Marketing Analytics tools are one of the most powerful weapons that B2B marketers have access to, providing them with a way to process and understand the huge amounts of first-party and third-party data that they have access to.
Used correctly, Marketing Analytics tools provide a vital competitive advantage, allowing us to truly understand what’s going on beneath the hoods of our businesses. The problem is that there are so many options out there that it can be hard to tell which B2B marketing analytics package to go with.
That’s where this article comes in. We’re not necessarily going to tell you which specific platforms to use, because you’ll still need to do the research yourself and choose the best analytics and attribution tools for your needs. Instead, we’re going to give you the tools you’ll need to identify what functionality to look for.
Cookieless attribution is a growing trend at the moment, in large part because Google has announced that third-party cookies will be phased out by 2023. With this change in mind, your Marketing Analytics tool will still need to be able to provide the same standard of tracking as legacy cookie-based tools. Ideally, you’ll be able to find either a cookieless analytics tool or one that allows you to switch between using and not using cookies. The limitation with cookie-based tools is that you will only be able to see data when users ‘allow’ cookies. Any time a user visits your site and deletes cookies, that data is lost to your company.
Building on our last point, your Marketing Analytics tool needs to ensure that you’re in full compliance with all of the appropriate privacy laws in your jurisdiction. Pay particular attention to Europe’s GDPR, the strictest privacy and security law globally, even if you are not doing business in Europe currently. No matter where your company is located, you will want to understand how your data is collected, stored and whether or not it is shared with third parties.
Heat maps are useful because they can show you exactly how your visitors are interacting with your website. Seeing as your website is essentially the digital storefront of your business, heat maps allow you to carry out the equivalent of seeing how people walk around your store and where they spend the most time. You can then ensure that your calls-to-action are in the places where they’re most likely to be seen and interacted with.
It’s important to spend some time looking at APIs and integrations because these are what will allow your Marketing Analytics tool to communicate with the other platforms that you use. The goal should be to use as few tools as possible and to adopt any new tools into an ecosystem where data is shared from one platform to another. That way, you reduce your chances of creating a silo in which useful data is stored and can’t be accessed.
Your Marketing Analytics tool needs to allow you to see everything, grouping all of your marketing’ data together in a single place. This includes everything from the basic contact information on customers, web purchases, Sales funnel status and the information from those heat maps that we talked about. Those APIs can come in handy too, bringing in data from disparate sources into a centralized hub. The goal is to use your Marketing Analytics platform as a dashboard that can tell you everything you could possibly need to know about your company’s performance. You can then make decisions based on data instead of a gut feeling.
Now that you know just a little bit about choosing the right B2B marketing analytics platform, it’s over to you so that you can put what you’ve learned into practice. Remember that there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all platform, and so it’s all about identifying your own unique needs and finding the best platform for you.
A lot of analytics platforms offer free trials or free demos at the very least. Don’t be afraid to take advantage of these, because they can be a great way to find out whether a potential platform is right for you or not.
And if you’re in the market for a powerful, cookieless Marketing Analytics tool, Metricsflow can help. Get in touch with us today to learn more about our approach to marketing analytics and to find out whether we’re a good fit for you and your organization.