MarTech mayhem: Have you created Frankenstein’s Monster?

Has your beast of a MarTech stack morphed into an uncontrollable monster? Is your CRM team howling with rage as they work within the limitations of the technology? Are you missing opportunities because your plug-ins are speaking in tongues to each other?

If yes, it sounds like you have one seriously cursed CRM. Fear not, we have the antidote! Read on if you want to bring your MarTech stack back from the dead.

Here are three eerie signs that your MarTech stack has spiralled out of control:

There’s a graveyard of disjointed tools

Imagine walking through a sinister cemetery on a foggy night, lost in a labyrinth of crumbling tombstones and twisted trees. You call out to see if anyone’s there, but you just get your echo back.

This is the reality if you’ve got several systems in place and unnecessary plug-ins that don’t integrate properly with each other. Not only will you be suffering with siloed data, but your team members are likely bewildered by the number of tools they need to navigate in order to get their job done.

While it’s true that there aren’t many single platforms that offer all-in-one solutions without drawbacks, it’s crucial to hack off the unnecessary limbs (chainsaw optional).

Firstly, determine your needs by evaluating which tools are essential. Have you got multiple systems being used when one or two of them could do the whole job, as well as plug-ins that aren’t being used or haven’t been optimised? Once you’ve identified any that are redundant and no longer serve a purpose, kill them off immediately until you’re left with your ultimate final girl MarTech stack.

Your budget’s lifeblood has been drained

One of the most hellish symptoms of a monstrous MarTech mashup is the spiralling costs of your sales and marketing technology. You might have even given up tracking your spend altogether!

This is particularly true if you’ve bitten off more than you can chew. Hidden fees, unexpected upgrades, and unused subscriptions can quickly drain the life out of your budget. And in a world where technology budgets are under scrutiny, it pays to be efficient with your financial planning and spending.

Our advice is always to start with the smallest package and upgrade as you move upwards. Firstly, it’s easier to test features on an ad-hoc basis, rather than being locked into a long-term high-spec contract that you’re desperate to downgrade because you’re not using it. But secondly, it means your costs grow in line with your company revenue.

You’re haunted by phantom data duplicates

Due to the many ways you collect customer information with a CRM system, it’s inevitable that customer records will enter your CRM multiple times. But if you start to notice instances of the same contact or customer scattered across different tools and databases, then you’ve got a grave case of data duplication ghosts haunting your MarTech stack.

Because the quality of your data impacts almost every team. Multiple systems with no one source of truth means no single customer view. So marketing teams will struggle with segmentation, personalisation, and inconsistent messaging within their campaigns, and customer service will be slow to resolve any issues. An all-round ghastly experience for customers, isn’t it?

But even worse for your bottom line – inaccurate reports that affect your decision-making process and create missed opportunities. And let’s not forget manual data transfers, making tasks needlessly time-consuming and prone to errors. It’s frightening when you realise the impact it has.

Performing a MarTech exorcism

If you think you’ve fallen victim to one or all of the above MarTech scarefests, it’s time to cleanse your stack and banish those demons once and for all.

Start by:

• Listing out all your tools and identifying your needs
• Consolidating essential tools and removing any unnecessary or outdated ones
• Prioritising specialised platforms with easy integrations

And to avoid the dreaded MarTech horror sequel, be sure to establish a ritual of regular reviews and maintenance to keep your stack free from gremlins. Schedule routine check-ups to identify any lurking anomalies, as well as regularly cleansing your data to eliminate duplicates, update outdated information, and ensure data accuracy.

If you’re looking for CRM advice, then you’ve wandered into the right crypt. We’re a specialist CRM agency, which means we live and breathe all things operational and technical in the CRM sphere for B2B and B2C businesses worldwide. Come chat to find out more.

Until then, stay safe. It’s a horror show out there folks!