The modern marketing tech (martech) stack is instrumental for winning customers and keeping them happy. For example, marketers today depend on their stacks to coordinate campaigns and deliver personalized shopping experiences. They use various solutions to automate processes, discover untapped opportunities, and transform data into actionable insights. Put simply, the martech stack empowers brands to optimize the entire customer journey from beginning to end.
But what exactly is the customer journey and how does a martech stack affects it?
The customer journey refers to the process by which individuals interact with an organization to achieve their goals. From the time people first discover a product to when they make a purchase, activate a subscription, or use a coupon, they are on the buyer’s journey.
The customer journey matters because shoppers care deeply about the interactions they have with brands. According to a recent Salesforce survey, 80% of customers consider their experiences with a company to be as important as the products it offers. Of course, having a great product is only part of the answer. But to create exceptional experiences – every time for every customer – marketers need sophisticated martech stacks.
However, building a robust martech stack is easier said than done, and there’s no one-size-fits-all playbook. So, as a marketer, you must focus on choosing the right solutions for your needs. Then, you must establish an ecosystem in which all tools integrate seamlessly.
When this happens, you can evaluate and finetune your customer journey to elevate marketing performance. You can invest your marketing dollars with confidence and illuminate what makes you successful as a marketer. The key lies in understanding the martech stack and how different layers affect touchpoints along the customer journey, from physical to digital channels.
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Marketing Automation
Marketing automation is foundational in the modern martech stack. Automation is what makes the integrated, omnichannel approach that brands strive for possible. Without marketing automation tools, we can’t meet all people wherever they are in the customer journey. We also struggle to evaluate our marketing strategies holistically.
Marketing automation is how companies show relevant related products to customers immediately after they make another purchase. It’s how you and your team can publish tailored content for multiple buyer personas and produce dynamic content based on past behaviors. A well-oiled marketing automation function makes your customers feel seen and heard.
Shoppers are more likely to remain loyal and advocate for brands when their unique desires are fulfilled. Automation, when done right, makes this all possible and enhances touchpoints throughout the customer journey, which goes a long way in building trust with consumers.
Direct Mail
Direct mail automation represents another important part of the martech stack. Historically, direct mail has required a lot of manual effort. Marketers can now simplify much of what they did on the direct mail front in the past and coordinate direct mail campaigns alongside other efforts.
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By integrating direct mail into a broader, digitally-enabled marketing ecosystem, marketers can drive more sales and track certain metrics closely. It can provide consistent experiences for customers between online and in-person touchpoints, creating powerful memories that help brands stand apart from the pack.
A well-designed direct mail automation platform gets high-quality content into customers’ hands faster. It syncs up with other marketing channels and makes people feel like they are interacting with a thoughtful, attentive brand. Direct mail automation also gives marketers more time to focus on pushing content that resonates with individual buyers and frees them from mundane logistics.
Content Management System & Experience
A sophisticated content management system (CMS) enhances every stage of the customer journey, much like how marketing automation tools do. CMSs serve as hubs that marketers can use to schedule, publish, and edit content across many channels. They make it easier to move people through the marketing funnel and onboard them with new products or services.
Good content encourages consumers to learn more about your business, product, or service. It also validates how customers feel and showcases why your services meet their needs. However, to be clear, optimizing content experiences goes further than content creation.
Your CMS and content experience tools should make it easier for people to find, use and interact with everything your marketing team produces. These solutions should also provide insight into whether your content strikes a chord with your audience. When you have this information, you can identify the best types of content for reaching people at different stages of the customer journey.
Analytics
Having a robust data analytics capability in your martech stack outside of the use cases mentioned above is also crucial for optimizing the customer journey. Analytics gives you access to real-time data across all channels and enable you to evaluate the customer journey at different points in time or over the long term.
Well-built analytics tools can measure and track all marketing activity to uncover what is working and what isn’t for your business. They give you a high-level understanding of how different layers are working together and allow you to make connections between seemingly disconnected marketing workflows or systems.
In doing so, analytics allow marketers to be more efficient, improve customer relationships and generate revenue by upgrading specific facets of the customer journey.
Maximize Every Customer Touchpoint
The next generation of martech solutions makes it easier than ever to manage customer data, engage people continuously, publish relevant content, perform real-time identity resolution, and conduct powerful analyses. You must leverage the latest technologies available to unleash the full strength of your marketing team. Also, you need these tools to integrate so that you can orchestrate all that your modern marketing function requires.
Once you’ve established the right martech stack, you have what you need to optimize the customer journey across every digital and physical touchpoint. No interaction or experience that you offer will go underutilized. You can finally uncover your consumers’ deepest needs and create compelling moments at every opportunity.
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