By Julie Zander, Marketing Operations at Numeric Analytics
“The IDC predicts that by 2020, marketing organizations will be radically reshaped. The core fabric of marketing execution will be ripped up and rewoven by data and marketing technology.” Additionally, Forrester highlights that “IT is losing its control over business intelligence platforms, tools, and applications often due to ITs inability to operate at the increased pace of the business.”
As digital marketing gains an increasing percentage of the total business marketing spend, the task to keep up with the rapid and constant changes of technology can be overwhelming – for both IT and Marketing. As the technology evolves and marketing spans across numerous devices such as smart phones, tablets, laptops, television, video, social media, SEO and email, do you have the right tools, talent and partnerships in place to keep up with the expanding engagement needs?
Without strong cooperation, Marketing and IT run the risk of working in silos. Marketing doesn’t get what it needs, and IT doesn’t understand Marketing’s goals well enough to help choose the right tools and the right time. Partnership to understand the business need and match the right tools is critical to success.
In some instances, organizations may end up working with existing enterprise applications that are ill-equipped to handle the increasing demands of the digital space. In other cases, businesses try to play catch-up and run the risk of entering a “train-install-launch” mode – continually chasing after the next “big thing” which prevents them from realizing the full benefit of their current solutions. The pace of technology creates the need for companies to be even more agile, innovative and collaborative than ever before.
When IT has a firm understanding of the real-time needs of marketing, and Marketing has an awareness of application capabilities, and both groups gain insight from their customers, organizations are bridging the gap and are able to create an alignment around platforms and technology and creating a customer-driven strategy that everyone has a stake in.
A recent IBM C-Suite Study stated that companies whose CMOs effectively partner with their CIOs outperform their competitors. Whether you’re a large organization with C-Level leaders, or a smaller business with a simple marketing and IT department, the same rules apply. Those organizations who have a clearly defined set of identified needs and goals, and who work as an integrated team with the full and collaborative support of Marketing and IT will be in the best position to capitalize on and realize the full potential of digital marketing.
