What began as a relatively straightforward – although very large – system to manage and distribute Heineken’s brand guidelines and digital assets globally evolved over the last 10 years into a suite of applications that support a broad range of functions for over 20,000 users in Heineken.

Having met the original brief our objectives were expanded to include improving collaboration and communication. The platform allowed Heineken to quickly prototype and test communities to see if there was traction, and to adapt accordingly. Shortly after the success of the first collaborative community, “Enjoy Heineken Responsibly”, a more sophisticated Innovators Community was launched.

The Innovators Community brought together Heineken’s global network of innovators in an environment that fosters idea-sharing. People can spark debate, leave messages, ask questions, give feedback, and inspire each other. With the success of these early communities, it didn’t take long before other communities of interest appeared.

At the same time Heineken had been struggling to develop a global university using standard Learning Management Systems. Besides hosting the eLearning and managing the events, Heineken wanted the university to provide a social learning environment where employees could network, learn and collaborate. We were quickly able to build the branded social learning environment Heineken were looking for, subsequently adding gamification and other design ‘nudges’ to encourage adoption.

Each major enhancement follows the same pattern of: existing systems, data, content audit and usage analysis where appropriate; stakeholder research, user research, stakeholder workshops, sketching, prototyping, design and build. Importantly, however, the launch of the new features really signifies the start of the project rather than the end. Once launched, usage is analysed using engagement analytics.

while user surveys and user experience testing ensure maximum adoption and usage. SMLWRLD proactively present the results of this analysis every six months. In short, we provide best advice to the client as to how to ensure the ongoing success of the platform.