What is MarTech?

Martech is the software and tools that marketers use to achieve their objectives, helping them to manage and learn from data, optimise and personalise contacts with customers. 

Martech is the analytics tools, SEO tools, marketing platforms, CRMs, CDPs, DXPs, experience platforms, and more that help you to maximise sales, personalise your marketing communications, and generally improve your customer experience.  

In an increasingly digital world, where customers expect a great experience from the companies they interact with, martech is essential to manage data and customer interactions for businesses of every size. 

Martech market size and growth

• The market landscape now numbers more than 8,000 vendors, a growth rate of more than 5,000% in just under ten years. 
  
  
  
  
• While overall marketing budgets were tightened during the Covid-19 pandemic,  the proportion of spending on marketing technology remains strong, with Martech taking a 26.6% share of marketing budgets according to a Gartner survey of CMOs. 
  
  
  
  
  

Perhaps like for many, the first image conjured upon hearing the word 'martech' is the Marketing Technology Landscape Supergraphic, produced annually by (godfather of Martech and keynote speaker at #MarTechFest 2019) Scott Brinker.

Just look at that beast! Year on year the immense graphic illustrates the ever-growing number of tech platforms and tools available to assist marketers in everything from SEO, email, chat bots, CRM, eComm and more in exhaustive detail.

But with so much attention given to the tech of Martech, you could be forgiven for assuming that’s where it ends, however as digital marketing efforts evolve and digital transformation intensifies, it’s time to look beyond simply which tools make the stack.

What does Scott Brinker say?

According to the godfather of Martech, the term “martech” applies to major initiatives, efforts and tools that harness technology to achieve marketing goals and objectives. 

But, he adds, there is “far more to Martech than simply the technology and software”.

Nowadays, the term increasingly encompasses the profession. These “marketing technologists” among us who started out as either marketers or technologists, who decided to amalgamate their skills to form a powerful hybrid of the two powerful professions.

As digital marketing efforts have grown so has the Martech landscape, as technology is developed to help better connect the dots between each digital solution.

By integrating platforms and data across all phases of the customer journey, Martech allows businesses to create smarter strategies based on what’s working, helps streamline processes, and identifies ways to make your marketing communications as personalised as possible.

In a nutshell, Martech is essential if you want to remain efficient, profitable, and competitive.

Martech strategy

As the old adage goes, “a fool with a tool is still a fool” so before you attack the stack, there are much broader areas to consider…the how, the who and the why - specifically - marketing planning and strategy, people and teams and overall business goals.

It's not just about picking a tool and having a crack, it's about using that tool in such a way that it can help deliver your goals.

When tackling martech, there are four key areas on which to hone your attentions and which - for your convenience - we have simplified into a patented framework complete with alliterated headlines. We call it….wait for it….The Four Ps of Marketing Technology.

👏You’re 👏welcome 👏

Plan: The why

This is a cornerstone of your marketing strategy. Your Martech plan and roadmap wraps around the customer journey, powers your channel marketing, delivers richer insight and accelerates your marketing strategy through to the business goals and customer experience.

People: the who

The skills/training, people, partners and team structure needed to deliver your Martech strategy. Marketing technologists or ops, platform partners, marketing automation managers, digital marketing operations managers, data scientists, growth hackers and more, all the way to emerging and disruptive tech that redefines roles as we know them today.

Platforms: the what

From marketing tool selection, to building and integrating your complete marketing stack. This is the technology powering your marketing functions.

These include advertising and promotion, commerce and sales, content and experience, data, management plus social and relationships. This could be anything from email marketing, search, measurability, multi-channel automation, personalisation, sales enablement and loads more.

Process: the how

This is a two-parter: Firstly, it’s the implementation of, or the process of setting up your  solution(s). Secondly, it’s the operations, or process of how the marketing runs with Martech platforms in place. In both cases, it’s about speed, adaptability, rapid experimentation and optimisation.

Tl;dr

The tech tools, which are often the primary focus of conversations about Martech, yet they are really just the tip of the iceberg.

A well-rounded Martech approach can accelerate and enable your overall strategic business goals, but to do so must be backed by the power of a fully developed marketing technology strategy and roadmap and powered an informed, skilled team with a depth and breadth of experience.

Further reading and useful links

At Martech Alliance, we have lots of useful blog posts, reports, training courses and events to help you understand Martech and imporve your marketing campaigns and business performance. 

• The 4Ps of Marketing Technology. Our guide to the what, why, who, how of Martech / marketing technology. 
• Marketing Stack Management Guide. A step by step guide to marketing stack management.
• Our 2020/2021 UK Marketing Technology Landscape Supergraphic.
• Marketing & Tech Book Club. Learn from the best marketers in the business.
• Martech Stats and Trends. A collection of key data on the industry. 
• The Essentials of Martech. Our training course will improve your understanding of Martech and how you can harness it to grow your business. 
• AntiConLX.