With today's customers expecting more personalised and engaging omnichannel car-buying experiences, carmakers are struggling to create the sheer amount of visual content needed to facilitate them. Whether it's the thousands of photorealistic graphics needed to visualise all the options, accessories and configurations across a brand's extensive model portfolio, paid and organic social media assets, or 3D content for the latest XR experiences, access to high-quality media assets is essential.

The relentless rise of new formats, platforms and customer expectations means generating the volumes of media necessary to meet today's requirements can seem an impossible task. According to Dentsu, 84% of marketers see content generation as a challenge, while 72% of marketers are unable to create enough content to meet demand. A recent poll by ZeroLight also discovered that 78% of respondents found it a challenge to meet their marketing objectives due to a lack of content.

Without easy and efficient access to high-quality digital assets, many carmakers find themselves facing a series of creative, logistical and financial hurdles. Some may have to rely on out-of-date images and videos, while others may only have capacity to re-touch existing assets, further hampering creativity. These increasing demands also risk delayed schedules, with carmakers left with no option but to rely on costly third-party agencies, which themselves are unable to achieve the scale needed.

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In response to this strategic challenge, ZeroLight created Spotlight Suite™, a cloud-based content creation platform that carmakers such as Volkswagen are using to create a wide range of computer-generated content, quickly and easily. Spotlight Suite's powerful APIs can also be used to generate content on demand without human input, empowering brands to effectively personalise their customer journeys at scale.

Since 2019, Volkswagen has used SpotLight Suite™ as the foundation of its own Content Creator, a tool that enables the brand's global teams, agencies, markets and partners to create high-quality localised images, videos, product turntables, digital brochures, and even AR models quickly and easily without the need for specialist hardware, software or training. By making available a cloud-based digital twin of all Volkswagen vehicles across all markets over multiple model years, users can quickly create bespoke content that is guaranteed to be product-correct and aligned with brand guidelines.

Today, ZeroLight believes that SpotLight Suite™ can equip carmakers to produce up to 80% of their CGI content requirements, leaving only specific use cases such as tv commercials requiring photography or alternative CG rendering options. As the omnichannel retail model and the demand for assets continues to grow, these solutions are enabling carmakers to close the digital content gap with easy-to-access, personalised, engaging and high-quality assets.

To schedule a meeting to discuss your content gap and understand how ZeroLight could help, please send a message to ben.gardiner@zerolight.com.

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