The marketing industry is in the midst of a transformation as organizations embrace the tools of modern marketing to engage today’s customer. Following this trend, The Harvard Business Review recently published an article titled “The Rise of the Chief Marketing Technologist”.
The article’s co-authors, Laura McLellan and Scott Brinker, define a marketing technologist as part strategist, part creative director, part technology leader, and part teacher. The new role of the Marketing Technologist is quickly being adopted by companies across the board. Gartner conducted a survey earlier this year and found 81% of organizations now have the equivalent of a chief marketing technologist, compared with 70% in 2013. This audience has made such an impact that during the summer of 2014, Third Door Media launched The Marketing Tech Conference (MarTech), attracting tech savvy marketers, data scientists, and digital strategists. It’s clear the marketing technologist movement is in full force and is here to stay.
How does the rise of the marketing technologist relate to Data…
It’s clear the marketing technologist is changing the way organizations look at customer and prospect data. Here at Oceanos, we recognize this evolution and have subsequently established the Data Optimization Cycle. This framework provides smarter data to increase sales and marketing performance and drive revenue.
The New Framework: Data Optimization Cycle…
The Data Optimization framework presents a continuous data management strategy focused on acquiring and increasing the utility of contact data.
It’s comprised of five core solutions – Data Cleanse & Append, Contact Gap Analysis, Business Intelligence, Contact Discovery, and Contact Valuation. When each solution works in cohesion, it’s high octane gas for your marketing automation system. It supports better segmentation, content alignment, and drives demand generation activities such as cross-sell, retention and new customer acquisition programs.
Getting started with Data Optimization Cycle…
No matter where you stand, you can start implementing the framework to improve results. To increase success, you first need to clearly define an audience definition. With this in hand, you’re ready to start applying the framework.
The framework begins with Data Cleanse & Append. Here you weed out the bad contacts and append data to incomplete records. The enrichment includes individual and account information and can also incorporate business intelligence such as software installs, trigger events, and a myriad of social media intelligence.
Get a full picture of your database with a Contact Gap Analysis…
With your data organized, you can start to take inventory with Contact Gap Analysis. This process provides visibility into the contacts you have and those missing within your house database. It reveals the “gaps” – the target contacts missing at each account. The report also indicates if a third party contact record is available or if custom discovery is required to close the gap.
Filling the gaps with Contact Discovery
Contact Gap Analysis provides the “map” to support the last two solutions within the framework – Contact Discovery and Contact Valuation. It’s within the contact discovery step where marketers are commonly misled to think there is a single database solution. If you are seeking evidence to discredit this notion look no further than your Contact Gap Analysis results.
Contact Discovery now, more than ever, requires a balanced approach that includes a blend of traditional sources with web and social media discovery. With the explosion of social media intelligence, you can expand your search beyond job title to include roles, responsibilities, skills, certifications, group membership and the like.
To optimize your contact discovery, you can apply the last piece of the cycle – Contact Valuation. This solution connects social media and other intelligence to the contacts and then weights the attributes to establish a valuation.
This valuation, or score, serves two purposes. First, it helps you identify the best third party contacts to purchase. Second, it supports segmentation and allows you to prioritize contacts for inclusion within a specific campaign.
If I were twice as big…
Let’s assume your house database follows the common industry standard and that you’ve captured 35% of your available target audience. What if you applied the results of the Gap Analysis and were able to increase your contact universe from 35%to 70%?
From a percentage standpoint, you’ll be exposing your messaging to an audience twice the size! All the time and money invested in marketing automation, content development, and messaging would be applied 2X.
Would you then feel more confident to invest resources into content such as interactive infographics, ROI calculators and value storybooks to generate more leads and ignite buying decisions? How would this affect each stage within your demand waterfall?
Summary
The marketing industry is changing and there’s no doubt that technology is the driving force. Oceanos was founded in 2002, a time when email marketing was just taking root. If you were in the industry during that time, when you needed data you called a list broker. Today, the landscape much more complex.
Charles Darwin said “It is not the strongest or the most intelligent who will survive but those who can best manage change”. Since our inception we have constantly pushed ourselves and our clients to think differently in order to improve the data acquisition process. The Data Optimization framework is a direct result of years of collaboration with hundreds of smart marketers with whom we have been fortunate to work. Right now it encapsulates the best thinking, but we recognize it will change and welcome you to play a part in that evolution.
To learn more about The Data Optimization Cycle, download the eGuide here.
Today’s Author:
Brian Hession, CEO and Founder of Oceanos. Oceanos was founded on the principle of delivering List Intelligence to optimize sales and marketing performance. We have changed significantly over the past twelve years, but today List Intelligence is the core of our DNA.
Amazing image from Ken Fager