Abstract
- Martech proficiency. Expertise unlocks potential. The true potential of martech tools is unlocked through deep understanding and specialized skills, not just having them.
- Data has two roles. Marketing combines art and science. Data bridges the art and science of marketing, revolutionizing strategy by combining creativity and analytics.
- Strategic simplicity. We value efficiency. Marketing efficiency comes from focusing on core needs and mastering them, rather than accumulating more tools.
Many marketing teams struggle to deliver on the promise of martech solutions. Sometimes it's because we ask too much of a tool without fully understanding its capabilities or putting our expertise and talent into it. Tools can only do so much. Anyone can get behind the wheel of a Formula I race car, but only experienced drivers and teams can get the best performance out of it.
Lackluster performance in martech can also be caused by a combination of intimidation and inclination. His current Generation X marketer may have chosen marketing in college because there is no math or science involved. They were intrigued by branding, influence, recognition, and personas – concepts in the art and psychology of building relationships and driving intentions and actions. Numbers and metrics were outside of our wheelhouse.
But the martech big bang of 2010-2011 changed everything, forcing marketers to adapt to a new world of data, analytics, metrics, and (gasp!) math. Suddenly, art and science became the same, and the people who embraced measurement and optimization were from math/science backgrounds or other technical fields such as IT, engineering, and product development.
Problems with today's martech solutions
The problem is that today, art-minded people of my generation are in charge. They are the senior leader and her CMO who decide what tools to invest in and how. They are untrained and have little interest in math and measurement, so vendors rip it off and promise it to the world. Too many decision-makers cannot separate the wheat from the chaff. Martech and analytics currently consume nearly 30% of marketing budgets and are expected to continue to grow, ultimately resulting in bloated and complex technology stacks and tool chains that still lack meaningful measurement. We can't provide the value that we can.
Related article: How effectively are marketers using martech tools?
Martech solutions by engineers
It’s time for marketers to take lessons from engineers and build a clean martech stack that creates efficiency through structure. Here's how:
1. Learn to be methodical
Most senior marketers are accustomed to working in real time and making reactive contingency decisions in response to changing consumer sentiment and demands. The idea of slowing down and leveraging historical data and automation to predict, strategize, and execute is foreign. Without data to guide you, it's all about intuition, but what you need now is consistency, procedure, and slowing down. These tools are fast when it comes to data ingestion and analysis, but when it comes to strategy, it's the tortoise, not the hare, that wins the race.
Related article: Trends that will shape your martech strategy in 2023
2. Accept measurements
To optimize something, you must first establish a baseline or benchmark, and then experiment to see how different variables improve the results. Marketing leaders often feel uncomfortable with her KPI measurements. Instead, we rely on simpler, more readily available metrics, such as email opens and web page visits, that can help us understand how our work contributes to sales and revenue. It doesn't actually prove whether or not you're there, which is a key business metric.
Today's marketers embed instrumentation (measuring devices in engineering parlance) into everything: sensors, tracking pixels, and other digital devices that send signals back to their tools and tell them how well things are working. is needed. There are too many limitations to rely on intuition and intuition.
Related article: Strategic handbook for integrating martech and digital operations
3. Prioritize data health
An old adage about IT that you've probably heard is: “Garbage in, garbage out.” In marketing, dirty data leads to bad results. To make decisions with confidence, marketers must prioritize good data hygiene, data governance, and accurate and reliable measurement. This is another reason why it's important to slow down and be methodical. Building grand campaigns based on inaccurate data is a huge waste of time and money. Before we talk about creative, let's start with hard data.
Related article: Have martech and marketing become synonymous?
4. Keep it simple
One of the biggest pitfalls marketing leaders fall into is the shiny bauble syndrome. Every vendor makes promises to the world, and marketers need to improve performance, so they often overpurchase without considering total cost of ownership. First, decide how much of a differentiator you need versus your current approach and competitors. Do you need something “good enough” or unparalleled excellence? Their prices vary widely, but you don't have to use every feature from the beginning. Choose some core needs, find a suitable solution, and master it in relation to all of the above (methodology, measurement, data hygiene).
Related article: The definitive checklist for reducing marketing technology sprawl
5. Think long term
You want to start simple, but you also want to base your purchasing decisions on long-term needs. Is this a core competency that you will rely on for years to come? Or is the core competency something else and should be outsourced to a partner? Ask, “What will it do for me in a year?” two? Or even three? Will they have the ability to scale, for example to support international outreach and co-branding? Platforms and vendors also need to be forward-thinking, because the cost of replacing them after two years is ludicrously high. You have to choose what you have.
Related article: How to simplify your MarTech stack
6. Acquire specialized skills
As many marketing teams have discovered, tools don't work automatically (or at least not well). And don't think that hiring young people will solve the problem. University programs are just beginning to teach martech solutions and tools, emphasizing measurement and analytics in their curriculum. Some platforms have developed their own in-house learning academies, and consultancies have emerged to teach the basics.
Find someone with this training, send your own people to this training, or hire people outside of the traditional marketing industry, such as business analysts, data scientists, business intelligence, or even database administrators. Please consider.
Related article: Solutions for your Martech stack: Tips for staying organized
final thoughts
As business technology needs expand, IT departments everywhere are feeling overwhelmed and underfunded. It's no surprise, then, that marketers want to move martech solutions into their own space and increase their agility and speed so they don't have to wait for IT to catch up.
But without an analysis, science, and engineering-based strategy for sourcing and leveraging martech solutions and tools, even the best platform will struggle to deliver results.
Marketing has always been rooted in the art of creativity and persuasion, and while no marketing solution or tool can replace this, marketing leaders need to be more systematic and data-driven to master the blend of art and science of modern marketing. You should adopt an approach based on
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