“Marketing infrastructure.” Not too many years ago, that might have been nominated as an oxymoron, right up there with a deafening silence, sweet sorrow, and jumbo shrimp. But now, that’s where some of the most interesting developments in marketing are happening. Marketing operations is on the rise. Process is “the new black” in data-driven marketing. […]
Conquering the challenges of social media at scale Read More »
There are generally two audiences for my blog: (1) CMOs and marketing executives, who want to understand how technology fits into the bigger marketing picture; and (2) marketing technologists, who know the technology and appreciate a site dedicated to their art. Every now and again, however, I connect with someone who is both a CMO
When a marketing technologist is also the CMO Read More »
In the upper right of Gartner’s latest magic quadrant analysis of web content management (WCM) providers — in the top of the “leaders” quadrant — there are three companies: Adobe, SDL, and Sitecore. If you’re an enterprise marketing department looking for a web platform, odds are you’re talking with one or all of these vendors.
Beyond the technology, the art of customer experience Read More »
Southwest Airlines. Whole Foods. Lego. Dollar Rent-a-Car. Under Armour. These are all great brands. And behind every great brand these days, it’s worth asking — if you’re a marketing technologist — what marketing software are they using? The common denominator across those five — and many more like them — is a cloud-based digital marketing
A vision of marketing orchestration beyond automation Read More »
I first met Brian Kardon a couple of years ago, when he was the CMO of Eloqua. He was one of the early advocates for this blog, and he provided a lot of encouragement on the emergence of this new breed of “marketing technologists” that they were seeing appear among many of their customers. When
Haves vs. have-nots in marketing/sales alignment Read More »
I’ve come to believe that organizational culture is the quintessential competitive advantage. That’s why, for all the tremendous changes underway in the world of marketing today, I’m most fascinated by the evolution of culture in marketing departments, as a function of new responsibilities, new technologies, and — most of all — new people with new
Build and nurture an analytical culture across marketing Read More »
Marketing technology management can look straightforward on paper, when analysts and pundit-bloggers such as myself draw simplified diagrams of new organizational structures with a few quick brushstrokes. But the real work of implementing these organizational changes for “the new marketing” — and the cultural shifts entangled in that mission — especially at a major Fortune
Balancing marketing technology and IT at a Fortune 500 firm Read More »
There are few companies that are witness to The Great Digital Transformation of the world at the scale of IBM. And as that transformation overtakes the marketing department — an epic collision of cultures like no other in the history of business — I envy the court-side seats they have seeing this play out across
CMOs must become systems thinkers and culture champions Read More »
While the marketing technology landscape is vibrant and crowded with innovators of all kinds, there are only a handful of companies that can legitimately take credit for having — near single-handedly — changed the very way marketers think and talk about marketing. HubSpot, the people who invented “inbound marketing,” is one of them. So it
Moving marketing beyond the arts and crafts department (interview) Read More »
If you were to take a poll of the hot topics in marketing these days, “social media” and “big data” would both be top contenders. So when the folks at Viralheat, a provider of social media marketing software (covered in TechCrunch earlier this year), invited me to interview their Director of Business Intelligence, Erin Robbins
BI and marketing should be peanut butter and jelly (interview) Read More »
