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MarTech Maturity India Research Findings

Research Objective

To understand the evolving business dynamics for the adoption of MarTech and assess the maturity level of various companies in leveraging MarTech to provide a connected customer experience.

Research Parameters

Time period: Apr to Oct 2021

Key Industries:

•	Banking, Financial Services & Insurance (BFSI)
•	Automobile
•	FMCG
•	Consumer Durables
•	E-commerce
•	Retail

Respondents: 100+ CXO’s and Senior Marketers from diverse industries in India

MarTech Maturity Research Findings

Overall MarTech Maturity

39% of the organizations were at a nascent stage in the MarTech journey, corresponding to level 2. Another 30% were at level 3, where standards were being put in place and Centre of Excellence model was typically operational. These are good indicators reflecting the fact that many organizations in India have kick started their MarTech journey. 18% were just beginning their MarTech journey with limited knowledge of this space. 13% of the organizations were at a mature level 4 stage, which represents a “connected” organization with clearly identified goals, roles & responsibilities and governance protocols to achieve improved customer engagement. This number is expected to increase across industries in the coming years.

MarTech Maturity across Industries

The industry wise maturity had some interesting observations. Over 80% of the organizations were at level 3 or above among the E-commerce companies, which was among the early adopters of MarTech. BFSI was also a relatively early adopter of MarTech with over 50% of the organizations in level 3. The bigger players in BFSI started leveraging technology much earlier than most for a range of initiatives like disseminating information about products & services, customer education, customer service and so on.

FMCG was also an interesting sector with a lot of variation in the maturity. While close to 30% of the FMCG companies were at level 4, there were also over 55% between level 1 and level 2. Retail is another sector, which started a bit late, but a few leaders have shown the way in adopting MarTech.

Emerging Trends in the MarTech space

Top areas organizations want MarTech vendors to focus on

63% felt Ease of Use as an area of improvement. Products and platforms need to be simple to use and intuitive. Simplicity with essential features trumps a complex product with multiple features. This one change could go a long way in improving adoption of MarTech and getting buy-in from business stakeholders.

Another popular feature highlighted by around 60% of respondents as an area of improvement was the ability to customize technology to suit their specific needs. Since finding one perfect tool to satisfy all business needs would be nearly impossible, organizations would expect Martech vendors to be versatile with multiple technologies to compare and combine to find the best possible solution.

57%, again a high number, felt that integration with other technologies in the stack could be improved. A common mistake made is to invest in a set of individual siloed tools that an organization then tries to get to work together which invariably results in a mess. The need for better integration is a pressing issue and vendors better take note.

Customer experience & Analytics were also popular choices by a significant number of respondents. This could be a lesson for MarTech product vendors to keep in mind while designing products.
Top impediments in achieving business goals

74% felt the integration of Marketing and Technology solutions was a big impediment in achieving business goals. This is a common issue faced across industries. Traditionally, Marketing and IT tend to work in silos. With the increasing role of Technology in Marketing, there is realisation of the benefits of having a collaborative approach and the need to fix this gap fast.

A vast 70% also felt that the lack of construction of clear use cases was a major impediment. Well defined use cases will help in quicker requirements definition and improve communication between Business and IT which in turn would result in advancement of business goals.

Getting the people ready with the right training and upskilling was also highlighted by over half the respondents as a problematic area. This is a reflection of the diverse skills required to make MarTech work. Marketers today need to be able to appreciate and understand multiple areas like database management, automation, predictive modelling and testing.
Top emerging technologies that will have the largest positive impact on the company’s marketing activities in the next 5 years

Advanced analytics & automated decisioning came out as the top emerging technology, picked up by 72% of the respondents. This was rated as the top pick by a big margin. That data can be the differentiator is not a story that needs to be sold anymore to marketers. With more and more marketers coming from a left brained background, this area has got a big boost across industries.

Event triggered campaigns was picked by 46% respondents. This is also the realization of the need to reduce the time lag between creation of data and acting on it. More and more companies are gearing themselves for real-time engagement. This number is expected to further increase in the coming years.

A significant portion of respondents also felt that generative content is a top emerging technology. Generative content such as personalized ads may improve the customer engagement levels to a great extent. Due to the advent in machine learning, it is now possible to customize everything from emails to videos providing users a deeply immersive ad experience.
How do you expect spending on MarTech in your organization to evolve over the next 5 years?

Overwhelming majority of respondents felt the MarTech spending will increase over the next five years. This was true across the board, from very big to small organizations. This is a welcome sign that in spite of being in the middle of a pandemic, most marketers are optimistic about increasing their spends in the future. This is a sign of the growing importance of MarTech as a key differentiator in driving a connected customer experience.
Customer Maturity

How is CX/Customer Strategy perceived across the organisation?

33% of the responses indicated that CX Strategies were being applied primarily for all customer facing operations. 29% of the responses also suggested that the responsibility of CX is being taken by a specific department within the organization. However, very few organizations are tracking CX metrics & their impact on business objectives meticulously.
Analytics Maturity

Which statement qualifies for analytical interventions in your organization?

It is observed that around 95% of the organizations are deploying some or the other form of customer analytics. However, 58% of the organizations are still using very basic analytics or Microsoft Excel on an ad-hoc basis instead of making use of advanced statistical and predictive models.

What is the most common use of analytics in your organization?

29% of the organizations have been using analytics to take important business decisions. Another favorable use case of analytics suggested by 22% of the respondents is to predict customer behavior. Only 7% of the organizations are making use of analytics to develop customer experience strategies.
Digital Maturity

What kind of digital work is done at your organization?

The survey also revealed that a staggering majority of organizations are putting a great deal of effort into digital marketing. The responses were divided closely with regards to the entity handling the digital work. 36% of the organizations outsource their digital marketing to a separate digital agency, while 39% of the organizations seem to handle the end-to-end digital process by themselves.
Technology Maturity

How do you leverage technology to fulfill marketing needs?

Around 35% of the respondents suggested that they leverage marketing technology tools for purposes such as campaign management, reporting and personalization. However, the data still sits in silos and there is no single source of truth for most. Around 27% of the respondents said that these operations are still not automated and most of the work is currently being done manually.

How are you measuring the effectiveness of your marketing technology initiatives regularly?

The most popular method of measuring effectiveness of marketing technology according to 33% of the responses is to assess revenue/profitability movements. 31% of the respondents have said they identify the initiative specific KPIs and track their movement.