A new report by Deloitte Access Economics, commissioned by Sitecore, suggests that collaboration between marketing and technology teams in large Australian businesses could yield productivity benefits of an average AUD $110 million per year. The report, titled 'Digital Bridge Building', surveyed 300 marketing and technology leaders in Australia. It indicates that collaboration centred around customer needs could lead to an additional 11% revenue growth in the next year for businesses leading in collaboration.

Troy Outtram, Partner at Deloitte Digital, also said, "As brands continue to invest in their digital transformation, the benefits for teams that work in harmony are becoming more apparent, with ruthless alignment to the businesses goals the key to success for major projects."

The research warns that unsuccessful projects require more management time to correct, diverting focus from other business matters. This was seen as a problem by 62% of business leaders who experienced negative impacts of technology investments. Key challenges identified by survey respondents include integration difficulties, money wastage, and loss of innovation.

The report suggests that the top two priorities for business leaders over the next five years are scaling existing digital solutions and broader digital transformation, ranking higher than traditional objectives like revenue generation and customer retention. A staggering 98% of the business leaders surveyed consider digital investment pivotal to business strategy.

"When collaboration is centred around customer needs, businesses leading the way in collaboration forecast an additional 11% revenue growth in the next year," the Deloitte Access Economics report states.

Joey Lim, Sitecore's APAC and Japan president, commented on the findings, "Challenges to collaboration can make the case for further digital investment difficult and add to executive resistance to transformational initiatives. Sitecore’s commitment to offering choice through its leadership in both on-prem and SaaS digital experience software uniquely places it as a powerful collaborator when overcoming internal resistance by offering multiple solutions that merge marketing and technology."

According to Lim, "Sitecore can help brands unlock the potential A$110 million that is on the table. As a digital experience software provider with years of leadership and understanding in the space – and one that boasts an extensive partner network with focused experience overcoming internal and stakeholder blocks to innovation, Sitecore is uniquely placed to help brands achieve success. We look forward to working with brands to understand the impact innovation can have on their customer experience provision and the benefits that marketing and technology collaboration can provide in helping firms become more agile and engaging now and into the future."

The report recommends that business leaders develop co-investment strategies to overcome budget barriers, remove organisational barriers to promote collaboration, align marketing and technology teams on business strategy and priorities, and create clear, structural accountability for shared focus areas. Sitecore, a global leader in end-to-end digital experience software, unifying data, content, commerce, and experiences, is well-positioned to aid in this process.