More than 8 in 10 (83% of) marketing leaders from across the world believe their work will be more technology-driven after the pandemic than before. This is per a report [download page] from Salesforce that also has a look at which marketing technologies organizations are using today.
While the number of marketing technologies available seems to grow every year, there are some technologies that a majority of organizations are using. Some 89% of the more than 8,200 marketing leaders surveyed use a CRM system, while 88% use marketing analytics and measurement tools. Marketing attribution tools (83%), advertising platforms (81%), marketing automation and journey management (81%) and advertising platforms (81%) are also included in many of the marketers’ martech toolkits.
About 8 in 10 (79% of) the B2B and B2B2C respondents say they are using account-based marketing (ABM) platforms, however, fewer than half (46%) of those who are using an ABM program say they are completely satisfied with the technology they are using to run this type of program.
Similarly, only 44% say they are completely happy with the measurement and tracking of results of their ABM program. This, too, is likely tied to the martech being used. Research from Demand Gen Report found that many marketers are struggling with measuring their ABM efforts due to messy CRM data and problems integrating data across platforms.
Close to two-thirds (64%) of all the marketers surveyed are currently using artificial intelligence (AI). A full 60% say they have a fully defined AI strategy. This year, the leading use case for those marketers using AI is to drive next best actions, followed by personalizing the overall customer journey and automating customer interactions.
What Metrics Are Marketers Tracking?
The report reveals that, because of the pandemic, more than three-quarters (78%) of marketing organizations have changed or reprioritized metrics. Along with that, two-thirds say they can measure campaign performance in real-time.
In order to measure KPIs and performance, 78% of respondents are tracking revenue, while 77% are tracking marketing and sales funnel performance (B2B and B2B2C respondents only). Three-quarters of respondents say they are now tracking customer satisfaction analytics to measure performance. Indeed, customer satisfaction metrics are considered the most valuable marketing metric by those who are using these metrics to track performance.
The full report can be found here.
About the Data: Findings are based on a May-June survey of 8,277 marketing leaders from B2B, B2C and B2B2C companies across the world.
