Embracing creative automation for scaling asset creation

Lauren Chester
Lauren Chester
Director of Tech Projects
Length
5 min read
Date
16 August 2023

Just Eat Takeaway.com (JET) is one of the world’s leading online food and convenience ordering and delivery companies — operating in more than 17 markets across the globe, with upwards of 692,000 food partners, and a user base that spans over 20 languages. 

This global brand depends on connecting with its customers at a local level, delivering effective messaging and creative that’s relevant to each market’s culture and cuisine. Together, JET and DEPT® have developed thousands of creative assets over the years, but faced with economic pressures, JET needed to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of its asset production.  

Enter Project Sundae: our solution to JET’s problem that utilises creative automation technology to automate the ongoing production of tens of thousands of individual assets, tailored to each markets’ unique needs. 

Scaling creativity at a new level

It’s no secret that the rise of AI has put pressure on creatives — drumming up feelings of both fear and excitement as the impact of automation on the creative economy has yet to make itself clear. But one thing is certain: The creative industry is growing, and expected to account for 10% of global GDP by 2030. 

Now is the time for marketers to follow the lead of top brands — including DEPT® clients such as Spotify, Philips, Just Eat Takeaway, and eBay — and embrace the intersection of creativity and technology with creative automation in order to stay ahead. Allowing emerging technologies like AI and automation tools to assist in asset creation unlocks the potential for marketing and creative leaders to deliver greater personalisation, conserve more time for human creativity, and open unprecedented opportunities to grow and scale at a global level. 

Creative automation sits at the centre of DEPT®’s capabilities: intertwining the incredible thoughts and experiences of humans with the unparalleled output capabilities of tech to streamline production and augment the creative process so that the best ideas take shape faster. With our Lightspeed tool — a feature of our ADA by DEPT® proprietary platform, and our in-house martech consultancy team, brands can tap into DEPT®’s proprietary technology enabling the delivery of creative assets at scale and dynamic advertising.

Rapidly increase productivity

Anyone who has spent hours upon hours manually developing dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of versions of ad creative understands the inefficient and time consuming nature of this work. 

As creatives ourselves, we understand the vitality of maintaining quality creative within digital media, which can feel possible only if it’s overseen by people. But consider the opportunities, ideas, and experiences missed when your team’s top creative minds are being put to use only to perform repetitive tasks. 

While relinquishing this process to automation might feel like giving up control and creativity, DEPT®’s creative automation technology is smart enough to augment and multiply creativity without diminishing it. Our software can quickly create many creative versions via a streamlined production process. You can get a compact package with high quality, ready-to-use assets, or use the API to easily add them to your own system and make the whole process smoother.

This gives creative people the absolutely critical time and space to focus on craft and innovation, while allowing for an even greater level of asset output.

Harness AI for better results 

Digital campaign creative should be living and breathing, not set and static. Continuous optimisation is essential to maximise performance. But for international campaigns spanning multiple countries, languages, and audiences, tracking performance and contextualising high volumes of data can be a daunting task.  

With DEPT®’s creative automation tools, you can not only deliver creative assets at scale, but you can leverage AI and machine learning to continuously test, experiment, and optimise your digital media campaigns. Through automation, teams can quickly and easily iterate on their ad creative, adjusting messaging for countless customer segments based on performance.

Connect personally with vast audiences

Today, consumers expect marketing messaging and ad creative to be relevant to who they are, where they are, and what they are doing. As campaigns like JET’s Project Sundae set the bar incredibly high, brands that want to keep up and deliver content at the same personalised level must be open to adopting creative automation practices. 

Using automated asset production tools and technology like ADA by DEPT®, teams can achieve personalisation at scale — producing hyper-relevant content that appeals to customers in any language, across all regions and cultures. Whether your brand is running a global campaign that must align with local markets or you’re promoting a vast variety of products and juggling multiple creative variables and inputs, automation allows for the mass production of assets in a strategic, quality, and cost- and time-effective manner.

Mass production, max performance

On the surface, the rapid evolution and adoption of automation technology and AI might seem like an encroachment on the creative industry. But, as marketing and creative leaders continue to embrace these digital advancements, we’re seeing unprecedented opportunities to deliver deeply creative, thoughtfully human, and high-performing assets at a new level of scale. 

Alongside the experts within the DEPT®/Creative Automation Practice and utilising tools like Lightspeed by DEPT®, businesses and creative teams can unlock time and budget for innovation while delivering sophisticated, relevant, and optimised content.

Questions?

Director of Tech Projects

Lauren Chester