Introduction

The marketing technology landscape is changing faster than ever before. Marketers are faced with the challenge of selecting solutions that are not only on-demand, but also fit their business and can scale as they grow. The list of things to consider when evaluating marketing technology can be overwhelming. So where do you start? It all starts with asking the right questions! In this post, we’ll share five key questions that will help your team evaluate marketing technology solutions more effectively:

How will this marketing technology improve my marketer’s life?

When selecting a marketing technology, it’s important to ask yourself: will this improve my marketer’s life or not? If the answer is yes, then you’ve found a good tool for your team. If the answer is no, then you need to dig deeper and find out why.

For instance, if we’re talking about email marketing software, one of my favorite features is that I get alerted when people open my emails—and even better (for me) if they click through from an embedded link! This allows me to better gauge how well-received our campaigns are by our audience. It also gives us more data on which types of messages resonate best with our users so we can optimize future campaigns accordingly.

What are my goals and how will I measure success?

Before you can make an informed decision, you need to know what your goals are. This is because the technology that will best meet your needs is different depending on your objectives. For example, if one of your top priorities is increasing sales, then a marketing automation platform may be a better fit than an email service provider (ESP).

On the other hand, if you want to improve the quality of leads and their engagement with the brand over time through nurturing campaigns (i.e., drip campaigns), then an ESP would be more suitable because it provides more capabilities for segmenting contacts into groups based on behavior and preferences (which also makes it easier for marketers to send relevant messages).

The bottom line is that knowing how you plan on measuring success plays an important part in determining which marketing technology will work best for you so make sure this question gets answered early in the process!

What is the impact to our security, privacy and data governance?

You are not only responsible for ensuring that your marketing technology suite is working as it should, but also for making sure it doesn’t get hacked. Cybersecurity is a top concern in the digital age and companies need to be aware of how their systems will be affected by new technologies.

Security and privacy policies should always be at the forefront of any organization’s considerations when selecting a platform or software solution, as they impact not just your company’s brand image but also its bottom line. The very nature of marketing automation means you will use personal data from prospects and customers on an ongoing basis – this data must be collected and stored securely so that it does not fall into the wrong hands.

What are the total costs of ownership (TCO) of the marketing technology solution?

While a marketing technology solution can be an excellent way to boost your company’s sales and grow your business, it’s important to consider the total cost of ownership (TCO). TCO is the total cost of a product over its lifetime. It includes the initial purchase price, plus any additional costs associated with the product’s maintenance and support, upgrades—even if you don’t currently have them in place—and so on.

The longer you keep something running, the higher your TCO will be. If you plan on keeping a particular marketing technology solution for more than five years, it may make sense to invest in something that offers lower up-front costs with higher ongoing support fees. On the other hand, if this campaign will last only one year or less before being replaced by something else entirely new and shiny, then investing in something expensive could end up biting into profits rather than boosting them.

Are there any gaps in capabilities?

If you find there are gaps in capability, this could be a sign of poor project management, poor communication between departments or a lack of planning. It could also mean that your budget is too small to get everything done right away. If it’s the latter, you should consider how much money you want to spend on marketing technology before getting started and make sure everyone involved understands what they’re working towards.

An example of this would be looking at an analytics tool but not getting access to any data until after the implementation phase has been completed—that way if there are bugs with the implementation itself (which happens!), then it doesn’t affect your ability to measure ROI or other key metrics for your business.

Selecting Marketing Technology requires more than a checklist of features.

Selecting Marketing Technology requires more than a checklist of features.

When selecting marketing technology, you need to ask yourself:

• How will this help my business? Will it make me money or save me money?
• What is the cost of selecting the wrong marketing technology? Can I afford to lose customers if I select the wrong marketing technology, or will it be difficult for me to recover from that loss and get my business back on track?

Conclusion

When selecting marketing technology, it is important to ensure that you are thinking strategically about how each tool will impact your marketing and business goals. A good rule of thumb is to make sure that your selected tools provide the capabilities you need and align with the company’s mission.