WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS. Marketing Software Survey 2014

Transcription

1 Marketing Software Survey 2014 WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS A snapshot of the current software products & platforms made for and used by marketers across industries.

2 CONTENTS Web & Mobile Analytics: Mini Report 3 on Top categories of Marketing Operations 3 Web and Mobile Analytics Stats Web and Mobile Analytics: what it means and why it matters 5 Web and mobile technology solutions: what s available out there? 7 What users are saying? Survey Results 8 Key Takeaways 9 Footnotes 10 About MTA 11 Page 2

3 WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS The QEDBaton B2B Marketing Technology Spend Report 2014 presented an overview and trend analysis of the investment choices marketers are making in key areas of marketing technology ¹. Our subsequent reports surveyed a large sample of B2B marketers to reveal key investment trends in each of the 6 key areas of marketing technology ². Accordingly we have handpicked the sub categories3 within each of the 6 broad categories ³ and started further deep dive to explore why they are seeing traction, critical features of technology solutions available and survey results about the technologies being deployed in each of the sub categories. In this section we will focus on Web and Mobile Analytics. The ubiquity of mobile devices and the inescapability of the website as the primary face of marketers makes it more than the norm to analyze this spaces Page 3

4 WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS FACTS /10 smartphone subscribers are served mobile ads, an increase of 66% over 2013 when only 3/10 were served ads Social networking is increasing in network impact as this category is made up of 63% images and 32% video a significant change from 2013 when social networking video apps such as Vine and Instagram Video didn t exist. Mobile ads are now served to 50% of smartphone subscribers - up from 30% of smartphone subscribers as reported in the February 2013 Page 4

5 WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS: WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT MATTERS Web and mobile analytics are a subset of marketing analytics. The ubiquity of mobile devices and the inescapability of the website as the primary face of the marketer have led to web and mobile analytics emerging as an independent area of study. Web Analytics Even in this era of social media, the website is still often the primary face of the organization and a critical piece of the marketing mix. An effective web strategy therefore needs constant tracking, measurement, feedback and course correction. There was a time, not too long ago, when number of unique visitors, page views and hits were the height of web usage insight. Marketers satisfied themselves with the knowledge that thousands of unique page views meant their investment in website development and related activities was worth it. Unfortunately, it is impossible to hide behind such flimsy indicators in the day and age of web analytics. Now, marketers can and should know who came to their site, when, how long they stayed, where they came from, where they went next, what they did when on the site, whether they bought anything and a host of other behavioral data. This rich and steady flow of intelligence is processed by web analytics platforms to return robust insight into the current status and predict future behavioral models. Most important, analytics can provide valuable directions on further refining and making more relevant marketing messages, including website content, social media strategy etc. Clearly, driving traffic to the website though crucial - is no longer a useful benchmark to measure website effectiveness. More important indicators are number of enquiry forms filled, product demo videos watched, content like white papers downloaded or shared etc. After the first visit, a prospects return to the website will be determined by the relevance of the website content, which can be best tailored based on B2B web analytics. Marketers can & should know 1. who came to their site (both web and mobile), and when 2. how long they stayed 3. where they came from B2B marketers need to deploy tools tailored to the needs of a B2B focused organization. Conventional B2C analytics platforms are designed to analyse individual visitors as just that- individuals. However, in the B2B context, visitors are in fact representatives of prospect and client organizations. Further complexity is built in when the visitors are from different functions, industries Page 5

6 WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS: WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT MATTERS and management levels. The analytics tool must be able to test, measure and analyse visitor web behaviour in the B2B context, including being able to link visitors to the Key Account Management database or platform and consolidating the findings to better understand the prospect organization as a single unit. Mobile Analytics is mobile. Search is mobile. Social is mobile. Prospects and customers are mobile. An overwhelming majority of corporate executives the influencers and decision makers of B2B marketers 91% according to an Xcube infographic ⁴ use smart phones for work. Mobile devices are already set to overtake desktops and web mail as the leading mail client. Optimizing the digital marketing strategy for mobile devices like smart phones and tablets is more crucial than ever for B2B marketers. And this strategy needs to be more than just providing a mobile version of the website. Mobile analytics deep dives into the mobile usage behavior of prospects and customers on the website and provides insights on how to optimize the user experience to keep them coming back to the site or otherwise continue to engage in the desired manner with the brand. Ultimately though, just as mobile is a part of the larger marketing strategy, mobile analytics is part of the overall analytics strategy. Customer engagement is not a linear path. To truly know the prospect, analytics must be based on internal data (brand owned properties) as well as external data prospect behavior on public sites and forums both online and offline. In other words, mobile or web analytics should feed into the overall marketing analytics platform for real, contextual and actionable insight. Anything else can lead to illinformed marketing decisions. 4. where they went next 5. what they did when on the site 6. Whether they bought anything and a host of other behavioral data. Page 6

7 WEB & MOBILE ANALYTICS TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS: WHAT S AVAILABLE OUT THERE? For B2B marketers whose bread and butter comes from key accounts, the conventional B2C focused analytics platforms do not serve the purpose. B2B organizations have complex relationships with prospects and even more complex relationships with customers. Specialized B2B web and mobile analytics platforms are designed to better understand and interpret prospect and customer digital behaviour with the aim of better serving their needs. A visitor to the website must be tracked as both an individual professional as well as a part of an organization. Web analytics and mobile analytics are distinct areas but the analytics platform should usually be able to deliver intelligence about both. Most comprehensive B2B web analytics platforms enable identification and tracking of prospects that visit the website. The primary objective is to generate leads from online traffic, either with data about visitor behaviour on the website or on off page social media, forums etc. Web analytics platforms should be able to connect back to marketing analytics platforms or even CRM systems and identify prospects as well as pull up all existing intelligence about the prospect in order to deliver optimal results. Page 7

8 WHAT USERS ARE SAYING: SURVEY RESULTS An online survey ⁷ conducted by QEDbaton polled over 135 senior B2B sales and marketing executives from around the world on their use of marketing operations technologies. About half the respondents were using some form of web and or mobile analytics. Google Analytics was the leading web analytics tool (about 33%), with Adobe a distant second (about 10%). However, 31% respondents were unsure of what web or mobile analytics solution was deployed in the organization. Usage Trends of Web & Mobile Analytics Tools 46% Small No 59% Yes 41% % Large Size of Business Top Tools Used Page

9 KEY TAKEAWAYS B2B marketers globally are yet to truly leverage digital marketing as a strategic tool. B2B marketers have tended to be slower to respond to digital marketing and corresponding analytics as it was typically seen as a B2C phenomenon. And yet the reality is that B2B customers and prospects spend as much if not more time in the virtual world as B2C consumers. B2B marketers have to aggressively be present in the virtual spaces that their prospects and customers inhabit web and mobile analytics can guide their investment decisions and marketing choices. A study ⁵ conducted among senior B2B decision makers in 2013 found 44% of respondents agreeing that B2B commerce is adopting B2C best practices in order to optimize the purchasing experience. B2B prospects and customers do not strictly segregate work and personal time spent on the internet and could potentially be responding to B2B marketing messages at any time. Particularly young professionals are increasingly buying online. An Acquity Group survey ⁶ of corporate buyers with annual budgets exceeding $100,000 found that 90% of those aged and 68 percent of buyers age make company purchases online. B2B buyers under age 60 spend longer (one to two hours on average) researching before making a major purchase of $5,000 or more. Without web and mobile analytics, B2B marketers would be unable to refine their content strategy and lose out on the time young B2B procurers are spending online accessing content to inform their purchase decision. Page 9

10 FOOTNOTES 1.The structure of the report and survey was based on Scott Brinker s super graphic on the same topic which divides marketing technology into six super categories, each with a set of sub-categories. 2.Key areas of marketing technology: Our report built upon Scott s work, which divided marketing technology into 6 key areas, each of which was further divided into sub-categories. The 6 areas were: Marke ng Experience Marke ng Opertaions Middleware Backbone Pla orms Infrastracture Marke ng Enviroment Each key area was further divided into sub-categories. 3. Technologies serving Marketing Operations can be classified into 9 sub-categories. These are: Marke ng analy cs Marke ng data Business intelligence Channel/ local marke ng Web and mobile analy cs Dashboards Digital asset management Marke ng resource management Agile and project management In the survey conducted for the QEDBaton B2B Marketing Technology Spend Report 2014, 5 of these subcategories (in bold) enjoyed the most investment or intent to invest, as well as seemed the most crowded in terms of technology products available. This series of mini reports delve deeper into these 5 sub-categories to understand why they are attracting the maximum B2B marketing investments and what the wide ranging solutions encapsulate. 4. Xcube graphic: and Page 10

11 FOOTNOTES 7. About the survey: an online survey with 135 plus responses. Respondents profile: ŸSenior sales and marketing professionals or senior management executives ŸPrimarily based in USA, UK, Canada, Australia, India, Germany ŸOrganizations are either B2B or both B2B and B2C marketers, ranging from small to medium and large firms (<$10 million to over $1 billion ) ŸPrimarily in the IT/Software, manufacturing, advertising or media/pr, construction/ engineering or telecom sectors ŸFor more information on the survey, please XYZ@qedbaton.com Page 11

12 ABOUT MARTECH ADVISOR MarTech Advisor is the world s Leading Source of Marketing Technology News, Unbiased Research, Product Reviews & Expert Commentary. MarTech Advisor reaches and informs a world-wide audience of over 250,000 sales & marketing professionals via its newsletters and LinkedIn group. Our focus at MarTech Advisor is to help the sales & marketing professional stay on top of the multitude of rapidly evolving marketing software products. Our content assists our readers in comparing, researching and selecting the right products and platforms to meet their marketing objectives. Contact Us: On the web info@martechadvisor.com Twitter: Twitter.com/MarTechAdvisor Join the world's leading sales & marketing group on LinkedIn: Page 12