Adobe 2013 Annual Report Download - page 5

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Adobe’s Digital Media segment also includes our Document Services business, built around our Acrobat family of products,
the Adobe Reader and a set of integrated cloud-based document services. For over two decades Adobe Acrobat has provided for
the reliable creation and exchange of electronic documents, regardless of platform or application source type. Users can collaborate
on documents with electronic comments and tailor the security of a file in order to distribute reliable Adobe PDF documents that
can be viewed, printed or filled out utilizing our free Adobe Reader. Acrobat provides essential electronic document capabilities
and services to help knowledge workers accomplish a wide range of tasks ranging from simple publications and forms to mission-
critical engineering and architectural plans. With our Acrobat XI product and its innovative cloud services, we have extended the
capabilities of our solution. Users can take advantage of electronic document signing with Adobe EchoSign, complete form
management with Adobe FormsCentral, and utilize other features such as Adobe CreatePDF, ExportPDF and Acrobat.com.
Digital Media Strategy
Our goal is to be the leading provider of tools and services that allow individuals, small businesses and enterprises to create,
publish, promote and monetize their content anywhere.
We believe our Creative Cloud offering, marketed as a subscription model with attractive monthly pricing, will be a catalyst
for revenue growth in the coming years. We also believe the monthly subscription pricing model will be attractive to users of older
versions of our products who desire to use our latest releases and services, but who have not been willing to upgrade to newer
versions due to price sensitivity. Similarly, we anticipate we can drive new user adoption of our creative tools business over the
next several years outside of our core creative professional targeted market because of the attractive monthly subscription pricing
combined with the strong brand of our creative tools and the broad value proposition provided by Creative Cloud. We anticipate
that our shift to a subscription model will increase the amount of our recurring revenue that is ratably reported, driven by broader
Creative Cloud adoption over the next several years.
To accelerate the adoption of Creative Cloud, we have focused on migrating existing users of our creative products from
perpetual licenses to the subscription offering, as well as driving new customer adoption. Aspects of this strategy include: focusing
future innovation by our engineering teams on delivering new and incremental functionality only through our newest Creative
Cloud based products; increasing the value of Creative Cloud by delivering frequent product updates and enhancements to
subscribers to address their content creation challenges; using promotions to attract customers to the offering; expanding our go-
to-market reach through channel partners to reach new customers particularly in the small and medium business space; and utilizing
Creative Cloud for teams and Creative Cloud for enterprise offerings to drive broad adoption with customers who license our
products in volume.
As part of our Creative Cloud strategy, we plan to utilize our digital marketing solutions to drive customer awareness of
our creative products and improve conversion on our website and across other channels. We believe Adobe.com will increasingly
be the destination site where we engage individual and small business customers to sign up for and renew Creative Cloud
subscriptions. We utilize channel partners such as corporate resellers to target mid-size creative customers with our Creative Cloud
for teams offering. Our direct sales force is focused on building relationships with our largest customers and driving adoption of
our Creative Cloud for enterprise offering.
In our Document Services business, although Acrobat has achieved strong market adoption in document-intensive industries
such as government, financial services, pharmaceutical, legal, aerospace, insurance and technical publishing, we believe there are
tens of millions of users who still need the capabilities provided by Acrobat. We plan to continue to market the benefits of our
Document Services solutions to small-and medium-sized businesses, large enterprises and government institutions around the
world and increase our seat penetration in these markets through the utilization of our corporate and volume licensing programs.
We also intend to increase our focus on marketing and licensing Acrobat in targeted vertical markets such as education, financial
services, telecommunications and government, as well as expanding into emerging markets, while simultaneously enhancing and
building out the delivery of cloud-based document services to our Acrobat and Adobe Reader users. We intend to continue to
promote the capabilities of our cloud-based EchoSign solution to millions of Acrobat users and hundreds of millions of Adobe
Reader users. EchoSign provides a green alternative to costly paper-based solutions, and is an easier way for customers to manage
their contract workflows. We believe that by growing the awareness of Adobe EchoSign in the broader contract delivery and
signing market, we can help our customers migrate away from paper-based express mailing and adopt our solution, growing our
revenue with this business in the process.
Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing Opportunity
Consumers today increasingly demand personalized content and experiences in their online interactions, across multiple
channels and devices. As a result, businesses or any entity with an online presence must figure out how to best attract, engage,
acquire and retain customers in a world where the reach and quality of experiences directly impacts success. Delivering the best
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