Five Technologies Shaping Marketing Today

There are five technologies shaping marketing today:

• AI
• Big Data 
• Business Intelligence (BI)
• Digital Experience platforms
• Digital asset management

How Is AI Shaping Modern Marketing?

There are two ways in which AI affects marketing today:

• Personalisation at scale
• Predictive analytics 

Personalisation at Scale 

The history of marketing was built on vendors offering personalised experiences – you went to the market and forged a relationship with specific sellers. Technology changed that, allowing vendors to broadcast broader, less personal messages. However, toward the second decade of the 21st century, the pendulum swung back to the desire for personalisation; empowered customers wanted more out of companies. 

AI enables firms to personalise customer content and customer experience at scale. Based on previously-submitted information, AI tailors content and what customers see on a site, so they feel that the business really understands their needs. 

Predictive Analytics 

Want to know what a customer will do next? That’s where predictive analytics comes in. Based on information AI has gathered about what the customer has already done online, it can predict what the customer might do next.

For example, if a customer has purchased app development services, the next most likely purchase would be tech support. Suggesting that through a recommendation engine shows that you care about what your customer wants and needs. 

Big Data 

Big Data is one of the most impactful technologies in marketing today. Thanks to Big Data, marketers have more information than ever at their disposal. They can weave it into their marketing content to help customers make better decisions. 

However, information is only useful if you’re using it properly. That’s where data storytelling comes into play. Data storytelling is a way of using information that makes people care about the numbers. Moreover, it’s the last step in data analysis; if you don’t use data storytelling when you’re analysing information, you’re missing out on why what you’re looking at is important.

BI

Business intelligence matters to the modern marketing department in two ways: 

• For internal decision making 
• To help customers make decisions

Internal Decision Making 

As a marketer, you have a number of vital decisions to make. What messaging resonates the most with your audience? Where should you be devoting your greatest resources?

BI helps you answer those questions. It relies on the most accurate, up-to-date information available so that you can trust the information you’re using. 

As a marketer, you have vital decisions to make; BI helps you make the right choices.

The right BI tool allows you to model the same information in different ways. It also lets you share data securely with those who need it most, so that there’s no waiting for information to travel through your firm. 

Help Customers Make Decisions 

BI can also guide customer decision making. You can pull information from your BI solution and incorporate it into marketing content. BI tools also enable you to create data visualisations.

Data visualisations are a way to tell a story with information through images. As the human brain is hardwired for images, data visualisations can be a very effective technique to convince someone. Think about your own experiences. What’s more compelling, looking at a bunch of text, or seeing a bar graph with different colours? 

Digital Experience Platforms

Gartner defines digital experience platforms as ‘an integrated set of core technologies that support the composition, management, delivery, and optimisation of contextualised digital experiences.’ Vendors use a variety of definitions for their offerings, though, which creates confusion for customers. The best way to think of digital experience platforms is that they’re a way to create consistent digital experiences for customers across all the touchpoints they use.

What does that mean? If your customer uses your app, it doesn’t look and feel different than your website. If they start a chat with you on your website, another digital property will remember their details when the customer next logs in. 

Digital experience platforms offer your customers a consistent digital experience across every touchpoint.

One of the benefits of digital experience platforms is that they’re not just for the IT department. Line-of-business team members, as well as IT personnel, can use them. Digital experience platforms also allow you to quickly make adjustments to existing content if analytics tell you something isn’t performing well. 

Digital Asset Management

Another martech innovation that has shaped the modern marketing department is the advent of digital asset management (DAM) tools. This technology puts all of your digital assets, including images, videos, artwork, and text, into one place so you can easily find it. 

DAM saves the modern marketing department time and money. Let’s say that Jane in Marketing wants to use a particular image in an ebook, but she can’t access it because it’s stored in some repository, and she’s not authorised for it. She finds another version of the image and downloads that, but it’s a waste of time and money because it duplicates work.

A DAM solution would enable Jane to utilise the image she wants without having to download it again. DAM tools support rights management as well, so you don’t have to worry that you’re using an image in the wrong context, or that it violates a usage agreement. Moreover, you can edit, download, and delete files in one place; you don’t need several different solutions.

Enlighten Designs: Helping Shape Your Martech Strategy

Since 1998, Enlighten Designs has been helping its customers create amazing digital experiences. Today, martech allows companies to cultivate those experiences. Our experience as a Microsoft and Sitecore partner has given us a robust knowledge of martech. To learn how martech can play a positive role in the modern marketing department, contact us.