The promise of martech has never been more enticing. From customer relationship management (CRM) systems to advanced analytics and automation tools, martech solutions offer the potential to enhance customer experiences, offer ‘mass personalisation’ and drive customer acquisition and business growth.
However, the Arktic Fox 2024 Digital, Marketing & eComm in Focus study reveals a troubling reality: many marketers are struggling to make full use of the martech tools now at their disposal.
According to the study, many marketers are struggling with data management in general and martech in particular. Billy Loizou, Asia Pacific area vice president at Amperity, isn’t surprised many marketing and marketing-adjacent professionals feel under growing pressure. “Marketers want to take advantage of the available tools, but they are struggling to execute,” he notes. “This is hardly a new situation, but when you add in factors such as the rise of Gen AI, imminent reforms to the Privacy Act, flat marketing budgets, and Google changing its mind on deprecating third-party cookies, it’s not surprising so many CMOs are nervous.”
You’ll need martech’s to hit your KPIs
Marketers’ focus unsurprisingly remains on business growth – 77% of respondents said it was a key strategic priority.
Growth is tied to customer acquisition, which came in second (48%) on the list of priorities.
So far, so unsurprising. But subsequent priorities reveal marketers hope to fatten the bottom line by leveraging technology. The third most common priority (42%) was “Building our customer data strategy and better utilising our first-party data”, and the equal fourth (36%) was “Digital transformation”.
The study also revealed marketers and digital leaders remain focused on achieving goals that are only feasible with martech tools. Personalisation was classified as “important” or “very important” by 72% of respondents, who were also firmly committed to CX management (87%), online sales and lead generation (77%) and martech utilisation (76%).
In other words, if they don’t have the right martech tools and staff who understand how to use those tools, most marketers won’t be able to achieve their business goals.
Man vs machine
There’s a consensus that marketers and digital professionals aren’t making the most of martech solutions, but there’s debate about why that’s the case.
The easy explanation for the underutilisation of martech is the much-discussed skills gap. It’s certainly the case that martech can be challenging to master and often requires a solid understanding of data analytics, customer segmentation and automation workflows.
For marketers who lack a technical background, navigating these complexities can be daunting. Plus, as new tools and platforms emerge, marketers must continually update their skills to stay relevant.
But the problem seems to run deeper than a lack of staff capable of using increasingly sophisticated and powerful technological tools, Loizou argues. The first point he makes is that confusion continues to exist around what different marketing technologies are used for.
“The study showed that CRMs and marketing automation platforms still get most of the attention and investment,” Loizou says. “But those aren’t tools that solve the ‘messy data’ issues that so many businesses still confront. It’s Consumer Data Platforms (CDPs) that do that and provide an enterprise-unified view, which can solve many of the other challenges businesses now face.”
The need for a CDP ties into another issue Loizou argues the study highlighted – CMOs having spent big on tech stacks that have subsequently failed to meet expectations.
The rise of best-of-breed solutions
“To grossly oversimplify, the approach in the past was to buy the equivalent of a turnkey, off-the-shelf, full-stack solution from a big-name tech company,” Loizou says. “Given that 80% of respondents in the 2024 study reported their utilisation of martech was ‘average’, ‘low’ or ‘very low’, that doesn’t seem to have worked out well. The understandable but ill-advised reaction is to devote fewer resources to martech and martech staff training. That’s happening to some extent, with only 12% of respondents reporting they plan to increase their martech budget over the next 12 months.
“But the noteworthy development is the declining popularity of single-vendor solutions. When asked about their plans for future martech investments, 14% said they were leaning towards a single vendor, 29% claimed they were open-minded, and a whopping 57% stated they were leaning towards ‘best-of-breed’ solutions.”
All that noted, Teresa Sperti, the founder and director of Arktic Fox, says organisations usually have plenty of room for improvement regarding training. “When we undertake digital training sessions or partner with clients on strategy, it’s not uncommon for us to explain where the organisation’s data resides and help them connect the dots around their martech ecosystem,” she says. “Brands that have built strong internal capabilities and robust foundations in data and tech are thriving, while others are finding it difficult to shift gears.”
Don’t fall for ‘shiny new toy’ syndrome
“In recent times, we’ve seen around a 1000 new martech ‘solutions’ hit the market every year, and there are now more than 11,000 of them out there,” Loizou notes. “With so many tools available, each touting benefits more remarkable than the last, it can be tempting to fall victim to ‘shiny new toy’ syndrome. But my advice is to prioritise simplicity and integration and focus on what’s most important – delivering the kind of industry-leading CX that will keep your existing customers loyal and attract plenty of new ones.”
Consolidation, co-option and communication
At the launch of her report, Sperti expanded on why she believed there had been a downward trend in martech utilisation in recent years. After reiterating the point that less than one in five marketers reported that their martech utilisation is currently “strong” or “semi-strong”, Sperti noted, “More than 80% believe that they have average, low or very, very low utilisation. And we are spending a lot of money on this as an industry, so that should create a few alarm bells for people. So why is this occurring?
“There are a few causes. The first is a stack creep issue. I buy a few platforms and then providers’ product roadmaps evolve. As a result, I end up with a whole lot of features and functionality that I already have in another platform or that I simply don’t need.
“And the second cause is more around gaps in skills and capability of team members. ‘martech strategy and implementation’ was identified as the third biggest skill gap across the country within teams for the second year running. So, of course, we have a gap in our ability to effectively utilise the tech.”
Deena Coleman, group general manager, digital & marketing at Accent Group, backed up Sperti’s argument, pointing to the centrality of (well-utilised) martech at her organisation.
“As we’ve been reviewing our strategic business goals and how we’re going to get growth over the years, for us, it’s been looking at: OK, have we got the right technology? And have we got the right data foundations?
“We need to get that data foundation right, get the customer view right, and make sure that it’s really clear across the business and within the brands because we are a complex business… So, bringing on a new customer data platform and getting that at the crux of everything we do, then building everything out around it, is very important for us.”
Coleman had the following advice for those marketers struggling to win over corporate decision-makers. “I always take the approach of, ‘What is keeping executives – or anyone I need to bring along on a journey – up at night?’ Once you hone in on that point, you can get them aligned to what you’re doing from a digital transformation point of view. [You focus on how digital transformation] will help them do things such as hit their EBIT numbers.”
Coleman also recommends keeping it simple. “Remove the tech jargon because sometimes if you overcomplicate it in that space, you lose people along the way. So it’s about education, the alignment with what they’re trying to do, and bringing people along on the journey.”
