59%
Reduction in time to market
8.8min
Average asset build time
40%
Increase in asset output
Company
Vanguard is one of the world’s largest investment management companies, known for pioneering low-cost index funds and client-first principles. Serving individuals, professionals, and institutions, it offers a wide range of products and services, emphasizing long-term value, transparency, and fiduciary responsibility.
Headquarters
Pennsylvania, US
Industry
Investment Management
Size
20,000+
Integrations
Challenges
Before Knak, Vanguard’s marketing operations were fragmented and inefficient:
- No centralized marketing function until 2020, with teams working independently in Unica, Marketo and Salesforce Marketing Cloud
- Cumbersome, manual workflows slowed campaign delivery
- Design process created friction and limited governance
- Co-branded emails for hundreds of retirement plan sponsors required heavy manual updates
- Growing need to integrate AI tools into workflows without losing control
Solution
Knak enabled Vanguard to:
- Centralize creation across marketing teams with a no-code platform
- Automate repetitive processes like co-branding logos and variables across plan sponsors
- Streamline design workflows with padding, modules, and preview features directly in Knak
- Align with Vanguard’s AI strategy - embedding AI across their content supply chain to drive efficiency
- Drive adoption through Knak Academy training and enablement
Results
- Complete transformation of Vanguard’s email creation workflow
- Faster production: recreating past emails in Knak has been quick and straightforward, saving teams valuable time
- Stronger governance: modular asset libraries enforce consistency across teams
- Scalability unlocked: retirement sponsor co-branding can be automated at scale
- Adoption at pace: teams are trained and ready to execute “real production emails” in Knak
Conclusion
With Knak, Vanguard moved from disconnected, tool-specific workflows to a unified marketing creation ecosystem. Now, governance, efficiency, and innovation coexist — empowering teams to scale campaigns, save time, and integrate AI seamlessly into marketing operations.
