. Unfortunately, best-in-class digital
services and talent is hard to come by and expensive
to maintain. With decoupling, companies can tap
into this expertise, helping them reach and influence
consumers more effectively—without supporting and
maintaining dedicated in-house talent.
At the same time, Global Digital Marketing Services
providers simplify the operations process with standard
approaches, allowing marketers to focus on goals
such as brand building, driving demand, and enabling
sales. For example, today’s digital consumers expect
highly customized messages, and in this hyper-
segmented environment, analytics are a critical
element of any marketing delivery model. Digital
decoupling can provide companies with access to
the advanced analytics capabilities needed to reach
today’s consumers with personalized and relevant
messages at scale. That means marketers can focus
on learning from results and optimizing campaigns
versus spending time on production and execution.
Digital decoupling also allows a company to take
advantage of its partner’s global operating footprint,
leveraging their presence and investments to move
quickly into key new markets with relatively little risk.
This includes leveraging their partner’s ability to help
them research new markets prior to a full-scale launch.
DECOUPLE
AND
CONQUER
T
RADITIONAL
TRADITION
AL
TRADI
TIONAL
D
ECOUPLED
DECOUPLE
D
DECOU
PLED
AGENCY
Strategy Creative Production
AGENCY
Strategy
Centralized
Creative
PRODUCTION
Offshore

5. • Success criteria: Defines the key objectives
and measurable outcomes for turnaround
time, quality, customer satisfaction, reporting,
governance, etc.
• Complete capabilities: Offers all required
language expertise and operational
capabilities, including transcreation and
localization, regulatory review and digital
production to simultaneously
meet global and local demands
• A centralized, global operating model:
Provides a global agency network that can
scale campaigns across markets, languages,
content types and channels, with cross-
agency leadership located in one geography
• Consolidated services layer: Makes
operationalized capabilities, training
protocols, governance processes and project
and account management tools easily
accessible to global teams
• Shared governance model: Evaluates local
agencies and provides support when there
is no local agency to consolidate providers
• Process toolkit: Enhances agility with a
specific, repeatable process and toolkit for
all campaign services
KEY SUCCESS FACTORS
NOT ALL GLOBAL DIGITAL MARKETING SERVICES PARTNERS ARE OF EQUAL QUALITY. LOOK
FOR A PARTNER WITH WELL-DEFINED WORKFLOWS, METRICS AND OFFERINGS, SUCH AS:
SUCCESS

6. A recent survey found that 63 percent of marketers are working toward consolidating the
number of agencies they work with over the next one to two years.2
Some may be wondering
if adding a Global Digital Marketing Services provider to the mix will further complicate matters.
The answer is a resounding no.
By leveraging a Global Digital Marketing Services partner with centralized operations and a
global footprint, companies can reduce the number of agencies they work with for gains in
efficiency and control.
This grants the company freedom to hire any creative agency—no matter what their production
capabilities, global footprint or language skills—and frees the creative team to focus on
developing creative content that resonates with consumers.
WHAT ABOUT
CONSOLIDATION?
2
http://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2015/26909/brands-are-using-fewer-marketing-agencies
ONC S
A
O
T
LII OD N
For companies just entering the process of decoupling,
there are methods to try it on a smaller scale, rather
than immediately beginning a full-scale Global
Digital Marketing Services partnership agreement.
Many companies first leverage digital decoupling to
manage staffing shortages, while others begin by
using digital decoupling to gain access to specific
capabilities with no fixed commitments. Most of these
companies come to view decoupling as an effective
way to simplify and standardize production processes,
reduce the complexity of managing global multichannel
campaigns, increase global consistency and quality
and stretch the marketing budget further. From there,
they expand their decoupling agreement.
GETTING YOUR
FEET WET WITH
DECOUPLING

7. THE BENEFITS OF LEVERAGING GLOBAL DIGITAL MARKETING SERVICE PROVIDERS FOR TOP
QUALITY MARKETING OPERATIONS INCLUDE:
Cost Savings
• Cut waste by streamlining global marketing operations
• Keep a lean core team with the ability to tap point capabilities at will
• Leverage the latest digital technologies and strategies without
investment
Faster Turnaround
• Simplify the management of multichannel campaigns by standardizing
key processes
• Automate production, transcreation and localization to speed delivery
on a global scale
• Move more quickly into new markets with less risk by using an
established partner
Enhanced Efficiency
• Reach more customers in more markets with the same staff
• Consolidate and streamline agency relationships
• Leverage automation and industrialization to achieve global scale
Higher Quality
• Hire any creative agency or leverage an in-house creative team
• Outsource process standardization, governance and operations to allow
creative teams to focus on developing and managing the brand
• Gain access to the most advanced solutions and tools to achieve
consumer relevance at scale
SIMPLIFY, STREAMLINE
AND ENHANCE

8. Using a Global Digital Marketing Services partner is a smart strategy that will help lower costs and
reduce cycle times to reach more customers more quickly and easily than ever before. Access to
world-class technology and expertise on a global scale will help companies reach them with high
quality, relevant messages.
DIGITAL IS CHANGING THE GAME. TO WIN, COMPANIES
NEED TO CHANGE THEIR APPROACH TO GLOBAL
MARKETING OPERATIONS.
PLAY TO WIN
WIN

9. As the world’s largest marketing localization firm, Lionbridge combines language expertise and operational capabilities
to enable more than 800 world-leading brands to engage their global customers with the greatest impact. We provide
industry-leading translation and localization services, as well as highly scalable global marketing solutions to fuel
customer loyalty, enhance client service, ensure brand messaging and drive global growth. By leveraging our global
operating model, flexible approach to technology and deep language and cultural expertise to support global marketing
execution, brands are able to deliver local relevance on a global scale. To learn more, visit www.lionbridge.com.