Winterberry Group Research Finds Marketing Analytics and Data Infrastructure Spend to Reach $32 Billion

New research provides a comprehensive look at the path to significant growth and challenges of marketing analytics

Winterberry Group, released new research, “From Data to Insight: The Outlook for Marketing Analytics.” The research, based on 2023 survey findings of 200 US and European marketers, along with interviews conducted with industry experts, examines, and defines the present and future state of marketing analytics as well as use cases, industry challenges and factors for success as demonstrated by companies that are utilizing analytics most effectively.

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Winterberry Group forecasts that spend covering marketing analytics and data infrastructure is expected to grow from $22 billion in 2022 to $32 billion in 2026 in the US, UK, and EU. This growth is attributed to technological advancements and process improvements that have enabled businesses to achieve more with less reliance on people, empowering business analysts and engineers to leverage readily available technology, while reducing reliance on individuals with advanced degrees and offshore talent.

“As the use cases for analytics continue to expand, marketing teams must innovate and overcome challenges such as privacy regulation and loss of data identifiers to engage with customers effectively,” said Winterberry Group Managing Partner, Michael Harrison. “Organizations leading the charge in analytic decision-making have demonstrated that a cohesive strategy across data, technology, people, and processes is key to success. Winterberry Group predicts strong expansion in marketing analytics investments and use cases. Organizations must be flexible and capable to adapt to an evolving environment.”

“Personalized marketing and user privacy can co-exist, but now is the time for marketers to implement ID independent and statistics-driven approaches to ad personalization,” said Jim Lawson, CEO of AdTheorent, which offers a programmatic media buying platform that utilizes machine learning and data science to target ad impressions without relying on individualized user IDs.

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“Winterberry’s research confirms Acxiom’s belief that data-driven analytics are essential for success in today’s ultra-competitive marketing landscape,” said Kevin Lyons, General Manager of Analytics at Acxiom. “Beyond strategy, brands at all levels of analytics maturity benefit most from integrated data sources, fostered by an agile, collaborative culture, enabling tailored data modeling and decision intelligence solutions. This fundamental approach transforms data into actionable insights, enhancing customer experiences and accelerating brand growth.”

Though the analytics and data infrastructure market is entering a period of intense growth, it is not without its challenges. Winterberry Group research has identified four challenges to the analytics industry’s widespread use and acceptance in the US and EU: A shortage of talent, data quality and silos, measurement of ‘Black Boxes’ and Third-Party Cookie Deprecation.

“We’ve definitely seen the ‘Black Box’ issue in the commerce marketing space, and we’ve made major investments to help our clients solve it. Rather than rely on inconsistent, vendor-reported media performance data, Marilyn helps clients standardize results, measure the Total Business Impact of their media spend, and make more effective commerce media investments,” said Jake Berry, Executive Vice President and General Manager at The Mars Agency, a leading commerce technology platform.

“The best way to drive adoption of analytics is through decision-making based on measurement and insights that are tested, trusted, and backed by data,” said Nancy Smith, Founder, President and CEO of Analytic Partners. “From engaging customers more effectively to improving financial performance, companies have a great opportunity to get ahead by using data strategically.”

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