It’s mid-way through 2014, and you’re on a marketing team that saw a significant increase in budget dollars in the past two years. Maybe you’re good. The strategy’s in place for all your major units, and as far as you can tell, it’s nothing but smooth sailing ahead. (Note: If that description fits you, please feel free to contact me on e-mail because I want to be able to identify for our clients “the one marketer who has it all figured out.”)
But more than likely, what’s really happening is that you and your team got that big budget increase for marketing, with a special emphasis on mobile and social, but there are more than a few evenings where you’re sitting there, staring at the screen and you’re thinking to yourself, “Biggie (the late Notorious B.I.G.) nailed it: more money, more problems.”
For the past two years, digital marketing budgets have continued to grow, with tools such as social and mobile marketing cited as top budget priorities in recent Gartner for Marketing Leaders surveys of marketing decision makers. These increases are due, in large part, to the fact that marketers are still reacting to the big changes were seeing with how quickly consumers are turning to online media, social networks and the like. Finding new tools for the marketing toolbox has to be one of your priorities, right? I mean, think about the following factoid that just dropped into the news the other day: Millennials (18-34-year-olds) in the U.S. are spending as much 14.5 hours a week on their smartphones. (Registration might be required.)
That’s . . .just a lot of time.
Fortunately for you, the Gartner for Marketing Leaders just published 2014 edition of the Hype Cycle for Digital Marketing. You should look at the Hype Cycle as an annually updated snapshot of the key technologies at play in digital marketing. You’re going to need these tools – maybe not all, but many of them.
We break down the key technology driven trends into technology profiles. Among the profiles we rated as “transformational” that I think marketers need to track include data management platforms, real-time marketing, digital commerce, personalization and data-driven marketing. (Near and dear to my heart are mobile marketing analytics, augmented reality and content marketing.)
All of these technologies play their role in your ability as a marketer to engage with a customer or prospect at the right time, with the right offer on virtually any connected device the consumer happens to be carrying. Such highly targeted, personalized marketing scenarios are going to require marketers and their partners to acquire, manage and analyze vast amounts of information– and be able to act on them very quickly.
Biggie might have distilled the angst caused by rapid accumulation of resources into a memorable phrase. Our Hype Cycles can help you distill a sea of choices into a targeted list of investments in technologies to move you from seeing nothing but problems to embracing a set of solutions.
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