Marketing Management

With a headline like that, who can doubt that I’ve got marketing in my DNA? Seriously though, as you can see from the at-a-glance editorial agenda above — which doesn’t even include the couple dozen additional vendor-led sessions we’ll also have in our Solutions Tracks and on our MarTech Theater stage — this next MarTech Conference, April 15-17 in San Jose, is going to be jam-packed with deep educational content on marketing technology and marketing …

Only 3 days left for the best price on awe-inspiring, mind-expanding, career-accelerating MarTech tickets Continue Reading »

I spend a lot of time debating dichotomies with myself: The classic: is martech consolidating or expanding? Should you centralize or decentralize marketing, automate or humanize it? Should you practice agile or waterfall approaches to martech product adoption? Should you buy more martech tools or better use the ones you have? The martech triumvirate: suite or best-of-breed, software or services, build or buy? What’s hype or actual technological advancement? So as I find myself contemplating …

Dr. Martech and Mr. Hype: A Transformational Webinar Continue Reading »

It might be the dead of winter right now, but spring is only a couple of months away — as is the next MarTech Conference, April 15-17 at the San Jose Convention Center. As you can see from even the partial snapshot of sessions above, it’s going to be an amazing event. The agenda is 95% complete — a few surprise additions are in the works. But as you browse through it, you’ll see that …

Don’t miss the MarTech Conference in San Jose, April 15-17 Continue Reading »

As you probably have heard by now, Clayton Christensen — renown author, professor, and consultant on the topic of disruptive innovation — passed away late last week. I didn’t know him personally, but I had the privilege of meeting him on several occasions. And the ideas he shared in his writing and presentations have had a significant impact on my life. My first encounter with Clay’s concept of disruptive innovation was in 1994. At the …

Thank you, Clay Christensen, for everything you taught me about disruptive innovation and more Continue Reading »

Actually, I’m asking you. What is the current state of marketing technology and operations careers? This is my one-time-a-year pleading on my knees request to the martech community to participate in our survey of professionals in the field. In exchange for 5 minutes of your time, you’ll help all of us better understand the work we do and the mobility of positions in this space. In which department do you report? What are your job …

What’s the current state of marketing technology and operations careers? Continue Reading »

At the beginning of the 2010’s, I wrote a post about the rise of the marketing technologist. It was the early days of a new, hybrid professional emerging: rare “unicorns” who combined IT skills with marketing domain expertise and a genuine passion for harnessing the blossoming marketing technology landscape. Fast-forward to the start of 2020’s. Marketing technologists aren’t rare anymore. They’ve been fruitful and multiplied and are now an integral part of modern marketing organizations. …

The many splendid varieties of marketing technologists in 2020: martech roles and archetypes Continue Reading »

Happy New Year! To kick off 2020, I’m excited to share one of the first entries into The Stackies 2020: Marketing Stack Awards from Nexthink, an enterprise platform that help IT departments deliver great digital employee experiences. Jon Blumenfeld, Nexthink’s director of digital marketing, created their entry around the concept of a “Periodic Table of Martech,” a riff on the periodic table of elements. Each “element” represents a different martech tool — Jon narrowed them …

A marketing stack organized according to The Periodic Table of Martech Continue Reading »

I love TED Talks. They have such a great format for packing a really interesting phenomenon, observation, or story into ~15 minutes of focused narrative. Giving one myself — even an independent TEDx Talk — has long been something I’ve aspired to. And so I was thrilled to have the opportunity to do so at TEDx Boca Raton earlier this fall with a presentation on how Everyone is a Software Developer now. Here’s my attempt …

The explosion of code — and “no code” — in marketing and martech, presented at TEDx Boca Raton Continue Reading »

Last month, I declared that the 10-years war between marketing and IT was over. This was in response to Gartner’s CMO Spend Survey 2019-2020 that showed a remarkable reversal in the relationship: IT went from being one of the “top inhibitors” to marketing’s vision and strategy to being a “top supporter.” Actually, IT vaulted into first place as now the very top supporter of marketing. This week, Gartner shared their new Marketing Technology Survey 2019 …

Martech collaboration between marketing and IT, and the real impediments to martech success Continue Reading »

About a month ago, I received an odd comment on my blog, “Martec’s Law was quoted by the Portuguese navy with respect to asymmetrical warfare. It is definitely a law now.” Huh? That mandated an immediate Google search. Sure enough, Martec’s Law had just appeared in Jane’s Defense Weekly — what AdAge is to marketers, Jane’s is to defense industry professionals — in the article, Portuguese Navy reveals existence of “tech guerrilla” unit. (Ironically under …

What do martech and the Portuguese navy have in common? Continue Reading »