What is SAP Ariba?
SAP Ariba is SAP’s cloud-based e-procurement software. SAP Ariba allows organizations to transact seamlessly on one of the world’s largest business network, Ariba Network. Each year, Ariba Network helps customers collectively transact over USD 3 trillion and support over 4 million businesses. Customers fall into two main types, Buyers and Suppliers.
What problem did we need to solve?
Supplier customers vastly outnumber Buyers 1000:1, making it often hard to engage and reach. At the time, there was a lack of effective learning content for customers. Most of the existing content consisted of static PDF infographics and websites and primarily 20-30 minute videos. The existing videos were either slide deck and demo based or professionally produced customer references. Lead times were long, costly, and had no centralized team to manage it all, creating inconsistency and an accountability gap.
As more new features became available to customers, they found it hard to access the content, maintain attention, and unable to see how the features available were relevant to them. Often, the basic enablement content was gated behind virtual events. Lastly, some suppliers found that SAP Ariba seemed too corporate and distant from its customers.
How can SAP Ariba make content that is accessible, personable, and engaging for the underserved Supplier customer segment?
A sample demo based 20 minutes video
How did we approach the problem?
We started by auditing our content with criteria based on what was engaging, what was still relevant, and what would be too difficult to update at the moment. From there, we looked at our current Supplier customer satisfaction surveys and what feature-based pain points they had. Meanwhile, other members of our team worked on looking at what was working in the industry. We identified that we had the existing abilities to create easily shareable, bite-sized video content that spoke to these knowledge gaps.
We created the following format for most of the videos in this series:
An overview of the topic, feature, or innovation with supporting animations
Each demo would feature someone from the team, making it personable and using more simplified language.
A high-quality product demo (if applicable)
If there were demos, each one would need to provide step-by-step guidance.
Closing remarks and call-to-action
Each video would be hosted on YouTube to make it searchable and quickly shareable in our campaigns and social media platforms.
Supporting the project
In this initiative, I was assigned to shoot and edit all of the videos and plan the visual direction as the creative lead and principal videographer. I wanted to humanize SAP Ariba and organize the videos in ways where the customers could have a friendly face they could recognize. I leveraged my video production and animation skills to storyboard and planned the concept.
How did we execute the plan?
When our team began developing the Supplier Launchpad Video Series project, we were extremely limited in equipment (audio, camera, lighting, etc) and budget. I brought in my personal equipment that I used for photography including, cameras and tripods. As the ongoing project had evolved, the look and feel and quality improved as well.
The team jokingly named each batch of 4-5 videos as a “season”, here is how we iterated on the videos over a year:
Season 1 (Spring 2019) & Improving the Concept
Season 1 was our proof of concept. Although unpolished, I needed to test out certain elements and get feedback from customers and stakeholders. We leveraged these videos for the upcoming digital events that we hosted for Suppliers as a great way to share content and get feedback.
I identified the following critical issues from Season 1:
The audio was grainy and noisy, while the footage lacked clarity.
Animations were inconsistent across the first batch.
Lack of overall consistent brand alignment.
Screen recorded demos moved too quickly and were hard to match with the filmed explanations.
The product had to be recorded with the current public version, meaning upcoming features would be difficult to capture. Developer versions of the site often lacked finalized version of the features.
How did the Series change across the “seasons”?
Season 2 (Summer 2019)
- Changed intro sequence to be more brand compliant
- New overlays on demos to be clearer on where to click
- New equipment especially for audio
Season 3 (Fall 2019)
- Better lighting & addition of periodic angle changes
- More consistent animations
Season 4 (Winter 2020)
- More personable intro with speaker photos while staying compliant
- Revised demo section layout to be more neutral and informative
Seasons 5 (Summer 2020)
- More consistent footage colour grading
- Even better audio editing and lav mic attachment
- Added new mobile device demo format
How did we do and what did I learn?
20+ Videos | 75,000+ total views | Available in 6 languages
Since starting the Supplier Launchpad Video Series, we’ve supported over 20 different topics and features. The video series feedback from field teams such as sales, support, and account managers, has been positive. These teams have mentioned it speeds up the conversations they have with customers. Additionally, it provides long-term content for events and campaigns.
I’ve developed a lot during this project, especially in video creation. Before this, I was solely skilled in motion graphics and flat animations. It’s taught me to think more about how to make content more digestible and accessible. This process has taught me to be more fluid in the iteration process, as product features were often not final, and long-term thinking, such as creating reusable templates to simplify editing.