eters only use one-third of the stack’s capabilities //

Gartner’s Martech Report 2023 states that marketers are only using one-third of the capabilities of their martech stack. This is down from 58% last year and 42% in 2019.

Statista reports that marketing technology spending has increased by 35% between 2020 and 2023. Gartner reports that organizations spend 25,4% of their budgets on marketing technology.

“Not only is [utilization] low, but it’s declining year over year while people are buying more,” said Domenic Colosante, CEO of 2X, a B2B marketing-as-a-service agency. It’s a huge problem. “When I speak to CMOs they all know, they feel it.”

Gartner cites skills, governance, and stack sprawl and complex as the reasons.

Explore your stack’s past with data analytics

Colosante stated that the shortage of skills is due to the fact that no one — not the vendors or the marketing organizations — are teaching people how they can use the new technologies.

No one is Training

He said that “no one knows how to use the newer platforms like Drift or Bombora.” “You can’t learn this in school, and many of these vendors don’t have any training programs that teach you how to use it.” Some have certification programs but they are not training programs.

According to him, 2X’s research found that for jobs that require skills in marketing activities like email and events, there are 10 people who have those skills. Colosante stated that when it comes to the newer stuff, such as intent data, AI or ABM, there are 10 people with those skills for every job needing them. “Oh, and by the way, those people all have jobs.” They’re using less because they are buying more technology and not training their employees on it.

This is made worse by the complexity and sprawling of the tech stack. The short-term CMOs may be one of the causes for the ever-growing tech stack. CMOs are the C-suite offices with the shortest tenure at 18 months. It can lead to adding technology that the CMO knows, even if a solution is already in place.

Strategic thinking is crippled by CMO turnover

The strategic view of a stack changes constantly, whether or not the CMO is adding tech. Colosante also believes that stack expansion is due to another factor:

Add solutions that have redundant capabilities.

He said: “I see it as if you were sitting on a sofa with three universal remote controls that all control the TV, DVD, internet TV and sound system.” “But this one does only the TV and this one does only the cable,” he said. This is a marketer’s tech stack of today.

Gartner’s report cites that customer data challenges can be a major cause of under-utilization. The first step of collecting customer data, or unifying the data across multiple systems, can pose a significant obstacle in using it for advertising, measurement, and personalization. Gartner recommends reevaluating how you handle customer data and determining if transferring the responsibility of data management onto IT is a viable solution.

How many email solutions are required?

Colosante asked, “Do you really need HubSpot and Salesforce and Outreach in order to send emails?”

This all points to governance. Who is “the voice of the stack?” Who’s responsible for knowing the entire stack, including all its functions and interactions, so that they can present it to those who are considering making changes? CMOs seem like the obvious choice, but aren’t in place long enough to have the necessary technological skills. Do they really need to add another task to their already overflowing plates?

Colosante believes that the chief revenue officer should not be what it is now.

He said that “99.9% are sales heads who are now in charge of marketing.” “They admit that they don’t know much about marketing. A true CRO manages operations and technology across all go-to market engines: sales, marketing, customer experience, and service. This function should be an architecture center, which deals with platforms, and also responsible for who we are targeting, why, how, and in what way.

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