Avoiding pitfalls and maximising long-term value for your MarTech migration

By its very nature, marketing has always been driven by trends. Whether creating or following them, it is the job of marketers to stay relevant to our audiences. To capture their imaginations and keep just ahead of them. This desire to be setting trends coupled with the fear of being left behind not only drives campaign strategy and content, but our investment in the technology we use to design and deliver them.

MarTech platforms are constantly evolving to keep up with the latest marketing and technology trends. As such, it can be tempting to replace software systems after a few years with newer offerings boasting integration with the latest tools and technology. Before making the move to a new platform, however, it is important to understand the scale of the project.

In addition to understanding what your current system offers and what the new one can deliver, you should also have a clear and comprehensive roadmap for the migration itself before any contracts are signed or purchases made. It is all too easy to underestimate the timings and investment required for a successful MarTech migration project. Budgets can be burned through in pursuit of harnessing the promises of the latest technology – only to achieve exactly the same functionality you were using previously, or in some cases even less.

In an attempt to avoid the common pitfall of underestimating the time and resources required, this article provides tips and insights to help plan for a successful on-time and on-budget MarTech migration.

Building a business case: Should I stay or should I go?

As with any tech implementation or change-driven project, it is important to understand what you currently have, what you are striving for, and whether or not a new solution will provide it. This requires an honest look at your business and how your existing MarTech system supports it. To do this, I’d recommend using a SOAR analysis, which looks at your Strengths and Opportunities as well as your Aspirations and the Results you are aiming for – a much more forward-looking structure then the more traditional SWOT analysis.

Once you have a clearer picture of your business vision, it is important to assess whether a new MarTech platform maps to your true business goals. Improving customer experience should be at the top of your list, but remember that technology cannot accomplish this alone. Factor in the roles your people and processes need to play to ensure you get the most out of your investment – whether or not you decide to replace it.

Ultimately, the business case for a MarTech migration should prove that the time and money you invest in should result in significantly greater value for the business, making the disruption of the project worthwhile. Do your homework, weigh these costs against how much the new system will save by increasing efficiency and delivering what you need. In the long term, uprooting everything only to save a few pennies will likely prove to be a false economy, resulting in a race to the bottom. Prioritising cost over all else will likely lose you more customers than the money you may have saved.

Timing is everything

Remember that time is the only true currency and a precious resource. Not only do you not want to waste it, but never underestimate the amount you’ll need. A well-integrated MarTech migration generally takes 6-9 months from vendor selection until full implementation and widespread use, so you should factor this into your planning before making a switch.

Vendors make spectacular promises of speedier migration and deep two-way integrations, but as with the platform’s functionality, it is essential to look beyond the sales level promises to ensure the system will meet the business’s current and future needs. A well-executed MarTech migration should not simply be a ‘lift and shift’ exercise. Just as your decision to move platforms is driven by the greener pastures more cutting-edge technologies can provide, your migration needs to incorporate the time to learn and develop new ways of working to make the most of the platform’s new capabilities that will form the core of your digital marketing going forward.

Maximising knowledge transfer: a ’PRIMED’ approach

To ensure you extract all the value from your considerable investment in the new platform, it is vitally important not to fall into the trap of simply replicating the old ways of working into the new tool. This means creating a roadmap with adequate timings built in for everything from selecting the most suitable platform for your business to recreating workflows and rule sets, complete content and data transferring. Incorporating a comprehensive training plan with regular checkpoints to make sure your team knows how to make the most of the new system before the old one is phased out.

Program management is often overlooked and whether you choose an internal team or to work with external experts, it is essential that the project is overseen from start to finish to ensure it stays on track and yields the best results.

Over the past decade, Purple Square has honed our skills, experience and expertise to maximise knowledge transfer with every MarTech migration we perform. Our PRIMED approach breaks down the project into stages: Plan, Research, Implement, Manage, Educate and Deploy, helping to ensure the best possible outcomes with the goal of delivering ROI within the first 9-12 months. (You can have a listen to my webinar with Customer Lifeguard Gerry Brown to learn more.)

Managing Risks for a successful migration

As with any major change project, there are inherent risks to MarTech migrations, which is why we always ensure clients are making the most out of their current marketing technology platforms before they decide to make a move to a different model. If you have identified that your business will benefit from a new system, I can’t emphasise enough how important it is to ensure your migration process includes running both the old and new systems in parallel for a period. Every company is different, but allowing for a period of three months will help ensure that your team is up to speed with the new system and that you have extracted all your IP and value from the incumbent solution prior to decommissioning it.

Depending on your specific needs, you may also want to consider spreading the risk of your investment by taking a ‘best of breed’ approach to MarTech and working with multiple vendors. This approach means you can pick and choose the functionality from different platforms and solutions to find the right combination for your business, which can help tailor your technology to help you stay ahead of the competition in the markets and audiences you sell to. As with any MarTech platform, this approach requires tight integration and careful management to ensure your team stays on top of existing and new functionalities to avoid creating a messy, tangled ‘Frankenstack’, as we explored in our recent whitepaper.

Regardless of which path you take, your MarTech platform should be viewed as a long term investment. Avoiding shortcuts and investing in regular health checks and training will help you keep the software – and your team – up to date, ensuring it continues to deliver on its promise and supports your CX and strategic marketing for years to come.