Over £2 trillion is spent by marketing organisations worldwide every year. However, managing these campaigns can involve a labour-intensive mixture of digital asset management, spreadsheets, word documents and a plethora of emails all attempting to efficiently design, mount and analyse every campaign. To help manage these campaigns, drive customer relationships and achieve profitable growth, for many marketers, MRM technology could be the way forward.
Looking at the burgeoning market for MRM systems, it’s easy to become confused by the packages that are on offer. “All the key players are closely aligned in terms of the marketing challenges modern marketers face and all seem to address a similar set of pain points,” comments Chris Sykes, founder and creative director at agency-turned-solutions provider Volume. “This being the case, why is the MRM market so fragmented? Most of the larger vendors have applications that are heavily oriented to marketing analytics, whilst the smaller ‘niche’ vendors tend to offer a particular area of specialty (core competence). This can be confusing for businesses looking to implement an MRM-type solution.”
What is MRM
Unica’s white paper ‘EMM, MRM, CRM or CRO?’ defines MRM as “technology that manages the marketing ‘back office’ through which budgets are allocated, creative assets are managed and deployed and projects are managed. It stops short of the processes associated with executing direct customer contact. MRM is also often referred to as Marketing Operations Management (MOM) or Marketing Management Systems (MMS).”
Unica further points out that “MRM software should include workflow automation; resource, project and digital asset management; strategic planning; and fulfilment and distribution. However, many software packages classified as MRM only offer a fraction of these . MRM is the newest class of marketing software and is the least well-defined, making it difficult to directly compare vendors. In general, there are four key capabilities of MRM – strategic planning; budgeting and financial management; project management, and digital asset management.”
Buying confusion
The market for MRM systems is fragmented, which confuses the sector and leaves the buyer without a set of clear guidelines to follow when specifying their systems. “Fragmentation will continue. SMEs are suspicious of established vendors, the cost and the effort,” says Jeremy Keohane MD of marketing solutions company, TW Connect. “I think we will see fragmentation based on industry verticals. I remember the buzz around knowledge management and e-learning, lots of hype, lots of companies established around these disciplines, then consolidation. During the consolidation phase, the companies that survived were the ones that serviced a niche or particular industry sector. What is interesting is that they did indeed develop specific tools or functions related to their niche.”
To ensure that your business uses its installed systems effectively it is imperative that they are integrated into your other business processes. “I think that MRM deployed in isolation to existing systems and processes will ultimately fail to deliver on its promised efficiencies,” continues Keohane. “Integration is a prerequisite for success. The only question is the amount and level of integration. With so much compatibility about it is relatively easy to integrate most IT-based solutions. The problem is normally a political one. It needs to be driven by someone who has a holistic view of the business and not embroiled in internal politics.”
The purchase of an MRM system for your business should be approached with all the due care and attention you would use when buying any other critical services. Sykes at Volume says, “To anyone seriously looking at an MRM solution, my recommendation is to focus on gaining ROI numbers from the MRM vendors on your short list. Ensure that the favoured vendor has quantifiable reference sites in your industry. Ask to see a ‘live’ system, not a product demo or static screen-shots. You can always sign an NDA. There’s no doubt that MRM, in an appropriate form, can deliver significant improvements, but there are emerging cases of very expensive implementations that have failed to deliver any kind of ROI or meet the promises sold. A year in marketing is a very long time and anyone considering investing in a sizeable MRM application needs to ensure that ROI is achievable in the first year.”
Carol Meyers, head of marketing at Unica, adds, “Preparing for success starts with the specification of needs and vendor selection. It’s important to begin with an understanding of what the marketing group’s needs are, how they will measure success, what improvements are expected, and what role technology will play.
Planning for organisational and process change is critical. Often companies implement technology simply to automate existing processes rather than analysing how technology can actually improve and change current processes. To ensure benefit, it’s important to have buy-in from all key constituents (users of the solution as well as those who will benefit in other ways, such as executives) to clearly define success and benefits. It’s also important to train and encourage staff throughout the process, and to set and measure against milestones for application usage and results.”
Dynamic marketing
The MRM system that you choose can be as simple or as complex as it needs to be. Marketing itself touches on a number of discreet areas of your business that the MRM system will need to interface with.
Also, don’t forget your MRM system will support your business’s brand. Andrew Yates, senior vice-president at Aprimo, says, “With the expansion of marketing channels – from email, to text, podcasting and IPTV – brand management is becoming an increasing challenge. Brand management systems will have to expand to incorporate and manage all these diverse marketing assets. I can see a time when these systems will be a common feature within any marketing department.”
One example where MRM technology is becoming widely available to smaller businesses is the launch of Aprimo’s Marketing Professional Edition, an on-demand software version of the company’s award-winning EMM suite. It offers SMEs an opportunity to improve marketing effectiveness with an innovative solution previously available only to enterprise size companies. Delivered as a web-based service, it enables rapid deployment and faster time to marketing ROI; customers can go live in days.
“Professional Edition provides our customers proven best practices and functionality. Thousands of mid-market companies will benefit from achieving greater marketing productivity and accelerated time-to-market,” says Bill Godfrey, chairman and CEO of Aprimo. “And the flexibility and ease of use we’ve built into the product make it attractive for all marketing users, regardless of size.”
Time to invest?
The B2B sector is characterised by businesses that must market effectively to demanding customers. Any savings in cost as well as improvements in efficiency can positively affect your bottom-line. And now is the right time to examine how MRM technology could potentially improve your marketing activity.
Meyers at Unica adds, “MRM is a relatively early market so new entrants are bound to continue to emerge. The specialised vendors generally serve specific industries or particular complex needs that the broad market doesn’t always require. It can be confusing but if buyers are clear in their needs and follow best practices for software procurement, such as speaking with at least three to six vendors, they should be able to navigate the maze of suppliers.”
The bottom-line for a business to ask itself is if it can operate effectively without an MRM system. With all other business components systematised, marketing management should also become part of these integrated systems. Gartner adds that by 2010 firms that deploy these systems will see their businesses grow by more than 20 per cent. It’s up to you to make sure you’re one of those businesses.
