How technology increases efficiency in marketing campaign management

The very first thing we imagine when discussing Jira Software is the Information Technology (IT) area and maybe further, Project Management. The truth is that nowadays Atlassian products (Jira, Confluence, etc.) have evolved because of their System of Work, to the point that those products are being used across different teams. In this blog post, you'll learn how a business team such as marketing uses Jira to coordinate global advertising efforts to harness team productivity using Atlassian products.

Using the right set of tools can effectively help to manage complex, multinational projects, allowing teams to focus more on creativity, strategy, and execution rather than administrative tasks. That’s precisely why a large multinational communications and advertising holding company uses Jira for marketing teams. Keep reading to learn how they have implemented the tool to manage and administrate projects worldwide.

Get to know UHUB, an internal team dedicated to providing tech services to WPP. And what’s WPP? They’re the world's largest advertising holding company. In 2023, WPP owned companies from advertising, public relations, media, and market research networks industries, among the names of those companies, we can list AKQA, BCW, CMI Media Group, Finsbury, and Ogilvy. Based on their magnitude, you can already imagine why UHUB is a company by itself. 

Automation and the centralization of project management were key to WPP, to deliver coordinated marketing campaigns across 112 countries, hundreds of agency brands, over 107.000 employees, and a customer portfolio including Fortune 500 giants. WPP relies on UHUB to organize and automate complex campaign workflows. 

UHUB brought together and customized an Atlassian suite of tools to create an integrated project management platform. This platform serves as a single source of truth for WPP’s thousands of employees globally, making campaign management smoother and more transparent, addressing common challenges like data duplication and workflow inefficiencies.

Here’s how they did it, and how these tools can transform campaign management for marketing and advertising organizations of any size:

The team:
Streamlining collaboration in advertising

In large advertising agencies, collaboration flows across multiple roles such as Campaign Managers, Project Managers, Creative Directors, Copywriters, Designers, and more, and here’s where UHUB has streamlined the communication and data-sharing process, making it easy for all stakeholders to access and contribute to project data. It works as follows:

Campaign Program Managers are the primary project coordinators, they use the system to input campaign data, automatically sharing the data across teams. Project Managers and Planners monitor campaign statuses and resources by using Projectrak Layouts, enabling accurate scheduling and budget forecasting, and then, the Creative and Technical Teams find the details relevant to their roles, like briefing notes, timelines, and task priorities so they kick start the campaigns.

This workflow has reduced onboarding times, accelerated project progression, and reduced misalignment.

The software tools:
Empowering collaboration and efficiency

WPP uses Jira as the backbone of its project management system, supported by additional solutions such as Projectrak to control and enhance the project portfolio data from minute one without extra configuration in Jira, saving time and money, it provides structured layouts almost instantly, it allows to track project information, automate it, allowing customizable project views and keeping a relevant project reporting for each team level, granting visibility to encourage collaboration among different teams.

They also have implemented Elements Connect to fetch and display data from external sources directly in Jira to be managed and organized by Projectrak such as financial details or resource tracking, and adding ScriptRunner to their equation, automating repetitive tasks, such as campaign transitions and notifications, saving time for project managers and reducing the risk of human error.

The business impact:
Ways to increase efficiency and decision-making in campaign management

The implementation has automated a system bringing measurable improvements to WPP’s campaign processes. Among its benefits impacted the business, we can list the following benefits:

1. Increased productivity: The automatizations done with ScriptRunner based on project data provided by Projectrak reduce manual updates and data entry, freeing up valuable time for creatives and project management teams.
   
   
2. Reduced errors: The data displayed through Elements Connect minimizes the risk of using outdated information, reducing change of context and silos, while ScriptRunner enforces business logic to ensure consistency across campaigns.
   
   
3. Enhanced transparency and reporting: Projectrak's gadgets for Jira Dashboards allow building a reliable reporting hub with customizable data at the project level allowing stakeholders to visualize project health, statuses, and resource allocation, making it easier for C-level executives to assess overall campaign performance.
   
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4. Improved cross-functional team collaboration: By unifying and concentrating campaign information in one place using Projectrak Layouts, UHUB has created on Jira, a customized platform that eliminates silos and fosters cross-departmental collaboration, allowing a unified approach to campaign execution and success.

The right set of software solutions will bring global success

Leveraging additional solutions to their Jira customized for Marketing and Advertising purposes using solutions such as Projectrak and others, shows how Atlassian products help to manage complex business cases, for multinational projects at scale within different industries.

This setup allows teams to focus on creativity execution and productivity rather than administrative tasks, resulting in better, faster campaign outcomes and, ergo, better economic results for the business. For marketing managers, executives, and agencies looking to optimize project management, UHUB’s approach demonstrates how automation and centralized data can be key for success.

If you have similar needs or different use cases. We would like to know more about you. Also, if you’re ready to transform your Jira experience and solve these project or campaign management headaches, contact our team to learn more or book a demo.