Customer Experience Archives | According to Fred

December 30, 2019 by Fred

After a year of M&A where do the major DXPs go from here?

It’s a crowded marketing technology space and it gets worse every year. Startups are popping up it seems like every day to combat a specific niche need in the world of today’s digital marketer. To make matters worse (?? – intentional question), the SaaS platforms make it easier for companies to jump in and try/buy/use than ever before. The craziness around it all is that it only gets worse as you get bigger in size. But we also see that best-of-breed platforms are getting used as well, which leads me to the topic for this article. Where do the major digital experience platforms (DXPs) go from here?

Did that say billions?!

I always have some level of surprise when I see the headlines that “So and So” company bought another company for some big price tag. Let’s just use Salesforce and Tableau for example. Any time an acquisition in the MarTech space ends with a “B”, we all take notice. So when Salesforce dropped $15.7B, it’s not just an acquisition, it’s a statement. But like any acquisition, they are made for a reason, and the likely reason is that it fills a gap that the acquiring company has to either fuel further growth or immediate complementary services to add to the bottom line. Thus as you look at all the acquisitions of the last year (and into 2018) of all the major DXPs, you will see a pattern — fill a gap. There are some distinct differences in the gaps being filled and how they fuel further growth for each platform. However, gap filling is the main driver.

The acquisitions of 2019

Here is a quick list of the acquisitions in 2019 by the major DXPs.

Adobe

Allegorithmic – maker of 3d material and texture software
Adobe’s major acquisitions were in 2018 with Sayspring, Uru, Magento and Marketo.

Sitecore

Hedgehog – a professional services company with Sitecore specific IP
Sitecore’s major acquisition of 2018 was StyleLabs, a content marketing software company.

Salesforce

Griddable.io – data synchronization service
MapAnything – location based workflow software
Bonobo AI – conversational software
Tableau – data visualization
ClickSoftware – field service software

Episerver

Insite Software – B2B commerce software
Idio – a content personalization and analytics platform
Episerver was acquired by Insight Venture Partners in 2018, which is fueling the acquisitions in 2019.

Acquia

AgileOne – a customer data platform (CDP)
Cohesion – a low-code/no-code development platform
Mautic – a marketing automation platform
Acquia was acquired by Vista Equity Partners in 2019 as well, which is fueling the growth acquisition strategy as well.

SAP

None. All of their recent acquisitions were in 2018, the biggest and notable being Qualtrics.

Oracle

CrowdTwist – a loyalty software and service provider
Oxygen Systems – a NetSuite SuiteCloud Developer Network partner

OK, we got all that? So if you dig in, clearly the gaps are what is fueling the M&A. Some are rounding out their core offerings. Others are starting to get really niche in what they need to grow with.

So in my opinion, Acquia and Episerver are growing their core offerings to play with more established players such as Adobe and Salesforce. They both had recent ownership changes by private equity and they are fueling the growth needed to expand in their categories as well as grow into new spaces be it upper mid-market or lower enterprise companies.

Adobe’s sole acquisition of 2019 was very specific to content creation and in a world where they want to grow in the upcoming AR/VR space as that takes hold in 2020 and beyond. For Adobe, 2019 and going into 2020 it is all about integrating their big 2018 acquisitions of Magento and Marketo into a holistic platform with the rest of the Adobe Experience Cloud.

Sitecore’s acquisition of Hedgehog turned some heads in their partner ecosystem. Many thought this was going to change their partner relationship. Turns out it wasn’t so much that as it was to gain some proprietary IP and bolster their customer success efforts. The StyleLabs acquisition of 2018 was the big story of gaining a more robust DAM and marketing services technology.

For Salesforce, clearly the big news was the Tableau acquisition. Adding a big set of customers and adding a data visualization solution to their stack turned some heads, but maybe in jealousy rather than the actual acquisition itself. Data is complex. You can make it tell any story. But when you have the right tools to help decision makers make informed decisions, that makes business run faster and more efficiently. The difference of the other acquisitions of Salesforce is that they play in a lot of places with CRM being the hub. So whether it is conversational software or data synchronization or field service software with ClickSoftware, Salesforce is filling in specific gaps, not big ones.

Finally, I threw in SAP and Oracle only because they are big players, but they didn’t make any big noise in 2019. SAP did make some noise with the Qualtrics acquisition in 2018, but time will tell if that was a good move or not in the grand scheme of things.

Where do DXPs go now?

Disclaimer: Ok, this is where I have to make the statement that I work for a company in which we are alliance partners with many of the companies discussed here. However, all the information I’ve shared is public information. The next section is all personal opinion only based on the public information. I do not have insights into any M&A strategy by any of these companies or roadmaps through any of our partner agreements. All of these opinions are that of my own and not my employer.

It’s hard to say exactly where the major DXPs go from here. In some cases, several can fill in more niche gaps from the MarTech landscape. For companies like Adobe who also have other clouds in their product offering such as Advertising Cloud and Document Cloud, the acquisition front could shift to those to increase share of wallet on related services. Adobe Acrobat and Sign are great back-office softwares. Where else can they grow the back-office space? Adobe doesn’t have a CRM, but they do have a strong alliance with Microsoft with growing integrations of their Office 365 suite of services which includes Microsoft Dynamics.

For other companies such as Acquia, Sitecore, and Episerver, the play could be to continue to get to feature parity with Salesforce and Adobe. That’s a tall order as both Adobe and Salesforce play in so many places beyond the typical digital front-end these companies are known for. I personally also think this is why Adobe and Salesforce are public companies and Episerver, Acquia, and Sitecore are all still private. There just isn’t enough of an offering yet to be viable public companies.

For 2020, I think we will say a balance of a few things happen with the major DXPs.

First, those that have a mature offering will focus on integration of their offerings for better customer success and user experience. Marketers want (myself included) solutions that allow us to not have to rely on developers to create everything for us. We want to be able to do stuff on our own and bring in our dev teams as needed for custom experiences and solutions. So bringing these solutions tighter together to allow us to do our jobs better, faster, more efficiently and intelligently will be key.

Second, for the DXPs where they are playing catch up will need to decide how feature parity they want to go, and how they will differentiate themselves. What makes their offerings different than any of the others. Is it simpler to use? Better licensing models? Integrations with one or more of the thousands of other popular MarTech solutions out there?

Third, we will see more M&A. There are still some great solutions out there that are used by thousands of companies that will get gobbled up. I think anything around analytics and insights is fair game. Data visualization is fair game. Customer engagement solutions for better real-time response and data gathering. Really, any platform that is part of the overall customer lifecycle that can add data value to a DXP platform is fair game. Because with all the data privacy and collection laws coming into play, the more the DXPs can own the data source the better.

Final thoughts

I find the MarTech landscape one of the most fascinating spaces in the world of marketing. The technology to allow businesses to discover new audiences, create solutions, market to them, engage, and provide value is nothing short of amazing. It also makes marketing one hell of a tough job in 2020 as well. But as the landscape continues to shift to new channels, ways of engaging customers and prospects change with a changing demographic, the technology needs to keep up too. So whether you make your bet on wearables, voice, AR/VR, 5G, eSports or any of the plethora of channels, the one thing is certain — engaging with a customer base will require technology, data, and creativity. The companies that can offer solutions that fill those areas will find customers. The DXPs that can offer a tightly integrated platform around those areas will also win, but only if it works together and isn’t clunky.

Here’s to 2020 and the rollercoaster ride ahead. Cheers.

This post originally appeared as a LinkedIn published article.

October 4, 2018 by Fred

To Fuel Growth, Fill Your Gaps: Adobe Buys Marketo

There’s been an awakening. Have you felt it? I’m pretty sure every MarTech “Jedi” just felt a tremor in The Force…Adobe is purchasing Marketo for $4.7bn.

Let that sink in.

In a string of acquisitions in the last five years, nothing has come close to this price. SAP bought Hybris for $1.5bn. Salesforce purchased ExactTarget for $2.5 bn. Both in 2013. Salesforce acquired DemandWare for $2.8bn in 2016. Add to the fact that Adobe was in the running for at least two of those companies themselves…it was time to make a statement. And a statement they have made. The mic has been dropped.

via GIPHY

In a world where everyone is racing to create experiences, you need amazing software and practitioners to do it. You can either assemble a hodgepodge of solutions, or go with entire platforms (integrated or not). You can tell your IT dept you are going SaaS or IT can tell you that you need to go “On Prem.” You could decide to build the solutions yourself. In any scenario there are pros and cons. For every company, a decision on how you assemble your “stack” is very individual. There is no shortage of options for any company to use. The MarTech space is very, VERY crowded.

Over the last decade Adobe has been making changes and moves to assemble a suite of creative solutions and now marketing solutions. No other company can take you through the entire lifecycle of content creation to production to marketing to analysis than Adobe. No small feat. Not with out it’s own set of challenges. With any acquisition, integrating technologies takes planning, time, and sometimes hard work. When you are looking for growth, you need to identify where your gaps are and determine where you can acquire those skills or technology. You can either build, or buy. Adobe has done both.

Fill Your Gaps – Don’t Mind Them

I’ve been in several discussions when news broke last week that Adobe was in talks with Marketo. These sidebar conversations ranged from “Whoa, that’s interesting!” to “Doesn’t Marketo compete with Adobe Campaign?” Worthy conversations to say the least. It was a little bit of a head scratcher once the shock of name dropping of the two companies in the same sentence with the word “acquire” in there wore off. What will Adobe do with Marketo and why did they buy them? The answer is “fill gaps.” Yes, Adobe purchased Neolane in 2013 and has since rebranded it Adobe Campaign and has two versions of it. One is a grown version of the legacy Neolane product and the other is a rebuilt, rewritten version of Neolane in the cloud. Both versions do compete with Marketo to a degree. But, Marketo has features Campaign doesn’t, namely lead management (scoring, etc), account based marketing features, marketing attribution, data management and more. If you are a marketer in 2018, these are core tools in your current and future strategies. If you don’t have them implemented, they should be in your roadmap. Adobe Campaign lacks these features and I’m sure it was noticed.

When it comes to building, Adobe has their “Marketing Cloud Platform” which is a set of services, APIs, and other connective tissue beneath the surface of the larger solutions. There is no shortage of innovation going on there, which is where Adobe Sensei was born, their AI solution.

Building an Empire Means Always Evolving

Just over a week ago Forbes published the article “Why $128 Billion Adobe Is Running Scared“. Wait, what? Running scared? They are on top of every possible category as a leader for their technology. Why in the world are they running scared? Well, when you’re on top, everyone is coming for you. As Peter Carbonara wrote in that article:

The explanation for the expensive expansionism: In the rapidly changing world of software, small pieces of turf are hard to defend. There is always the risk that some larger company will either wrap a competing product into a larger suite you don’t offer or, worse, give away for free what you’re selling.

The target can’t be bigger for Adobe on their back. While it might not be advised to make two major acquisitions in the same year, let alone within four months, sometimes you need to evolve to keep pushing and leading the pack. There are few gaps left Adobe has to fill. They bolstered their marketing automation solutions today, and lack of commerce a few months ago with the purchase of Magento. Now integrating these solutions into the Experience Cloud is where Adobe can shine, bring value add, and give their customers a robust suite of solutions to connect with their customers.

65,000 Users Can’t Be Wrong

If you thought Adobe had an ecosystem of users, partners, and advocates, well…Marketo does too. The Marketing Nation conference is one of the marketing conferences to go to every year. Their customers are invested in their platform because it is such an essential tool to their “stack”. If you are going beyond basic email marketing and beyond a SMB, there are few tools to graduate to. It’s Hubspot, Marketo, CheetahDigital, and maybe a few more. To say that the Marketo Nation will fit in with the Adobe Marketing Nation is probably an understatement. I also think many, many Marketo customers use Adobe Experience Cloud solutions as well. So there is probably a more natural fit than one might think.

So, What’s Left to Buy?

So what’s left? In my opinion, CRM. One could argue that Marketo helps fill that hole, and it does a little. It buys them time, but I still think CRM is still a gap. Another gap is going to be where experiences traverse into voice, IoT, and AR/VR. While I know they have made some small purchases here, and they are indeed innovating, it has yet to be seen where it really shapes up and makes a mark. Could a DAM purchase be in their future? Adobe assets has become a solid solution, but it still has some features it lacks. That is also a byproduct of the state of content strategy, headless CMS, and where an “asset” isn’t just a document or picture. Finally, data visualization and other front-office tools. For now, their strategic relationship with Microsoft fills those holes.

So now we sit and wait. How will Oracle, Salesforce, SAP, and others respond to this news? Who knows. All I know is that Adobe Summit is going to be one hell of a time in March 2019.

Disclaimer: My employer, ICF, is a Premier Adobe Solutions Partner. The thoughts and opinions conveyed here are of my own. I do not have access to road maps or acquisition information.

This article was first published on LinkedIn.

January 29, 2018 by Fred

Mining for Personalization: How Far is Too Far?

How far are companies willing to go with technology to mine data and gain insights to deliver personalization to us?

I was in a conversation last week at work and somehow we got on the topic of voice and other “creepy” examples we see or interpret that leads to ads appearing on our devices. One example given was a co-worker was in her office with our summer intern at the time and was discussing a purchase she made on her computer on Amazon. The next day our intern stated that she started seeing ads for that same item on her Facebook feed. Two different users, different devices, not even an item the intern would have purchased, but ads are showing up now on her computer. This wasn’t the first time I had a conversation like this where ads would start to appear based on verbal conversations.

The conversation went further with someone else stating that they read Facebook was experimenting with analyzing the dust patterns on your photos from your cell phone lens to match people who are or are not connected and other data mining like Geo, proximity to each other, behavior patterns, etc. Now, Facebook isn’t actually doing this, but the idea that using location data or even dust to identify people who may show up in the “you may know” area, it does get creepy when you think about it. (NOTE: Facebook does neither, but not without admitted experimentation. See link above.)

We’ve heard the stories of apps using the microphone to listen in on conversations and TV shows for ad targeting. How far are tech companies willing to go to mine your data, behavior, and other attributes to deliver personalized, content, experiences, or in many cases just ad targeting? Farther than many of us realize.

Let’s be clear, if the dust analyzing freaks you out, you are uploading photos to a “free” service in which I’m confident somewhere in their Terms of Use states they can do this. You agree to those terms every time you use the app or website. A nice reminder of what “free” means in the age of the Internet. So when we are willingly providing data to a third party, how can we not expect them to mine this data to experiment and possibly deliver more value to you? It’s a fine line of value vs. trust.

Even as a marketer, I myself feel there is a limit we need to adhere to. I’m right there with the next marketer who wants as targeted of an audience as possible. We all want the Segment of One. To get there, it will take a lot of technology and analyzing data points. But dust specs on a smartphone lens from a photo that was uploaded? Seems a little too far to me.

So how far are we willing to go? How desperately do we need data, attributes, behaviors to map to get that customer? Are we willing to play the “everyone just clicks accept” to get the app or use the site? How much are we willing to build then break trust with our customers to get to the segment of one?

April 24, 2017 by Fred

Diet of Customer Relationships Shouldn’t Include SPAM

Last week I was scrolling through LinkedIn and caught this post by Charlie Cole, Chief Digital Officer, VP at TUMI.

As marketers we are always under the pressure to build a pipeline, a funnel and get leads, convert, etc. However, if we take the premise that we need to build Trust as a foundation, first engagement doesn’t mean open the floodgates on them!

So here is what often happens, and I think Charlie is spot on. You get a person to give you some Personal Identifiable Information (PII) and it is like you hit paydirt! Clearly they want to hear from us. They gave us their information. So let’s subscribe them to EVERYTHING. I’m sure it has happened to you. It happens to me all the time. I want a report from a vendor, I fill out a form and then I’m hounded for MONTHS. I go to a trade show, I get scanned at a few booths. I get HOUNDED for weeks or months.

It’s wrong and we can do better.

Every Relationship Takes Time

If you are married, think back to how the beginning of your relationship started. I’ll wait a minute. Got it? Good. Did you pop the question on the first date? Did you start asking for their financial background, credit history, and medical records? No. Chances are you started with some big, broad questions to get to know them. Personality questions, life goals, politics (or not…if you want to get to date #2). Information that is going to start to paint a picture about them, their life, interests, and compatibility. As you talk, text, video chat, and go out on dates more, you build more information about that person. You get secrets, regrets, stories about their childhood. You meet their friends and get a different perspective from them. A trust is built. Each time you get a little more information. That is how we need to re-approach marketing.

It takes time and we need to build content, interactions, engagements that build a profile of a person. What are their interests? What are they reading? What did they “like” from our posts on social media? Did they follow us? Did they see us at a trade show? Join a webinar? Just like dating, you aren’t going to meet the parents on the first date. So spend time to get to know them. Gather a little bit of information at a time. Start with an email address. Get a company name and a title. See if they follow you on social media. These are low barrier tactics to building a profile. Do some customer research. How big is their company? Who are the decision makers? Are they? Or are they an influencer? This will take time. Weeks, months, maybe even a year.

Know Your Customer and Their Journey

A relationship takes time and it is a journey. I won’t say it is impossible, and that nobody buys services on a whim, but in reality, the buying cycle is a journey that can take months or years. More often than not, I want to be left alone in my research of an issue, problem, or new piece of software I am looking to evaluate before I get a demo or interact with someone. My biggest pet peeve is when I do the first engagement and I get inbound calls and emails CONSTANTLY like Charlie. Trust me, you aren’t going to get far if you take this approach. You might get lucky, but I bet ore often than not you are striking out. I get what many called marketing fatigue. In fact, it is showing that we are trying too hard.

So be smart. Know when to back off. Know when to engage. Have patience. If you are providing the right information when the person wants it, they will ask for a phone call. They will ask for the demo. They need to go through their journey. That isn’t to say be completely hands off. You still need to know what they need to make an informed decision, that includes your products and services. Know their journey, and when to step in when needed.

Provide Value Along the Way

Value. Let me repeat. Value. That is what we need to do as organizations and marketers. If we can’t deliver value to our prospects and customers in time of need, we are just greedy and hungry for a sale to meet a quota. To this day, I still get daily offers from an airline I flew twice to Canada last year. Daily. I should unsubscribe, but I know I’m going to get that call that says I need to go back to our Toronto office and I’ll be back buying a ticket. Might as well get it for 30% off. But, it doesn’t make it right. In fact, my tolerance is probably higher than most (byproduct of being a marketer…always checking out what people are doing).

If you know that a relationship takes time and you know that there is a journey to be taken, be ready to provide the value along the way. Have the journey mapped out as best you can. Create content, test content, find what works and iterate all the time. Know when it is right to pick up the phone and when it is time to back off. As soon as you seem too aggressive, they will go to your competitor. Then you are stuck with an annoyed cold lead that won’t convert.

So What Can We Do?

So what do we need to do to change all of this? A few suggestions. Not all are achievable, but worth a discussion.

Change the KPIs we are measured on. I’m going to say it, we should be focusing on quality, not quantity. I understand we need to try to move leads through a process. And we have quotas to meet every quarter and every year. However, remember, the customer is in control, not us. We can only be there when they need us and give them the best content and value we can as they make up their mind.
Focus on the parts of the buying journey that are most influential. We really need to get in the heads of our customers and those who influence the buying process. That means we need to know exactly what we are offering and how it benefits our customers. We need to spend time in the field with our customers. When we are learning about our prospects, we need to understand that different points of the process are important to different people. Be ready to be individual.
Get sophisticated, but not pushy. There is a lot of technology at our fingertips to engage with prospects. Be smart about using these tools to track, evaluate, and engage. If you need 13 touch points during a sales process, make sure they are the best 13 touch points, not just 13 touch points in a timeframe that you think they need to have them. Let them tell you.

Let’s get back to basics. We have so many tools and pressures to meet expectations. Don’t take every first engagement and turn on the firehose. Don’t SPAM your prospects because you think they want to know hear everything from you. Be smart. Know what works. Measure along the way. Know the journey, and if you don’t, figure it out, quick.

If you rush a relationship, you may end up in a divorce pretty quickly, or no relationship at all. Better to have a long lasting customer who is your advocate than one who will have a bad experience and share that with the world.

April 12, 2017 by Fred

Google is Trying Too Hard to Beat Amazon Echo at Commerce

The battle for the home personal assistant is in full force. Amazon came out of left field with the release of Echo and the Alexa assistant over two years ago. Since then, everyone from Google to Samsung to Apple to Microsoft has been scrambling to come up with their digital assistant or in-home connected speaker. Each has their own strengths based on their originators background. For the Echo, the core is about commerce. It is what Amazon is best at and while there is content from Amazon Music, it is really about enabling more purchases on Amazon Prime.

Google, on the other hand, comes from a pedigree of search and ads. Without a display, getting ads into the mix of Google Home will be a tricky topic. We’ve already seen the feedback from when Beauty and the Beast was coming to theaters. Commerce isn’t really a strong suit of Google’s, but it’s not stopping them from trying to monetize the in-home device.

For me and my wife, the best feature of Google Home is the ability to manage our shopping list. We (and the kids) would add items to a shared Google Keep list and it really became a part of our weekly routine. Well, that’s about to change. This week Google unexpectedly changed how shopping lists are managed with Google Home and shifted the lists out of Google Keep and into Google Express, Google’s commerce tool. Needless to say…I, and many others, are not happy. It’s not so much that Google wants to push Google Express on me. I just think they did it in the wrong way.

First, just over a month ago, Google added commerce capabilities to Google Home. Using Google payment options, you could enable shopping to Costco and Target. While I set up my payment options, I never actually went through the exercise to set up products to be purchased, or re-supplied, through one or several of the partner companies. Regardless, the feature of commerce existed.

Second, the collaboration of adding and managing our shopping list, a weekly routine for us, has now been disrupted. We can no longer manage the list easily. Google Express is a website for me to log into, and I have to go through what seems like more steps to even see my list by going through the Google Home app, into a slide out menu, to my shopping list, to then fire up a browser. WHAT?! Before it was as simple as open Google Keep, tap on my shopping list, which was my first list. Easy. So the user experience got worse…big time.

Third, how this was all communicated was horrible. No transition period. No, ‘hey, we are looking to change the experience and here’s why this benefits you.’ None of that. Just switched this week without warning. Poor customer experience.

Finally, I think Google is trying too hard to be like Amazon. I know they think they need commerce to make this tool profitable for them because they know putting ads into Home will really piss people off. And they are right. However, I will say, I went with a Google Home over an Amazon Echo because shopping wasn’t the primary driver for me. My primary driver was the Google ecosystem that my life was already committed to.

Google needs to play to its strengths on this one. Be different. Don’t try to copy everything Amazon does. In fact, it is going to screw up the product if you do. Play to your search pedigree. Play to your strong ecosystem of mail, calendar, reminders, mobile, and more. I’m happy to have Google Express integrated. I’m happy to shop through it even though I have Amazon Prime. Frankly, I just don’t shop that way with Amazon. I’m not sure I will with Google Express either. Shopping is not the reason I bought a Google Home. Ron Amadeo says it best from Ars Technica Op-Ed…they are ruining a good product to push a inferior service.