Failed tech eats budget, ruins reputations and can even destroy careers. In a world of chaotic and confusing marketing technology how do you choose the right marketing technology stack?
Customer first
Technology should solve real-life customer problems. Take a people first approach to assessing the mar-tech you’ll need to wow customers. Look to data-driven customer insight and rapid prototype testing of customer experiences. Work with a customer-experience design partner (like Renegade) to ask the right questions.
This means data-led decision making, proper customer research and detailed customer journey mapping to drive out the detail of the real-life customer experience the tech needs to support. Prototype and test solutions with real customer groups and use this insight to make decisions about the technology ecosystem you’ll need to deliver the right customer driven experience.
Know your purpose
Understand what’s really needed to support your organisation. What’s your level of complexity? Are you a large organisation with globally distributed teams or a single brand operating through one centralised team? What are your growth expectations? Will you be launching new products or looking to expand and localise into new markets? What’s the appetite for innovation? Can you commit time and resource to exploring and experimenting with the latest Ai driven personalisation tools, for example?
Questions like these help us understand the tech you’ll need to support your businesses operating models. For example, balancing the stability and scalability of out-of-the-box SaaS (software as a service) features with the flexibility of headless open-code for custom features and bespoke development. There’s no right or wrong answer. It’s a question of what’s most important to you? Do you need the freedom to explore and experiment, or is a plug-n-play hands-off approach more important? As always, work with an experienced technology partner (like Renegade) who can help you understand the best-fit-for-your-purpose.
Understand your teams
It doesn’t matter how fancy the tech is if your teams don’t have the skills, knowledge or experience to properly use it. Understand your organisations internal capabilities is key to a successful technology implementation. For example, is your business geared to feed the demands of content hungry personalisation tech? If it isn’t (and many large global organisations still aren’t) then you will need a plan to evolve your internal process and the skills of your people to catch up with the technology. Otherwise, you can end up wasting budget on tech you can’t properly utilise, or worse the tech can end up demotivating your teams.
The right technology will motivate and empower your teams. Work with a digital transformation partner (like Renegade) to assess your people, process and technology as part of the decision-making process. Be realistic about what your internal capabilities can support today and plan a transformation roadmap to evolve and develop people and process alongside new technology tools.
Ai ready
Your tech strategy needs to energise your business-as-usual today AND support exploration and experimentation with an Ai driven future. Balance scalable, flexible and composable big-ticket infrastructure tools, with fast-moving operational tech subscriptions that allow you to explore, experiment and learn.
Longer-term infrastructure choices can make or break your ability to explore and integrate new tools. While too much focus on the latest smart tech can wreck your ability to transition without disrupting business-as-usual. Work with a strategic consultancy partner (like Renegade) to make good infrastructure choices today and avoid limitations tomorrow.
Prepare for change with a strategic roadmap and a detailed plan for how infrastructure investments will scale in support of experimentation.
Test, test, test & learn!
The pace of tech change is frenetic. Fortunately, many of the latest and most innovative technology tools, particularly in the AI space, allow you to test or trial before you fully commit. Many canny marketers we speak to are building the testing of new tech-tools into existing campaign budgets or in some cases even drawing on campaign underspend to run proof-of-concept trials on new marketing technology tools.
For example, look at customer facing tech like: real-time-data-driven urgency messaging for sales conversion, AI-powered chat for customer support, co-browser enabled sales support; or back-office tools to support your teams in content design and production.
Test what’s useful for teams and effective for customers, as well as what it takes for the business to integrate new approaches into working practices and process. Invest in success & learn even more from failure, rinse and repeat!
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Read about a fit-for-purpose website DXP | CMS technology supporting a global web estate transformation for Enterprise Ireland.
Andy Wood, Strategy Partner
20+ years bringing together business strategy, market insight, and technology to deliver business transformation, customer experience innovation and operational efficiency.
I can help you:
• Deliver next-generation digital experiences for customers
• Align enterprise technologies with operational & strategic goals
• Understand AI across business operations & customer experience
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