Marketers are turning to the relative security of an integrated or full-stack suite approach as marketing transformation quickens and niche solutions keep flooding the market.
Companies are concentrating on producing more with less in today’s economy. Marketing technology, however, has received the highest reported investment increase this year among all significant marketing resources from CMOs.
Marketers and martech experts can purchase a single product or platform suite. Any martech stack must include customer data, AI, marketing automation, and analytics, and several businesses are currently looking to sell all of these components at once. If firms already own a couple of products from a particular company, they are probably trying to convince the brands of the value of purchasing a third or fourth.
And to be fair, it can occasionally be a wise choice. The difficulty lies in comprehending the complex implications of this choice, the company’s particular situation at the time, and realizing the strategic objectives.
A marketing technology stack, or martech stack, is a collection of digital tools and platforms used to plan, carry out, evaluate, and enhance a company’s marketing initiatives. It’s a crucial component of any marketing team’s toolkit because it can help them develop better content workflows, streamline campaigns, gather and analyze data, and automate various tasks by assisting them in choosing the right technologies and building an effective stack. A martech stack can also develop relationships with users across different digital channels and at various customer journey stages.
But if CMOs take a strategic approach rather than adding a new marketing tool every few months, their budget will go further and produce better results.
The tools or platforms they choose must support the current stack and speak to each logically and integrated. CMOs must ensure that the martech stack creates a seamless customer journey, meets the marketing goals, and gains efficiency.
Building a martech stack
Always remember that the foundation of a successful stack comprises tools for social media, search engine optimization (SEO), content management systems (CMS), analytics software, and marketing automation.
Here are some go-to methods for choosing one:
The best way to create a marketing tech stack
Building a martech stack will take some trial and error, but it’s useful to keep in mind these straightforward steps:
- Establish the marketing objectives and the business areas where digital tools and platforms could benefit.
- Perform an audit to determine what technologies the organization already employs that can assist in carrying out these tasks.
- Make a list of the needs and requirements to help evaluate the various available technologies.
- Choose and implement the marketing technology solutions while ensuring staff members get trained to make the most of each tool and platform.
There is a good chance that CMOs will run into one of these typical marketing technology challenges as the company expands and the needs and requirements change. Since moving the Martech stack affects the transformation, marketers should think carefully before moving many tools simultaneously.
Stress the role of cross-functional teams and obtain their support and commitment
Even though purchasing a platform and integrating it into the larger company’s systems might be quicker, it is not advisable. Change is difficult, so CMOs need to involve teams early and in the beginning. Ask the brand marketers to review how assets will be rendered on the new platform.
Ensure analytics is aware of all modifications that would result from switching systems. Consider the data, tracking, and tagging changes a new product will bring. CMOs cannot afford to ignore these issues.
Inform the partner teams of the intention to migrate and the anticipated timing as soon as you start having these conversations. Ensure they obtain their agreement to participate, contribute resources, and complete the required work for which they are accountable.
Verify the maturity of the product
Many sizable martech businesses have expanded through acquisitions. These recently acquired products frequently need to be integrated into the larger ecosystem. Verify their plans and request a product roadmap, even if the product is well-known and has a strong reputation.
The team should request a discount and concessions because there is no guarantee. This strategy holds for recently released products as well. Is the system an immediate response to rivals, market changes, or a new feature added to a product? Get specific examples of how it can meet the capacity needs and validate its maturity.
Organizations use products in various ways depending on the business, so verify the actual use cases of the current clients to help ensure it will function properly in the company.
Create a detailed schedule and project plan before making a decision
Marketers frequently hear about remarkable changes that “only took X number of weeks/months,” but those rarely occur outside of a specific context. Don’t believe everything at conferences at face value. Think about the current workload and the problems motivating to change the martech stack.
Marketing teams should provide a detailed breakdown of the effort required and the time needed to implement it based on the size of your team, previous implementation experience, and knowledge or expertise in the new area. If the CMOs are hiring outside assistance, consider their learning curve, access to the company systems, and other minute details that could derail the plan.
A six-month or a year-long implementation depends on all the little details. When multiple capabilities are implemented at once, the problem worsens.
Determine the total cost of implementation, excluding platform costs
The marketing teams need to be ready to migrate one or more tools, estimate the total cost of implementation, and consider any necessary changes to the business. Many offer significant discounts When buying multiple items from a company’s stock. Be cautious not to be persuaded too quickly.
They might even stagger the licensing cost for the time to implement and scale the solution. Deciding on adding up licensing, managed services support, and development costs is simple. The actual migration involves a lot more, however.
Also Read: CMOs playbook for Seamless MarTech Stack Integrations
Using martech in an efficient manner
Timelines are rarely exact, even with a thorough project plan that considers the potential pitfalls from above. Sometimes marketers won’t consider certain problems until the project has started. Normally, marketers begin paying for the tools at contract signature rather than at launch.
If firms have enough money in the budget to pay for the old and the new, the leader will probably keep track of every day they pay twice. Marketers should ensure they’re not adding new shelfware to their company’s books as martech utilization rates are declining. Organizations can implement and adopt martech using the steps above, whether one or more platforms are involved.
Marketing and technology teams may experience major difficulties with a martech stack that is not enterprise-scale and does not integrate with upstream and downstream marketing technologies. Moving data around can be challenging. Moving content and information automatically from one system to another can be difficult.
Marketers are turning to the relative security of an integrated or full-stack suite approach as marketing transformation quickens and niche solutions keep flooding the market. With this strategy, businesses can rely primarily on a single vendor to provide a variety of interconnected capabilities. CMOs can understand the innovation arc they want to be on and see the potential in the new program with the aid of planning and partnerships.
The pandemic demonstrated that businesses must quickly change course to keep up with evolving market conditions. Marketers may have noticed immediately that their outdated technology could not handle the challenge, so it is understandable if they felt compelled to switch platforms immediately.
