The Top Emerging Martech Roles of 2023

"Martech roles", I hear you ask. "What martech roles? Our martech is looked after by that one very stressed, very frazzled marketer by the coffee machine. She's having a fine time." Oh no. We're going to have to do better than that.

Sitting Season 3 GIF by The Simpsons

With martech usage and dependence growing year after year, ownership of tools and platforms is more important than ever. Who's buying your tech? Who's looking after your tech? Who's researching your tech? Who's tucking your tech into bed at night? 

All these questions answered, and more, in this article. Let's jump in. 

Marketing Operations and CRM/ MAP admins 

Now, you've definitely heard of this one. 

Operations Orchestrator— a marketing technology and operations leader

The 'modern era' of marketing operations began in 2005, when IDG first defined the term. Basically, the huge growth in marketing software meant professionals were needed to select, deploy, and operate all these shiny new toys. 

Some people see marketing operations as the foundation of marketing. Basically, this role allows for direction and communication, as a means of working towards a common and defined business goal. This is done through the use of proven frameworks and data analysis. 

So, MOPs are the glue that holds the business together, combining planning, technology, data and processes into one effective, scalable package. 

Alexandre Pelletier, CEO of Perkuto, says it like this:

“Marketing operations is the art and science around connecting the right technology, having the proper processes, people, and training so that it can all work well cohesively.”

But what are the main responsibilities of marketing operations, according to chiefmartec.com?

  • 91.2% train and support marketing staff on using marketing technology products
  • 91.2% design and manage internal workflows and processes
  • 50% take responsibility for data privacy and compliance reviews
  • 61% perform technical reviews of martech software 
  • 1/4 also do security reviews.
  • 88% are most likely to recommend martech tools
  • 49% approve the tools purchase
  • 54% pay for martech products out of their budget

Marketing Technologists

A marketing technologist is a pretty new role. This position involves combining information technology knowledge (IT), and creative marketing skills. Think left and right brain collaborating at all times. 

The role is all about three words: streamlining, streamlining, streamlining. Having a marketing technologist on your team means that the relationship between IT and marketing is smooth, efficient, and yes - streamlined. That's why we love 'em. 

A marketing technologist is a tech-savvy marketer who uses martech. So, it's not just a case of being creative, or being analytical. It's about being both. Although these individual roles aren't going away, marketing technologists are all about reuniting both of these skills.

So, how does a marketing technologist differentiate themselves from other marketing roles?

Marketing technologists make sure that the strategies they utilise are adjacent to the general business goals. This is all about collaboration. These individuals go beyond their own team, and keep an open dialogue with other tech professionals within the business, especially when it comes to choosing and implementing software vendors. 

They also contribute to the development of business strategies, with their roles extending outside just the marketing space. 

According to chiefmartec.com, there is a trend among marketing technologist roles this year. They have seen a drop in responsibility for performing security reviews - down to a low of 19%. 

"The eternal optimist in me would like to believe this is because they defer that responsibility to an independent IT security team," says Scott Brinker.

"But the dogged realist in me thinks this is still a failure of the martech profession overall."

Marketing technologists, however, have begun to take responsibility for data privacy and compliance reviews - up to a three year high of 41%. This is a vital role - 92% of consumers say companies must be proactive about data protection, with 64% saying they would blame the company, and not the hacker. 

Marketing Analysts, Data Scientists, and Data Engineers

These roles are rarely found at smaller companies, and are part of martech teams within larger enterprises with the resources to dive into the data. 

A marketing analyst is responsible  for keeping an eye on market conditions, in order to assess the potential sales. This becomes a case of helping their company to determine what products are in demand, who will purchase the products, and the price they're willing to pay. 

In order to do this, this professional needs to be able to analyse qualitative data, trends, strategies, and competition. Plus, they need analytical and numerical skills, and are deeply creative with great problem-solving skills. 

Web and Marketing Developers

These professionals are marketers who build sites and apps. Although, with the influx of no-code and low-code product offerings, these individuals don't have to be expert coders or hacking geniuses, like they once were. 

Marketing engineers are an essential part of a marketing team, as they apply technical knowledge to sales and marketing campaigns. They help internal sales and external clients to understand the technical aspects of a product. 

So, in order to do this, they need both technical skills and communication skills. They also need to frequently report to marketing managers, and meet with clients.

On top of this, the role includes the ability to:

  • Provide technical support to sales
  • Develop and introduce new products process
  • Suggest suitable product use to consulting engineers as well as contractors
  • Identify opportunities and execute marketing campaigns to place DA’s products in the market place.
  • Prepare instructional, descriptive and application literature for existing and new products along with competitive products’ periodic reports.
  • Participate to provide long-term pricing policy to maximise profits to maintain customer satisfaction.
  • Collect and maintain competitive information to present complete market evaluation for specific products.
  • Investigate plus develop positions in current and new application areas.
  • Identify opportunities and execute marketing campaigns to place DA’s products in market place.

Martech Architects

This has been a role that has grown slowly. The marketing architect position has not yet gained mainstream adoption. But, as more and more companies develop martech stacks, they'll also need to consider this role as a necessity.

Developing an effective tech stack without the help of a martech architect will be impossible, or result in an ineffective stack.

"Before submitting new MarTech solution requests to a chief marketing technologist, businesses will need to utilise a MarTech architect to evaluate the resulting integration of these solutions across departments to guarantee a smooth transition and data-sharing functionality," says Tim Johnson for Forbes. 

So, what does the position require?  A martech architect needs to be able to own the design, creation, implementation, and maintenance of tactical items. They also need to be supportive of the client's strategy, and take into account both the customer's knowledge and technical maturity, along with their resource constraints. 

This individual has to be data-driven, who is able to apply customer-appropriate data analysis techniques, data governance regimes, and integrate third-party data sources into holistic data systems.

The martech architect also has to be a problem solver. This means being able to design, prototype and debug a larger number of issues that might arise during a project. 

Martech Leaders

The position of martech leader tends to get overlooked when considering martech roles. These individuals oversee entire martech organisations. Basically, they're the executives who define strategy and align marketing technology goals within the overall marketing and business objectives. 

This role sometimes gets added to the C-suite, with chief marketing technology offices being hired to work alongside a chief marketing officer. 

Although, some major brands are even dropping the CMO role for chief digital officers and chief customer officers, which oversee the marketing technological function. Other businesses have chosen to onboard vice presidents or directors of marketing technology and marketing operations who report to the CMO.

Martech leaders and managers serve as a crucial link between marketing and IT. The position needs to be filled with an individual with skills that support liaising with the marketing function of a business, as well as the ability to translate that marketing vision to a technology implementation to deliver on marketing goals. 

So, along with this, marketing leaders must also understand a bunch of traditional marketing disciplines, including:

  • Website optimisation
  • Search engine optimisation 
  • Paid search, social, and media
  • Email marketing 
  • Lead generation
  • Database management

So, a marketing technology manager has to be able to understand, and work towards, the practical applications of marketing. But, they must also understand the technology that is vital to make it happen.