1 00:00:00,040 --> 00:00:03,840 One of the big mega trends that I think particularly in fashion, 2 00:00:03,840 --> 00:00:07,320 for example, has been things like TikTok that have led to 3 00:00:07,360 --> 00:00:12,080 social influencers wearing something and then that content 4 00:00:12,080 --> 00:00:15,240 or that product or that experience needing to be live on 5 00:00:15,240 --> 00:00:29,080 a website within minutes. Hello and welcome back to the 6 00:00:29,080 --> 00:00:31,760 Retail Podcast. We've got a special show for you 7 00:00:31,760 --> 00:00:36,160 today. I'm joined by the CIO of NRF, 8 00:00:36,160 --> 00:00:39,200 Jason Holzmer. Jason, welcome to the show. 9 00:00:39,200 --> 00:00:41,720 Mark, welcome to the. Show great to see you. 10 00:00:42,200 --> 00:00:44,520 Thank you. So today we're going to really 11 00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:49,880 sort of get deep dive into a technical area and Jason, why 12 00:00:49,880 --> 00:00:52,840 don't you sort of sets maybe give us some context. 13 00:00:52,840 --> 00:00:55,640 Tell us about your what life is like, because this is like a 14 00:00:55,640 --> 00:00:59,480 real under lifting the curtains back and seeing what's going on 15 00:00:59,480 --> 00:01:03,120 at NRFI mean the the traffic you guys must have to deal with the 16 00:01:03,120 --> 00:01:05,200 tech. I mean, just give us, give us 17 00:01:05,200 --> 00:01:06,880 some insight. Yeah. 18 00:01:07,120 --> 00:01:10,760 So our biggest challenge over the last several years has been 19 00:01:10,760 --> 00:01:13,640 modernization. We've we've had legacy systems 20 00:01:13,640 --> 00:01:17,760 in place for 15 to 20 years and they've not evolved as quickly 21 00:01:17,760 --> 00:01:21,040 as we'd like them to. And so as AI is coming onto the 22 00:01:21,040 --> 00:01:23,880 scene, as there are better models to be able to create and 23 00:01:23,880 --> 00:01:27,640 deploy content, we've we architected our entire ecosystem 24 00:01:27,720 --> 00:01:32,200 from our CMS system all the way through to the end user search 25 00:01:32,200 --> 00:01:35,840 and platform with Storyblock. And so it's been a remarkable 26 00:01:35,840 --> 00:01:38,960 journey and it's, it's, it is now they're on the other side of 27 00:01:38,960 --> 00:01:42,600 of our, our launching our, our, our premier brand or our NRF, 28 00:01:42,600 --> 00:01:44,920 our primary brand. It is what a change. 29 00:01:45,000 --> 00:01:48,480 It's, it's, you know, to be able to track and see what we can see 30 00:01:48,480 --> 00:01:50,760 these days. It is made and it's transformed 31 00:01:50,760 --> 00:01:52,880 how we do things and how we're thinking about content. 32 00:01:52,880 --> 00:01:54,000 Oh. Fantastic. 33 00:01:54,120 --> 00:01:56,760 How long for context? How long have you been at NRF? 34 00:01:56,880 --> 00:01:58,440 13 years. Wow. 35 00:01:58,520 --> 00:02:02,320 OK, so you this is an area that content obviously is something 36 00:02:02,320 --> 00:02:05,000 that has been part of the show and that's what shows are about. 37 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:08,720 South, tell me some of the pain, like let's go back to five years 38 00:02:08,720 --> 00:02:10,680 when Storyblock went on the scene. 39 00:02:10,680 --> 00:02:13,360 Tell me some of the challenges that you were having in terms of 40 00:02:13,360 --> 00:02:17,440 what what you wanted and what you what was preventing you from 41 00:02:17,440 --> 00:02:19,440 getting there? One of the major things that 42 00:02:19,440 --> 00:02:22,480 they could have, two big areas for us were around content 43 00:02:22,480 --> 00:02:24,160 creation. So we were on a trooper 44 00:02:24,160 --> 00:02:27,040 platform. We had solar first search and 45 00:02:27,040 --> 00:02:28,720 discovering content was was challenging. 46 00:02:28,720 --> 00:02:32,040 And solar is if anyone has used it, it's enterprise grade, but 47 00:02:32,040 --> 00:02:33,960 it is very can be very complicated in the right 48 00:02:33,960 --> 00:02:36,280 context. So our sites when someone wanted 49 00:02:36,280 --> 00:02:38,360 to create content and then try to do some types of 50 00:02:38,360 --> 00:02:40,480 personalization, we couldn't do that very quickly. 51 00:02:40,480 --> 00:02:43,640 It had to have the IT team come in with a developer group and be 52 00:02:43,640 --> 00:02:46,400 able to, you know, address the, the a posting of a simple 53 00:02:46,400 --> 00:02:49,600 carousel on a, on a, an event page or yeah, you know, creating 54 00:02:49,600 --> 00:02:52,480 content and things like that. And so you Fast forward five 55 00:02:52,480 --> 00:02:55,120 years and, and we have story block in place and we have a few 56 00:02:55,120 --> 00:02:58,640 of the more modern tools. Content creation takes 1/4 of 57 00:02:58,640 --> 00:03:01,000 the time that it used to, you know, instead of launching us 58 00:03:01,000 --> 00:03:03,440 like in eight weeks, it takes us 3 weeks. 59 00:03:03,520 --> 00:03:06,240 You know, it's, it's, it is much, much faster. 60 00:03:06,240 --> 00:03:08,200 Content creators have greater control over that user 61 00:03:08,200 --> 00:03:11,720 experience and they, they can develop and deploy things with, 62 00:03:11,720 --> 00:03:14,720 with no IT intervention at all. So it is, it is transformed how 63 00:03:14,720 --> 00:03:17,880 we conduct business for us. That's fantastic. 64 00:03:18,040 --> 00:03:21,160 And in terms of when you, when you look to the future and the 65 00:03:21,160 --> 00:03:24,720 demands on your business, because again, I just think the 66 00:03:24,720 --> 00:03:28,000 number of partners, the number of content moments that you 67 00:03:28,000 --> 00:03:31,400 have, what sort of how do you envision the future in, in, in 68 00:03:31,400 --> 00:03:33,080 this world or around content? What? 69 00:03:33,080 --> 00:03:36,200 What sort of ideas have you got in in what you were doing? 70 00:03:36,240 --> 00:03:39,080 Well, we wanted to be able to reduce friction. 71 00:03:39,080 --> 00:03:42,120 You know, the goal was less speed to market. 72 00:03:42,120 --> 00:03:44,440 We wanted to be able to respond the industries changes so 73 00:03:44,440 --> 00:03:47,480 quickly and with all of the new emerging technologies and just 74 00:03:47,560 --> 00:03:49,160 even the, you know, the political landscape and 75 00:03:49,160 --> 00:03:52,280 everything that we needed to engage with happens at 76 00:03:52,280 --> 00:03:54,680 lightspeed and we couldn't keep up. 77 00:03:55,080 --> 00:03:58,080 We would try to it would limiting our ability to to 78 00:03:58,080 --> 00:04:00,920 respond and to address, you know, current affairs, things 79 00:04:00,920 --> 00:04:02,800 that we needed to be be more proactive on. 80 00:04:02,800 --> 00:04:05,400 And so with this deployment, what that gave us the ability to 81 00:04:05,400 --> 00:04:09,240 do was was to act in near real time to address this stuff in 20 82 00:04:09,240 --> 00:04:11,600 and a 24 hour cycle. And that was tremendous for us. 83 00:04:12,000 --> 00:04:15,160 You know, we had our show in New York had the largest attendance 84 00:04:15,160 --> 00:04:17,320 we've ever had. We had the best shows rating 85 00:04:17,320 --> 00:04:20,240 scores we've we've ever had. People were able to to find the 86 00:04:20,240 --> 00:04:22,840 content they were looking for and and engage with us in ways 87 00:04:22,840 --> 00:04:25,520 that they've never done before. So it's it has expanded our 88 00:04:25,520 --> 00:04:28,000 sphere of influence in a way that we just were not. 89 00:04:28,000 --> 00:04:31,200 It was not possible before. And this is just out of personal 90 00:04:31,200 --> 00:04:35,400 curiosity as a as an attendee, when you're talking about the, 91 00:04:35,400 --> 00:04:39,600 the content on the on on the website, is that all the way for 92 00:04:39,600 --> 00:04:42,360 example, from your agenda content, like is it the full 93 00:04:42,360 --> 00:04:45,480 spectrum or is it only one, I don't know, is it only one 94 00:04:45,480 --> 00:04:47,040 specific area? Yeah. 95 00:04:47,040 --> 00:04:50,360 So when we started in our all the architecture, it was 96 00:04:50,360 --> 00:04:52,840 literally you were on one URL and you couldn't cross pollinate 97 00:04:52,840 --> 00:04:55,280 between the various different things that were going on within 98 00:04:55,280 --> 00:04:57,880 our organisation. And now when you're on Big Show 99 00:04:57,880 --> 00:05:00,880 and you can go to a piece of content there or you search on 100 00:05:00,880 --> 00:05:02,160 nrf.com. Yeah. 101 00:05:02,320 --> 00:05:04,840 The way that it's Federated is allows us to see content in one 102 00:05:04,840 --> 00:05:07,280 place and be able to suggest something in another. 103 00:05:07,280 --> 00:05:12,040 And so it it gives us gives us greater visibility into users 104 00:05:12,040 --> 00:05:14,440 coming to our site, gave greater visibility into what was the 105 00:05:14,600 --> 00:05:15,840 breadth of what we had. Yeah. 106 00:05:16,160 --> 00:05:18,360 As an attempt, Cindy, I did notice a difference, especially 107 00:05:18,360 --> 00:05:22,280 when I have to go back and look at content and match that 108 00:05:22,280 --> 00:05:25,840 content to a speaker or to an event or to a partner. 109 00:05:26,080 --> 00:05:30,840 I found I normally what you get is like a big book and you're 110 00:05:30,840 --> 00:05:34,000 like, you got to search through the book and at some of the old 111 00:05:34,000 --> 00:05:36,880 conferences, obviously they've digitised them now, but it's 112 00:05:36,880 --> 00:05:40,280 still almost to me, all they've done is like taken photocopies 113 00:05:40,480 --> 00:05:44,520 of those pages that you then it's still really awkward. 114 00:05:44,520 --> 00:05:47,680 And I did notice this year that getting to things were so much 115 00:05:47,680 --> 00:05:49,280 easier. And then, as you were saying, 116 00:05:49,280 --> 00:05:52,640 like the cross colonisation from one platform to another, then to 117 00:05:52,640 --> 00:05:56,480 maybe to go out to LinkedIn or to go out to, to, to somewhere 118 00:05:56,480 --> 00:05:58,000 else was really good. Mark. 119 00:05:58,000 --> 00:06:02,800 I mean, it must be fantastic to have a, a customer as so as big 120 00:06:02,800 --> 00:06:07,320 as NRF and so such a powerhouse in the industry. 121 00:06:07,600 --> 00:06:11,880 I'm just curious when CIOs like Jason are sort of thinking about 122 00:06:11,880 --> 00:06:13,840 this journey with you, where do they start? 123 00:06:13,880 --> 00:06:17,000 Where does this journey start? Yeah, it's a it's a good point. 124 00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:20,880 And, you know, I I get to meet a lot of senior business leaders 125 00:06:20,880 --> 00:06:24,480 like Jason who are in exactly the same situation in the retail 126 00:06:24,480 --> 00:06:27,000 space. This challenge of getting 127 00:06:27,000 --> 00:06:31,280 content live quickly has become an increasingly big issue. 128 00:06:31,320 --> 00:06:35,040 And one of the big mega trends that I think particularly in 129 00:06:35,040 --> 00:06:38,840 fashion, for example, has been things like TikTok that have led 130 00:06:38,840 --> 00:06:44,080 to social influencers wearing something or, or seeing a new 131 00:06:44,080 --> 00:06:45,640 product that they might be testing out. 132 00:06:45,840 --> 00:06:49,400 And then that content or that product or that experience 133 00:06:49,600 --> 00:06:52,320 needing to be live on a website within minutes. 134 00:06:53,320 --> 00:06:57,080 And, and Jason's colleagues, the people who are responsible for 135 00:06:57,080 --> 00:07:00,480 the content, as you, as you probably have heard, is they get 136 00:07:00,480 --> 00:07:04,640 frustrated really by the inability to be able to 137 00:07:04,640 --> 00:07:08,200 merchandise or get something up on their website very, very 138 00:07:08,200 --> 00:07:10,360 quickly. Because they're often dependent 139 00:07:10,360 --> 00:07:14,160 on a developer or a process to get content up on a website. 140 00:07:14,160 --> 00:07:16,320 Whereas really what they want to be able to do have a, a 141 00:07:16,320 --> 00:07:19,120 merchandiser or a product manager or a brand manager take 142 00:07:19,120 --> 00:07:22,160 a tile that might be already available on the website and be 143 00:07:22,160 --> 00:07:25,160 able to place in, oh, here's what Kim Kardashian was worth 144 00:07:25,240 --> 00:07:28,920 wearing just a few moments ago. And here it is available for you 145 00:07:29,200 --> 00:07:32,640 here and now. And unfortunately, retailers 146 00:07:32,640 --> 00:07:35,600 have just been struggling to move at that pace that for 147 00:07:35,600 --> 00:07:39,680 example, that certainly this mega trend of social influences 148 00:07:39,680 --> 00:07:41,680 has has created. And so Jason is. 149 00:07:41,800 --> 00:07:43,400 Being a social influencer myself. 150 00:07:47,440 --> 00:07:50,560 But. Anyway, no, sorry to interrupt 151 00:07:50,560 --> 00:07:52,400 your, your trade of thought there, but I'm, I'm just 152 00:07:52,400 --> 00:07:55,760 curious, one of the challenges that I've seen is and is what 153 00:07:55,760 --> 00:07:59,280 Jason was saying is this cross colonisation of content about 154 00:07:59,280 --> 00:08:02,040 content, you being confident that some of the content doesn't 155 00:08:02,040 --> 00:08:05,680 live in your world, it actually sits somewhere else. 156 00:08:05,960 --> 00:08:08,960 How much, I mean, Jason, how much do you see when you were 157 00:08:08,960 --> 00:08:12,800 as, as obviously a part of the the executive team, how much was 158 00:08:12,800 --> 00:08:14,360 the business coming to you for that? 159 00:08:15,440 --> 00:08:18,480 Yeah, so the content team we were getting requested, we just 160 00:08:18,480 --> 00:08:21,000 couldn't meet. And so that created some 161 00:08:21,000 --> 00:08:23,160 consternation within the organisation about, you know, 162 00:08:23,160 --> 00:08:25,480 just knowing what they wanted to say, knowing how they wanted to 163 00:08:25,480 --> 00:08:27,960 say it and what they wanted to include and not being not having 164 00:08:27,960 --> 00:08:31,520 the capabilities to do so. And so that helped with buy in 165 00:08:31,520 --> 00:08:34,240 and that helped with getting folks on board, because when you 166 00:08:34,240 --> 00:08:37,480 talk about a digital transformation, that means so 167 00:08:37,480 --> 00:08:39,679 many things to so many people. And if you're not in technology, 168 00:08:39,679 --> 00:08:41,480 it means something very different likely. 169 00:08:41,480 --> 00:08:45,120 And so it gave the, the, the real world examples that we, we 170 00:08:45,120 --> 00:08:47,200 needed to be able to help push this forward. 171 00:08:47,200 --> 00:08:50,200 And it was, it was the change that we asked the organisation 172 00:08:50,200 --> 00:08:53,360 to go through was it was, you know, it was huge, monumental, 173 00:08:53,360 --> 00:08:55,680 like it was something that you don't do every, every year. 174 00:08:55,680 --> 00:08:59,360 And it's so in order to get that buy in, you know, we had to, we 175 00:08:59,360 --> 00:09:01,400 had to bring it down to why should I care about this? 176 00:09:01,400 --> 00:09:02,840 Like what, what would this do for me? 177 00:09:03,680 --> 00:09:06,360 And so that's, that's what we, we ended up, you know, using 178 00:09:06,360 --> 00:09:08,680 some of those examples where we couldn't take content from 179 00:09:08,680 --> 00:09:11,040 other, other areas and we couldn't move fast enough to 180 00:09:11,040 --> 00:09:13,200 help them understand and bring down to the level where they 181 00:09:13,200 --> 00:09:14,640 need it and, and could buy into it. 182 00:09:15,320 --> 00:09:18,000 And Mark, what's the secret source in terms of the, the 183 00:09:18,760 --> 00:09:21,960 getting such a, a big system up and running? 184 00:09:22,120 --> 00:09:24,200 I think last time we spoke you were telling her that the 185 00:09:24,200 --> 00:09:28,120 actual, there's a misconception of how difficult this is to do 186 00:09:28,120 --> 00:09:31,320 that you guys can actually the, the technology lends itself to 187 00:09:31,320 --> 00:09:33,360 simpler integration. Is that right? 188 00:09:34,040 --> 00:09:37,960 Yeah, so one of the when we start to actually talk to the 189 00:09:37,960 --> 00:09:41,200 retail landscape, one of the things that we've certainly seen 190 00:09:41,280 --> 00:09:44,600 is this, this increasing proliferation of screens. 191 00:09:44,640 --> 00:09:48,440 In fact, just to give you an, a real life example of something I 192 00:09:48,440 --> 00:09:52,080 went through recently, I wanted to, to purchase a new iPad. 193 00:09:52,080 --> 00:09:54,760 It was, it was Christmas. I hey, you've got to treat 194 00:09:54,760 --> 00:09:56,640 yourself. And then I was looking to 195 00:09:56,640 --> 00:09:59,880 purchase this from one of the big large retailers here in the 196 00:10:00,320 --> 00:10:01,720 department stores here in the UK. 197 00:10:01,720 --> 00:10:04,760 And, and I noticed actually someone had a great offer. 198 00:10:04,760 --> 00:10:07,320 And I thought, oh wow, they, they've actually got a store not 199 00:10:07,320 --> 00:10:09,880 too far from me. I'll, I'll, I'll go and pick it 200 00:10:09,880 --> 00:10:11,280 up. Incredibles that. 201 00:10:11,360 --> 00:10:14,920 But what was interesting is that there was an experience that I 202 00:10:14,920 --> 00:10:18,480 had at home, which is obviously one source of content. 203 00:10:18,720 --> 00:10:22,760 There was a, a set of content that the person that I met the 204 00:10:22,960 --> 00:10:25,200 Apple section within that department store. 205 00:10:25,560 --> 00:10:27,560 Yeah. And she had a different price. 206 00:10:27,640 --> 00:10:29,680 And then a lot of these technology products have a 207 00:10:29,680 --> 00:10:32,520 little screen now in front of them to sort of describe how the 208 00:10:32,520 --> 00:10:35,480 product works and essentially sell you and that had another 209 00:10:35,480 --> 00:10:37,040 price as well. Oh wow. 210 00:10:37,600 --> 00:10:40,800 And, and actually, and so there was a, there was a, a big 211 00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:44,560 disparity between the content and the experience that was 212 00:10:44,560 --> 00:10:47,360 happening. So anyhow, the, the, the, the 213 00:10:47,360 --> 00:10:52,040 net net is that this, this new modern approach to content, 214 00:10:52,040 --> 00:10:55,120 which is often referred to as a, a headless CMS. 215 00:10:55,240 --> 00:10:59,320 It sounds like something from the 1600s in the UK with Henry 216 00:10:59,320 --> 00:11:04,000 the Eighth. But what it's actually doing is 217 00:11:04,000 --> 00:11:08,560 it's, it's essentially enabling or large retailers to have a 218 00:11:08,560 --> 00:11:13,080 singular pool of content, but to serve that content up, whether 219 00:11:13,080 --> 00:11:17,400 it be on a on a web browser at home for that retail experience, 220 00:11:17,520 --> 00:11:21,160 a little display that might be adjacent a product for, for 221 00:11:21,160 --> 00:11:24,320 merchandising that product. And now increasingly the little 222 00:11:24,320 --> 00:11:26,760 digital displays that go alongside the product with 223 00:11:26,760 --> 00:11:28,640 pricing information, for example. 224 00:11:28,760 --> 00:11:32,200 So when you look at the look at the show, for example, we have, 225 00:11:32,240 --> 00:11:35,400 you know, many systems feed that the content for that show. 226 00:11:35,480 --> 00:11:38,320 We have our back end database system that handles exhibitors 227 00:11:38,320 --> 00:11:39,600 and speakers and things like that. 228 00:11:39,600 --> 00:11:42,200 And then we have other content like folks who are contributors 229 00:11:42,200 --> 00:11:43,920 that can contribute content to the event. 230 00:11:43,920 --> 00:11:46,760 And so we have to we have to be able to deploy very quickly. 231 00:11:46,880 --> 00:11:50,160 And so it allows us very, you know, without a huge level of 232 00:11:50,160 --> 00:11:52,720 effort to take four or five different sources and be able to 233 00:11:52,720 --> 00:11:56,240 feed into these the blocks within the, within the site 234 00:11:56,280 --> 00:11:59,160 that, that, you know, we also, you could do Dr experiences from 235 00:11:59,160 --> 00:12:01,600 and, you know, and so if you have the single source of your 236 00:12:01,600 --> 00:12:05,320 truth is from a source that can be controlled or validated, it 237 00:12:05,320 --> 00:12:08,080 makes the content, you know, kind of in Marx example, less 238 00:12:08,080 --> 00:12:10,120 likely to happen because you have systems that are actually 239 00:12:10,120 --> 00:12:12,320 pulling from the same source, but may be presented differently 240 00:12:12,320 --> 00:12:15,200 in different platforms. So it's, it's very powerful and 241 00:12:15,200 --> 00:12:17,800 it allows us to be confident that what we're presenting is, 242 00:12:17,840 --> 00:12:19,800 is accurate and timely. The other piece that we're 243 00:12:19,800 --> 00:12:22,040 looking at is being able to create more personalised 244 00:12:22,040 --> 00:12:24,160 experiences. So, you know, the dynamic home 245 00:12:24,160 --> 00:12:27,840 page, being able to create and integrate search results with 246 00:12:28,080 --> 00:12:31,160 someone's background information so that we can actually create a 247 00:12:31,160 --> 00:12:33,240 page that's relevant and contextually imported or 248 00:12:33,240 --> 00:12:34,960 necessary for whatever it is you're looking for. 249 00:12:34,960 --> 00:12:37,640 And it's, that's massive. It's, it's going to change. 250 00:12:37,760 --> 00:12:40,200 You know, people don't, they get bombarded every single day with 251 00:12:40,200 --> 00:12:43,160 things that is not, they're not relevant and it's not important 252 00:12:43,160 --> 00:12:44,400 to them. And so they disengage. 253 00:12:44,400 --> 00:12:47,720 And so if you can provide people content that is targeted and 254 00:12:47,720 --> 00:12:50,320 specific on the fly when somebody logs into your site 255 00:12:50,320 --> 00:12:53,760 because of what you know about them, you can you can maintain 256 00:12:53,760 --> 00:12:55,960 that relationship all you understand me and you can get to 257 00:12:55,960 --> 00:12:57,920 place you get people to engage with you and the content. 258 00:12:58,360 --> 00:13:03,600 More Yeah, the future of the future of retail is content. 259 00:13:03,800 --> 00:13:05,920 And I'm not just saying that because of this to come to, but 260 00:13:05,920 --> 00:13:10,680 it is from everything I've heard from conference CEO's, different 261 00:13:10,680 --> 00:13:13,480 business leaders, everyone talking about the proliferation 262 00:13:13,480 --> 00:13:16,520 of influences of all the different elements of digital 263 00:13:16,520 --> 00:13:18,560 touch points, all of them are content moments. 264 00:13:18,600 --> 00:13:23,320 And so therefore, I think to effectively do this to serve 265 00:13:23,320 --> 00:13:27,480 content to users, you need to have some form of robust system 266 00:13:27,480 --> 00:13:29,160 in place. Just coming into the final 267 00:13:29,160 --> 00:13:32,800 couple of questions, Jason, in terms of words of wisdom, if I'm 268 00:13:32,800 --> 00:13:36,360 coming to look at this and maybe if you cast your mind back to 269 00:13:36,440 --> 00:13:40,000 where you were before you had this system, what's one thing I, 270 00:13:40,080 --> 00:13:43,480 I need to be conscious of what, what's one thing that you, you 271 00:13:43,480 --> 00:13:46,400 thought through this process you've learned that you would 272 00:13:46,400 --> 00:13:48,640 pass on? You know, I didn't realise the 273 00:13:48,640 --> 00:13:52,680 amount of effort that would be saved by, you know, deploying 274 00:13:52,760 --> 00:13:54,800 story block. I think the, the piece for me, 275 00:13:54,800 --> 00:13:57,600 when they told me what the, what the site would we would gain 276 00:13:57,600 --> 00:14:01,160 back in productivity or hours of developer time, I didn't take 277 00:14:01,160 --> 00:14:02,560 that. I thought that was the joke. 278 00:14:02,680 --> 00:14:05,200 And you know, to be honest, because it was, I think it can't 279 00:14:05,200 --> 00:14:06,600 possibly give me that much time back. 280 00:14:06,600 --> 00:14:09,040 It's not realistic. And I wish I'd done it sooner is 281 00:14:09,120 --> 00:14:11,200 kind of where I would go with it for the simple reason is, you 282 00:14:11,200 --> 00:14:14,200 know, a site launching 8 weeks versus, you know, 3-3 weeks 283 00:14:14,200 --> 00:14:16,880 versus 8 is massive. Like that is, is a big deal. 284 00:14:17,040 --> 00:14:19,520 And so in giving the controller, the content creators in this 285 00:14:19,520 --> 00:14:22,320 process, you know, going from a Drupal place with a platform 286 00:14:22,320 --> 00:14:25,240 which was extremely manual to this, it was, that's something I 287 00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:27,840 did not, was not aware of just the performance gains. 288 00:14:27,840 --> 00:14:30,160 I thought that that was just marketing speak and it wasn't. 289 00:14:30,480 --> 00:14:32,520 We're seeing those things today. That's fantastic. 290 00:14:32,680 --> 00:14:36,200 Mark, final question, in terms of like the outcomes that Jason 291 00:14:36,200 --> 00:14:39,840 has, is there anything that you feel that we've missed that is a 292 00:14:39,840 --> 00:14:41,800 surprise to people? Because I think sometimes 293 00:14:42,040 --> 00:14:44,880 because CMS obviously has been around since the dawn of what 294 00:14:44,880 --> 00:14:47,720 people are doing, it's all overlooked as the the the 295 00:14:47,720 --> 00:14:49,600 catalyst for a lot of transformation. 296 00:14:49,960 --> 00:14:51,720 Yes. I'm just curious on your 297 00:14:51,760 --> 00:14:54,880 thoughts. Yeah, I, I, I think coming back 298 00:14:54,880 --> 00:14:59,240 to Jason's point, sometimes the, the biggest hindrance to making 299 00:14:59,240 --> 00:15:02,640 progress is, Oh my God, how big a project is this going to be? 300 00:15:02,640 --> 00:15:04,520 How big a change is this going to be? 301 00:15:04,560 --> 00:15:09,920 Bearing in mind a lot of today's systems have been in place five, 302 00:15:09,920 --> 00:15:13,200 maybe seven years. And so often what I I hear is, 303 00:15:13,280 --> 00:15:17,000 Oh my God, OK, is this just going to be too big a step? 304 00:15:17,120 --> 00:15:21,720 And, and will the effort involved actually reward the 305 00:15:21,720 --> 00:15:23,560 fact that we're going to put all this effort in? 306 00:15:23,680 --> 00:15:27,560 And it's great to hear and, and I hear it so many times that it 307 00:15:27,560 --> 00:15:30,040 is worth going, making that big step. 308 00:15:30,440 --> 00:15:33,600 And, and certainly we're starting to see very large 309 00:15:33,720 --> 00:15:38,640 retailers with, you know, years of content and very complex 310 00:15:38,640 --> 00:15:42,400 organisations have made that step and it's been a very, very 311 00:15:42,400 --> 00:15:45,720 worthwhile for them. So and, and I think if you're an 312 00:15:45,720 --> 00:15:49,800 organisation that is increasingly looking to connect 313 00:15:49,840 --> 00:15:53,560 your digital online experience with the in store experience or 314 00:15:53,560 --> 00:15:56,880 you're implementing technology like kiosks and so forth. 315 00:15:57,320 --> 00:16:01,240 And so essentially multi screen digital environments where you 316 00:16:01,240 --> 00:16:04,760 do want to offer up a consistent service, probably now's the time 317 00:16:04,760 --> 00:16:08,280 to take the leap because it's those types of transformations 318 00:16:08,360 --> 00:16:10,960 where this change can deliver the biggest advantage. 319 00:16:10,960 --> 00:16:12,360 How? I mean, I know I said it's a 320 00:16:12,360 --> 00:16:14,760 final question, but just listening to you both talk, it's 321 00:16:14,760 --> 00:16:16,600 inspired me. It's the final, final question. 322 00:16:16,600 --> 00:16:18,920 I promise. When you when it's an AI 323 00:16:18,920 --> 00:16:22,560 question, you know, I'm, I'm just where, how far are we from 324 00:16:22,560 --> 00:16:26,520 like AI being the mechanism to deliver the content, right? 325 00:16:26,640 --> 00:16:31,400 That sort of layer of above, above the platform that then is 326 00:16:31,400 --> 00:16:33,240 in. I mean, I'm just curious, you're 327 00:16:33,240 --> 00:16:34,760 the experts in the field. What do you think? 328 00:16:35,400 --> 00:16:40,240 I think we're, for us, you know, AI has become such, this an 329 00:16:40,560 --> 00:16:43,360 important part of us, so many of our technology conversations. 330 00:16:43,360 --> 00:16:47,360 And I think when we're looking at connecting topics and things 331 00:16:47,360 --> 00:16:49,480 like that together, we're not there in terms of writing 332 00:16:49,480 --> 00:16:52,000 content and, and being able to have these tools kind of 333 00:16:52,040 --> 00:16:54,920 released and, and to, to, to develop content. 334 00:16:55,000 --> 00:16:57,520 But if I understand who you are and what you might be coming to 335 00:16:57,520 --> 00:17:00,440 the site for, there may be avenues of content that you 336 00:17:00,440 --> 00:17:03,200 haven't explored that we could use AI to help provide some more 337 00:17:03,200 --> 00:17:06,599 relevant contextual pieces that could create a more full picture 338 00:17:06,599 --> 00:17:09,480 of something that you're looking for and potentially offer, you 339 00:17:09,480 --> 00:17:12,319 know, make suggestions on offering things that you may not 340 00:17:12,319 --> 00:17:15,800 see in our content offering or shows or other products. 341 00:17:16,880 --> 00:17:18,520 How far away is that? I mean is that? 342 00:17:18,920 --> 00:17:21,960 I that's very near. I believe that that's when we 343 00:17:21,960 --> 00:17:24,040 reached the end of this process. We're already having 344 00:17:24,040 --> 00:17:26,599 conversations today about how do we how do we integrate these 345 00:17:26,599 --> 00:17:29,040 pieces into our content cycle That's. 346 00:17:29,120 --> 00:17:30,800 Brilliant, Jason. I'm sorry, Mark. 347 00:17:31,200 --> 00:17:34,320 Yeah, I and, and I would add to what Jason said, right, which 348 00:17:34,320 --> 00:17:38,040 is, look, I don't think the robot or the bot is necessarily 349 00:17:38,040 --> 00:17:42,080 going to take over from our, from our content creators, but I 350 00:17:42,080 --> 00:17:45,520 do think it's helping them. And, and as Jason said, 351 00:17:46,160 --> 00:17:49,160 understanding what performs well, what reads well. 352 00:17:49,280 --> 00:17:51,920 We're definitely seeing a big take up there. 353 00:17:52,120 --> 00:17:55,160 We're also seeing a big take up in, in translation actually. 354 00:17:55,600 --> 00:18:02,480 So AI enabling us to take, you know, content that's on brand, 355 00:18:02,760 --> 00:18:06,440 that that takes the, the brand personality and convey that in 356 00:18:06,440 --> 00:18:09,840 different languages. We're definitely seeing AI take 357 00:18:09,840 --> 00:18:12,960 advantage be taken advantage of of there. 358 00:18:13,560 --> 00:18:18,520 But yeah, I think the human still has a an awful lot to play 359 00:18:18,520 --> 00:18:20,360 in in the development of content, right. 360 00:18:20,360 --> 00:18:26,320 And I and I, I know content a lot of content creators who are 361 00:18:26,320 --> 00:18:27,880 very. Are rightly. 362 00:18:27,880 --> 00:18:31,960 Very recipherous about that. But I do think AI can be a a 363 00:18:31,960 --> 00:18:35,440 powerful enabler also in helping them to do their job. 364 00:18:35,440 --> 00:18:39,760 So yes, lots of opportunity. That's wonderful, Mark. 365 00:18:40,120 --> 00:18:42,760 Sorry, Jason, you want to? No, I, I just to echo those 366 00:18:42,760 --> 00:18:45,920 points, I think that it is, I agree with that 100%. 367 00:18:45,920 --> 00:18:50,040 I think there is a, there is a scenario and and those use cases 368 00:18:50,040 --> 00:18:53,040 you described are some of what we're testing internally already 369 00:18:53,040 --> 00:18:55,840 to be able to make sure that our content stays on brand, that the 370 00:18:55,840 --> 00:18:57,920 translation pieces is exceptionally. 371 00:18:58,280 --> 00:19:01,760 I think it's taken us further along than we've ever gone in, 372 00:19:01,760 --> 00:19:03,520 in that area. And I think it those who are 373 00:19:03,520 --> 00:19:06,880 consuming the content find it more contextually relevant and 374 00:19:06,880 --> 00:19:09,120 and and the translations are getting much much better. 375 00:19:09,320 --> 00:19:13,680 Yeah, I mean, look, NRF while I was in Japanese, Portuguese, 376 00:19:14,080 --> 00:19:17,760 Spanish, French, I mean, like there there wasn't a language I 377 00:19:17,760 --> 00:19:19,760 didn't hear while I was walking around NRF. 378 00:19:19,760 --> 00:19:23,920 So I can imagine how that will be a major a major play in the 379 00:19:23,920 --> 00:19:26,680 future. But Mark, Jason, thank you so 380 00:19:26,680 --> 00:19:29,120 much for giving up your time and joining me on the show. 381 00:19:29,360 --> 00:19:33,080 It's been, you know, hopefully we've unlifted the lid on, on 382 00:19:33,080 --> 00:19:35,400 the art of the possible in this world. 383 00:19:35,480 --> 00:19:40,000 Well, that as as is is going underneath or going through such 384 00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:41,880 rapid transformation. Thanks, Al very much. 385 00:19:41,880 --> 00:19:42,240 Thanks.