My colleague Ted Schadler and I are excited to announce that “The Forrester Wave™: Adobe Implementation Services, Q2 2020” is now live. Following up the previously published Now Tech report, it’s the first time Forrester has evaluated Adobe services providers’ capabilities globally. In our 24-criterion evaluation of Adobe implementation service providers, we identified the 12 most significant ones globally — Accenture, Adobe, Cognizant, Deloitte Digital, Dentsu, HCL Technologies, IBM iX, ICF Next, Infosys, Publicis Sapient, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), and WPP — and researched, analyzed, and scored them on current offering, strategy, and market presence.

Forrester Analytics survey data indicates that globally, more firms purchase marketing technology software from Adobe than any other vendor. From content design and creation to measurement, delivery, and commercialization, Adobe gives enterprise customers a suite of tools for designing and delivering personalized experiences that drive business results. To maximize their investment in Adobe technology, customers work with one or more third parties that provide consulting, implementation, and operations services to accelerate experience-led business transformation. When considering their requirements for Adobe services, firms should look for providers that:

  • Combine Adobe expertise with business understanding. Managing the sophistication of customer engagement today requires a wide variety of Adobe products, making the breadth and capacity of providers’ Adobe expertise key differentiators. But extensive Adobe Certified Expert product coverage and Adobe Specializations across regions won’t be enough to satisfy buyers. They expect providers to complement their Adobe skills with vertical expertise, understand clients’ business priorities and challenges, and bring in prebuilt assets, accelerators, and industry-relevant best practices.
  • Have expertise in the specific Adobe products you need. While all of the providers we evaluated broadly support and deploy Adobe Marketing Cloud and Analytics Cloud, their customers seldom discussed or commented on Advertising Cloud, Marketo Engage, or Commerce Cloud (Magento). If you need help with one of these, or in the emerging Adobe Experience Platform or Sensei, be sure to ask providers for references in these niche areas.
  • Marry design, strategic consulting, and implementation. Adobe service buyers look for providers’ in-market resources beyond implementation, including strategic consulting and design. Most providers only excel in one or two of these or can’t demonstrate the same level of expertise and resources in all three regions. In particular, they fall short in Asia Pacific, which is also the region that Adobe is least present in. These shortcomings were reflected in the stories that customers across North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific told us.
  • Integrate with internal and external ecosystems. Adobe service buyers span four roles: marketing, technology, customer experience/digital, and business/commerce. Their Adobe practice success relies on enterprisewide collaboration across these roles. Leading providers are able to align stakeholders to work toward a common purpose: customer experience success. As Adobe customers often use multiple tech and service providers at the same time, providers with a strong partner ecosystem and solid integration capabilities are also important to buyers.

To see how the evaluated vendors stack up, Forrester clients can find the full report here — but keep in mind that the written report just scratches the surface of the full evaluation. Download the interactive scorecard tool and use it to customize the Forrester Wave model for your organization’s objectives.

If you are interested in digging deeper into the findings of the evaluation or want to discuss Adobe services more broadly, please schedule an inquiry with Ted and I.