marketers are replacing foundational Martech //

Tony Byrne, founder and CEO of Real Story Group, , stated that “Enterprises are in a kind of a substitution mood.”

Organizations had to adapt their engagement technology in response to changes in customer behavior and the pandemic. This is what our MarTech Replacement Survey revealed.

Marketers are now looking at the bottom layer of their stack and replacing foundational technology that powers other layers.

The foundational layer

Byrne stated that “more and more companies are investing in what’s called ‘enterprise Foundation’ services.” These systems are not channel-specific. These systems live below your engagement platforms and help deliver an omnichannel experience.

Companies place tools that enable them to engage customers through specific channels in the engagement layer.

Customers made changes during the pandemic by using digital channels more often and taking new routes. A customer may have ordered household goods online instead of buying them at the supermarket. They might have started to research online more to help them make informed purchase decisions.

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Marketers had to make more fundamental changes to their marketing stacks in order keep customers engaged in the face of all these unexpected changes.

CDP Replacements

This foundational layer contains data, decisioning, and content functions that will power all your marketing.

MarTech Replacement Survey revealed that customer data platforms (CDPs), while less frequently replaced than other technologies like CRMs, were more popular. This is because CDPs are a younger technology. Because CDPs are part of the foundational layer, organizations are taking aggressive steps to replace the new technology.

Byrne stated that “I believe companies are more likely to pull the trigger when something is wrong.”

CDPs are the place where data is kept in unified profiles per customer. This data can be used to drive engagement through specific channels that are managed by technology higher up in the stack. This is why CDPs are so important and why replacing them can be difficult.

Don’t put data management in the wrong place

Foundational technology such as CDPs and other tools for data management are not being replaced. This is because the data in these organizations is being managed using tools higher up on the stack.

Byrne stated that email platforms and marketing automation all claim to be able to manage marketing data. However, they are not the right place to do so. We could also say the same about personalization and other services. B2B marketing automation platforms, which are essentially a’martech platform in a box’, work well for small and medium-sized businesses. For enterprises that have a disaggregated and layered stack, it won’t work.

As you can see, decisioning and data technology should be prioritized as organizations strengthen and replace the foundational layer. These data and analytics capabilities will help to drive engagement with tools in the middle and upper layers.

Why marketers are replacing fundamental martech was first published on MarTech.