Marketing clouds face bad weather

Jana Marle-Zizkova/New Straits Times
It’s time for startups in Asia to get realistic. Our relationships with marketing clouds — despite their commitment to change, despite promising for years they would deliver what we want and need, despite their claims of progression and forward-thinking — aren’t working out.
We think it’s time for us to bite the bullet, and break up with the Cloud.
Every startup, no matter its growth stage or size, has a need to collect and maximise the use of first-party data.
For years, startups have maintained a relationship with marketing clouds, believing that they would develop the maturity to deliver what we need: real-time customer data activation, based on rich customer profiles.
But it’s time to wake up to the reality that it’s not working out.
The ability to harness first-party data for marketing is a non-negotiable for startups and cannot be underestimated.
We believe first-party data is the greatest asset a company owns, and to that end, it should be accessible and used by all teams in a company, including marketers.
Sad to say, marketing clouds haven’t been able to live up to expectations — they haven’t solved customer data issues.
Marketing clouds don’t give companies the ability to connect to their first-party customer data sources easily or quickly, and they often don’t deliver the full depth of data that is needed.
We need to see past the promises.
In reality, marketing clouds can require extensive additional support that can take months or even years to implement.
Even once the cloud is up and running, severe limitations can exist regarding marketers’ access to, and ability to engage with, data quickly and in the best interest of the company.
Even the “data integration promise” presented by marketing clouds usually amounts to a proposal along the lines of: “Oh, yes, we can ingest your data… Here is an FTP (file transfer protocol) and a structured CSV file (the CSV exactly according to our (usually very sparse) documentation and upload it regularly on our FTP. We will then load it into the system for you.”
But that’s not actually “data integration”, it’s actually more work for your company.
In the end, you may be left to complete the integration on your own.
And, we’re sorry to say, this often isn’t a one-time issue. Application programming interfaces (APIs) change, products evolve and more.
Setting up integrations is one thing, but maintaining them is another.
If you’ve been seduced by marketing clouds promising “we connect to everything”, be alert, and be aware of what may be behind that claim.
With marketing clouds, we have data silos, even years after activation. There is digital divide, disconnected data and a limited ability to get personal with customers.
We’ve been hearing about enhanced personalisation for years, but, in our experience, businesses have their data in silos, spread across platforms for specific teams, and they’re just not getting everything out of it. It’s a mess.
What is the solution? If we’re moving towards breaking up with marketing clouds, what’s the next-step relationship we should invest in, to give even non-technical teams in our startups simple, efficient and effective access to first-party data we’re collecting?
Many experts think startups should take a look at customer data platforms (CDPs).
CDPs help companies consolidate customer behaviour data from every source — online, offline, in-store, CRM, DMP, and more — unifies it, and makes it available to an organisation.
Some companies even use a combination of CDPs and marketing clouds, if they’re too far invested to make a clean break.
CDPs is an industry that experts predict will reach US$1 billion (RM4.2 billion) by next year.
CDPs allow companies to dive deep into their data, enabling a greater one-on-one experience and engagement with a customer.
Great CDPs are accessible and understandable by every team in a company too — marketers can deliver campaigns, IT teams have full control, transparency and visibility over data flows, and compliance is made easy — all with one system.
Regardless of the platform used, we know the No. 1 need for startups when it comes to data management is the ability to access and interact with data quickly to achieve the needs of a company.
Getting your hands on real-time data, without having to wade through silos or wait for logistics or technicalities to play their part, is essential for companies.
So, it may be time to get real with your startup’s relationship with marketing clouds, and look at different options.