Stack Optimization: Marketing Technology Through the Lens of Hulkamania

Today’s CMOs are forced to make hundreds of decisions on a daily basis and across a broad spectrum of categories and concerns. Their schedules are cluttered with meetings and obligations, and their responsibilities place incredible demands on their minds and bodies. The ones that are successful can navigate complex political arenas while delivering bottom-line results. One of the ways that this is possible is by leaning on data to make informed decisions, and—in the case of CMOs—it’s the insights made available to them by having an optimized marketing technology stack.

Marketing Technology Through the Lens of Hulkamania

Earlier this year, I traveled to Atlantic City for a computer security conference. Ahead of the conference, I visited the Hard Rock Hotel Casino website to see if I could get a deal on a room. I ultimate chose a different property. The day before the conference, I checked into my room, handing the attendant my credit card to cover the bill for my stay and any incidentals. I zipped up to my room, connected to the WiFi, and spent a few minutes catching up on some work. Within the hour, I’d received an email from the Hard Rock inviting me to Legends of the Ring, a fireside chat featuring wrestling superstars Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair happening that very night at their property.

While only a casual wrestling fan as a child—at most—I am a product of the 80’s and spent plenty of weekend afternoons watching wrestling matches, when my mother didn’t have bowling on. I couldn’t pass on the opportunity to hear their life stories in a small setting, so I clicked that big RSVP button in the email, and two hours later I was up close and personal with these wrestling legends.

More interesting to my inner-geek, though, was grappling with how marketing technology supports these types of campaigns and then enables teams to market, manage, and measure them.

Marketing Technology Stack Blueprint

Before we run wild ripping our shirts off and flexing our marketing technology muscles, let’s define what we mean by the “marketing technology stack.” Essentially, it’s the combination of, and interrelationships between, software systems used to perform marketing-related functions. These include, but are not limited to the following systems: Content Management, Content Syndication, Public Relations, Search & Social Advertising, Email Marketing, Marketing Automation, Events & Webinars, Analytics & Dashboards, and more.

Together, these systems comprise the (technological) toolkit of the modern marketer, and they are deployed to build brand awareness, to engage key stakeholders, to drive conversions, and to measure performance across every representational touchpoint. The marketplace for these technologies has exploded in recent years, as visualized by Chief Martec, leading our team to conclude that:

• Having a lay of the marketing technology landscape is a full-time job in and of itself;
• Being able to hire full-time specialists to expertly manage your systems in-house is a luxury; and
• Knowing how to select the right technology and use it correctly to yield the desired results is a rarity

In an effort to simplify the proliferating landscape, we've created a blueprint of the marketing technology stack geared towards the needs of B2B, professional services organizations. This visual guide can help marketing teams orient themselves, organize their current systems, make internal and external hiring decisions, and be more prudent about how to select systems that can improve business outcomes.

Optimizing the Marketing Technology Stack

To be clear, the blueprint is not definitive nor is it static: it is meant to be a foundation upon which to build, and it should be customized and extended or contracted based on factors like organizational size, complexity, resources, and priorities. For example, a mid-size, regional consulting firm probably has a different structure, focus, and budget than a global asset management firm with offices in three continents serving institutional and private investors.

What’s important is to set a proper orientation, using a blueprint—ours or your own—to visualize your current stack, and then choose technology systems that are right-sized for your current needs. It’s also critical to look ahead, aspirationally, to where you’d like your organization to go. This could mean replacing current systems with more robust ones; hiring specialists (over generalists) to manage specific functions (e.g., CRM, SEO/SEM, Demand Generation); or even downsizing to focus on maximizing results with select initiatives.  

Once you’ve oriented, it’s time to optimize. From the perspective of RubyApps, the greater the degree of interconnectivity between systems, the richer the insights yielded and the greater potential marketers have to harness those insights to achieve a competitive advantage. In some cases, particularly with larger organizations, this is about integrating systems. For example, if a firm engages heavily in content marketing, having a connection between your Content Management System (CMS) and Customer Relationship Management System (CRM) can enable it to display content on the web (stored in the CMS) that resonates with specific customer segments (stored in the CRM). This can lead to deeper, more personal interactions with prospects and clients, building brand affinity and driving sales conversions.

For smaller organizations, integrating systems isn’t always possible or feasible, which is why the approach to optimizing is all about bundling. Whereas larger organizations typically invest in best-in-class systems managed by specialists, small and mid-size enterprises need to look for value and utility, as they have fewer human resources to oversee multiple systems. “Bundling” takes a page, or a pocket, out of the Swiss Army Knife playbook—choose systems that have multiple tools built-in. While not all of the tools will be best-in-class, one usually is (within its category) and the others are good enough to get the job done. Plus, bundled software can often provide insights and reporting to measure the effectiveness of how its tools are performing.

RubyApps, with a best-in-class CMS at its core and high-performance modular extensions for Document Generation, Experience Management, Analytics & Dashboards, and Social Publishing, is one example of bundled software. HubSpot, with its CRM, Marketing Automation, Email Marketing, and Sales platforms is another.

Stepping into the Ring: Marketing Technology in Action

To illustrate marketing technology at work, let’s reexamine my experience with Legends of the Ring. While we can’t be certain which systems were integrated, which may have been bundled, or which were even used, we can be sure that the Hard Rock has optimized its marketing technology.

First, on checking in and using my various digital devices, I provided several digital footprints that, one of which likely triggered a notification alerting a system with my demographics and spending profile that I was in town. This was potentially cross-referenced with the Hard Rock’s loyalty system, which may be standalone or reside in the CRM. I logged into the WiFi and visited the Hard Rock’s website, powered by their CMS, which displayed current events and advertisements for the Atlantic City location.

Any of these interactions could have been sufficient for the Hard Rock’s email marketing system to send an automated email to me with an invitation for the Legends of the Ring event. I clicked the call-to-action (CTA) in the invitation to RSVP, which was captured by the event management software. This would have likely put me on a segmented list in the event management software, linking back to my profile in the CRM—so that the Hard Rock would know that I am interested in these type of events, and that it could market similar opportunities to me in the future. These could take the shape of personalized emails, retargeting or display advertising on social networks, or any of a number of options.

Alternatively, we can examine this from the perspective of the customer journey—albeit, in this case, a condensed and somewhat transactional one.

• Awareness: On arriving and triggering several systems, the Hard Rock served up content to make me aware of an opportunity that, given my profile and interests, would resonate with me.
• Consideration: Embedded within the invitation is the description of the opportunity, providing me with information to consider whether or not to attend.
• Decision: Given this example, the Decision-stage content is co-mingled with the Consideration-stage content; but, the CTA provides the opportunity to convert me into an event attendee.
• Retention: From here forward, the Hard Rock has gleaned insights into my behavior, and can nurture and further cultivate our relationship in the future.

While the sales cycle is typically longer, more complex, and less transactional within the professional services domain, the core concepts are interchangeable—deploying content and offers that resonate with key stakeholders at the right time will result in higher conversion rates and potentially longer-term relationships. An optimized marketing technology stack, in coordination with the right strategy and sound execution, makes it possible to market, manage, and measure effectively—and when it works, you can sit back and give your best impression of Ric Flair’s, “Woo!”

RubyApps is a collaboration software platform that helps marketers manage, share, distribute, and protect mission-critical business content. To learn more, visit RubyApps.com and click this link to download your copy of the marketing technology stack blueprint.

If you’d like to view our webinar on this topic, click here.