Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming a core driver of business transformation. As organisations accelerate their investment in AI, many are discovering that success depends on more than adopting the latest technology.
Research shared at Salesforce Agentforce World Tour London revealed that 85% of AI projects fail to deliver, while only one in four organisations have successfully embedded AI into their business processes. The challenge isn’t the technology itself. More often, organisations struggle to move beyond isolated pilots because they lack the connected data, governance and operating model needed to scale AI successfully.
These themes were explored during Salesforce’s recent events in London, where Acxiom joined customers, partners and industry leaders to discuss how organisations can move beyond AI experimentation and unlock meaningful business outcomes. One message resonated throughout every conversation: successful AI starts with trusted data.
Why so many AI initiatives fall short
Most organisations aren’t short of AI ideas. In fact, many have identified dozens of potential use cases across marketing, sales, customer service and operations.
The challenge is moving those ideas into production.
During the session Drive Agentic AI Success: Activate Data, Platform + Model, Acxiom and Credera explored what many organisations experience today: AI pilot purgatory. Promising concepts are developed, prototypes are demonstrated, yet very few initiatives deliver lasting business impact because the underlying foundations simply aren’t in place.
Successful AI depends on three essential building blocks:
- Trusted, high-quality customer data
- Connected technology platforms
- An operating model designed to scale AI across the enterprise
When these elements come together, organisations can move beyond experimentation and begin creating intelligent experiences that deliver measurable value.
“The conversation around AI has shifted from what’s possible to what’s practical. Organisations aren’t looking for more AI, they’re looking for AI that delivers measurable business value. That starts with trusted data, connected platforms and a clear operating model. When those foundations are in place, Salesforce Data Cloud and Agentforce become powerful enablers of more intelligent, context-aware customer experiences.”
Lisa Andreou, VP Client Partnerships EMEA, Acxiom
Grounding AI in customer context
Generative AI and autonomous agents are only as effective as the information available to them. Without accurate, connected customer data, even the most advanced AI models risk producing inconsistent, incomplete or irrelevant outcomes.
Grounding AI in customer context means giving AI access to a complete, trusted understanding of each customer. Rather than relying on fragmented records across multiple systems, organisations can connect customer identity, behaviours, preferences and interactions into a unified view that enables AI to make more informed decisions.
This shift from fragmented data to connected customer context is what transforms AI from an interesting capability into a valuable business asset.
The Customer Data Fabric: Turning data into intelligence
At the heart of this approach is a Customer Data Fabric, powered by Salesforce Data Cloud.
By bringing together customer identity, enterprise systems, digital interactions, marketing data and operational information into a unified, real-time foundation, organisations create the context AI needs to operate effectively. Rather than acting on disconnected records, AI agents can access trusted customer information across the business, enabling more personalised engagement, faster decision-making and more consistent customer experiences.
This data-centric approach also creates a foundation for the broader Agentic Layer, where technologies such as Salesforce Agentforce can support customer assistants, operational insights, employee productivity and content creation, all grounded in trusted customer data rather than isolated data points.
For Acxiom, this is where decades of expertise in customer identity, data governance and marketing intelligence come together. By combining these capabilities with Salesforce Data Cloud, Marketing Cloud and Agentforce, we help organisations build AI-ready marketing ecosystems that are connected, scalable and designed to deliver measurable business outcomes.
Think big. Start small. Scale fast.
One of the strongest messages from the session was that organisations don’t need to solve every AI challenge at once.
Instead, they should identify high-value use cases, demonstrate measurable outcomes and build from there. This structured approach allows businesses to prove value quickly while creating the foundations needed to scale AI confidently across the enterprise.
Whether supporting customer service, empowering employees with better insights or delivering more personalised marketing, organisations that prioritise value over volume are far more likely to achieve sustainable AI success.
Partnerships that accelerate innovation
Delivering AI at scale requires expertise that spans strategy, data, technology and execution. That’s why collaboration matters.
Acxiom, Salesforce and Credera bring together complementary capabilities that help organisations move from AI ambition to real-world outcomes. By combining trusted customer data, modern cloud platforms and deep implementation expertise, we help businesses accelerate adoption while reducing complexity and risk.
The conversations at Salesforce’s recent London events reinforced that AI success isn’t driven by technology alone. It comes from bringing together the right partners, the right expertise and the right data foundation.
Turning AI ambition into lasting value
AI doesn’t create value on its own. Data does. More specifically, trusted, connected customer data that gives AI the context it needs to make intelligent decisions.
As organisations continue investing in AI, those that build strong data foundations today will be the ones best positioned to scale tomorrow. By combining Acxiom’s expertise in customer data and identity with Salesforce Data Cloud, Marketing Cloud and Agentforce, we’re helping organisations move beyond experimentation and create AI experiences grounded in trust, context and measurable business value.
