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OPEN LECTURE: MarTech Trends - Influencing Factors

  • Writer: Megi Gogua
    Megi Gogua
  • May 25, 2024
  • 7 min read

Updated: Sep 27, 2024



View the video recording of the Online MarTech Lecture:


Introduction

 

Hello everyone!

 

I’m really happy to welcome you to the first Online Open MarTech lecture.

 

My name is Megi, I have taught and studied MarTech for many years already, and with this series of Online Open Lectures, I would like to share with you what I know so far.

 

This series of lectures will contain all the topics related to MarTech, from broad approaches to certain examples and cases.

 

These lectures are for those who consider MarTech to be the topic, field, or direction of their career development. Also, these videos are for those who already have marketing experience but want to see a broader horizon and more examples of the application of technologies in marketing. Those who generally wish to learn something new can also benefit from these recordings of Online Open Lectures.

 

I really hope that this initiative of mine will be useful for you and helpful because I would love to share with you everything I know and invite you to this wonderful journey of finding something new, something interesting. If you ask me, this field of MarTech is incredibly fascinating and useful, and I’m happy to be able to guide you through it.


Last time, we discussed MarTech from the perspective of the term - definition, related concepts, its components and what it covers as an umbrella term. As with any other evolving field, it rapidly develops; hence, it is possible to see the clear trends it can follow, especially in B2C.

 

Today we will cover an important topic, which comes hand in hand with MarTech as a definition, and it is Trends. These trends can be statistical, numerical, qualitative, quote-based, and others. Today’s topic refers to the MarTech trends in 2024 and any other year as well. Why any other year, too? Indeed, you can search the internet for specific MarTech trends for a particular year, for example, statistical information on using a specific MarTech tool. Nevertheless, in a broader sense, you can learn how to determine the potential general trends of MarTech based on three components: marketing trends + technological trends + market trends. This approach is useful when can not find the statistical or qualitative information (like quotes) for your specific industry or country, so you can derive your own theory. Also, it is a good practice for your strategic thinking, which is also useful for any marketer.


So, apart from the clear information that you can find as a result of this keyword search, I think of the MarTech trends as the summary of three major components: Marketing Trends + Technological Trends + Market Trends.


Introduction of me as a lecturer

 

Before we get to the lecture, I would like to introduce myself with this slide.



A screenshot from the video with a description of my Education and Experience
A screenshot from the video with a description of my Education and Experience

Full information about my Education and Experience is available here:



…+…+… = MarTech Trends

 

MarTech as a field combines components, and these components are Marketing trends, technological trends, and market trends.

 

This comprehensive understanding of underlying trends related to MarTech helps to rely not only on the information you find in the reports from the analytical and consulting organisations and research papers but to learn how these trends operate to conclude the potential development directions for your business or your country’s market.

 

It is important to remember that the information from the report, while mostly relevant, does not always answer your question on the specific MarTech problem. The market state of, for example, any city in Canada is clearly different from the one in any city in France.

 

What to pay attention to when considering these concepts:

 

- Marketing Trends refer to the major trajectory of current marketing development. In short, in B2C we are in the era of customer-centricity, the individualised approach, and personalised communications.

 

- Technological Trends help to see the possibilities for realising marketing goals and objectives through technological advancements. With the increased efficiency of technological powers, it became easier and quicker to collect and process customers’ data, including personal data, behavioural patterns, and purchase history. Therefore, the individualised, personalised, customer-centric approach became a reality and became applicable quicker through marketing-related technology and tools.

 

- Market Trends are essential for determining the applicability of any MarTech trend to a particular market. Depending on the market you want to apply your MarTech-related initiatives to, you are most likely to consider the readiness of the customers, the industry specificities, and the legal frames and regulations. Customers in, for example, the UK, USA, Spain, Finland, Latvia, and Georgia are not the same; the markets (customers, laws, infrastructure) are drastically different; hence, the MarTech trends can act differently at any of these locations.

 

There may not be a particular statistically proven MarTech trend for the location you are interested in; however, by combining Marketing Trends + Technological Trends + Market Trends, you can make more efficient marketing decision-making.

 

From the Online Open MarTech lecture 1, we know that there are several trending concepts associated with MarTech, according to the recent presentation by Philip Kotler [2]:

  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) and related algorithms – even though there are numerous opinions and discussions on whether we can trust AI, use it, or fear it, we cannot neglect its importance within the scope of MarTech, especially regarding algorithms, the foundation of marketing personalization;

  • Digital and social media – this type of media gives the possibility to have two-way communication with customers, elevating the ways the marketing goals can be achieved online, from the understanding of the user persona and customers’ segmentation and behavioural patterns, giving the platform for the GenAI content generation and targeted advertising, scheduled posting, metrics and measurements’ collection, collecting not only quantitative but also qualitative information, like the topics of conversations online and opinions (as an example of semantic analysis), to mention only a few;

  • Voice and facial recognition – the digital assistants that we have on our laptops, smartphones or speakers (such as Siri and Alexa) can be used for marketing purposes, hence making them a part of MarTech, for example, by learning about the customers through the conversations, as well as training their AI components;

  • Big Data and Machine Learning – the drastic increase in data accumulation represents the term “Big Data” which is a foundation of machine learning, the core of AI, helping technology to learn and be able to operate independently, how to reduce errors;

  • Chatbots in all of their variations – textual or verbal (when an artificial voice answers you call a bank, for example), the chatbots are focused on keeping a conversation with the customer, could be script-based or AI-based;

  • Augmented (AR) and virtual reality (VR) – by linking physical reality with the virtual one it is possible to extend the customer experience and grasp more opportunities, however, as usual, paying a lot of attention to the ethical side of this option;

  • Intelligent virtual agents – these agents represent the AI-based conversational technology that delivers real-time responses and solutions to frequent questions and problems;

  • Biometrics and Neuroscience – the more advanced the technology gets, the more precise it gets in learning the way the human operates, to replicate further or forecast human behaviour;

  • Autonomous machines (robots, drones, self-driving vehicles) – these represent the physical embodiment of the virtual systems we are talking about, extending the customers’ touchpoints into real, physical life;

  • Sensors and the Internet of Things (IoT) – these allow linking already existing items in the household to connect and create an ecosystem, for example, by sharing the smart devices’ data to the e-commercial solutions.

 


Examples: 


The marketing, technological and market issues we need to consider when applying the potential of the use of the aforementioned instruments in your particular market could be the following:


  • MarTech requires data and its unification – however, there are certain developing countries with limited or fragmented access to not only the Internet but electricity in general. Evidently, the technology and market capabilities need to be taken into consideration way before the potential MarTech use.


  • Conversational agents, such as verbal and textual chatbots, can simulate a real conversation, and they become widely used – however, the languages they use can be restricted: the rarer languages, such as, for example, Georgian language, are not easily accessible for international website localization, even though there already are several organizations that are training AI systems to recognize and use rare languages, including Georgian.


  • Law on AI use (or any other data-based technology use in general) is highly fragmented all around the world – as a business, it is crucial to comply with the legal and ethical requirements at each market you operate on. For example, the legal documents include the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), Apple’s App Tracking Transparency feature, and many others. Additionally, the Artificial Intelligence Act of the European Union came into force on 1 August 2024.


  • The expectations of the customers of the developed countries may keep increasing: personalised emails, personalised recommendations, quick replies, and dialogue with the conversational agents became a must, so for a company to gain a competitive advantage, the use of MarTech tools needs to be even more advanced, and at the same time transparent and governed.

 

There are plenty of other issues to be studied when considering trends and the use of MarTech in various markets. This shows the importance of relying not only on marketing technology but also on fundamental marketing strategy and marketing management.  This is because both the lack of the opportunity for the MarTech implementation and the excessive requirement of using MarTech for the business’s competitive advantage require a broad understanding of marketing in general.





Concluding remarks

 

I hope it was useful! Do not hesitate to share this article with anyone you consider to be interested in this topic.

 

If you wish to learn more, you can follow the links:


Explore the MarTech field

Learn about MarTech: Attend my Open Online MarTech Lectures


Talk about MarTech: Participate in the “MarTalks” – my open speaking/discussion club


Practice for your MarTech communications: Complete my Free English Exercises for Marketers


Excel in your MarTech career


Learn about your MarTech career possibilities:


Explore the specificities of the developing MarTech field by going through my guide – The MarTech Guide

Ask me directly – register for a consultation with me to learn about the MarTech career trajectories, required skills and examples of the tasks


Improve your English for marketing purposes

  • Register for the Individual consultation or lessons based on your request (ex. presentation rehearsal, preparation for negotiations, MarTech terms and vocabulary enrichment)


  • Register to develop your individual learning programme for a chosen career path in MarTech





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