Research from Forrester Consulting commissioned by software provider Oracle has found Australian marketers at the top of the international game.

The report Why You Need To Be A Modern Marketer: The Business Impact Of Marketing Maturity In The Age Of The Customer shows a strong correlation between modern marketing best practices and business success. The study found Australian marketers more willing to invest in marketing technology that supports a rich ecosystem of complementary, partner-created applications.

The study surveyed 523 marketing decision-makers across a range of industries in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, and Australia, and found that organisations that embrace modern marketing processes outperform their non-modern marketing peers and competitors on key business performance indicators. The study defined modern marketers as marketers that use a combination of real-time predicative models and statistical techniques including intelligent targeting and cross-channel marketing attribution to ensure personalised customer engagement throughout each stage of the purchase journey.

The study found that when compared to marketers surveyed in the US, UK, Germany and France, Australian marketers lead the way when it comes to adoption of modern marketing. Australia specific findings from the report include:

• Australian marketers are much more likely to use at least some form of marketing automation platform, with only seven percent saying they use none (versus 22 percent for the rest of the world). However, Australian marketers are still not likely to have a single, fully integrated, cross-channel platform (20 percent versus 15 percent of their international counterparts).
• Australians are more willing to invest in marketing technology that supports a rich ecosystem of complementary, partner-created applications (83 percent of Australians versus 64 percent for the rest of the world).
• When asked if they use technology and process to build profiles that help to better understand customer needs, more than half (53 percent) of Australian marketers strongly agreed with this statement versus 28 percent for the rest of the world. More Australians strongly agree that their marketing technology is more advanced when compared to their peers (47 percent versus 25 percent).

“To meet ever-increasing demands, marketers need to be able to quickly and easily optimise the customer experience and execute marketing programs that have a measurable impact on revenue,” said Andrea Ward, vice president, Marketing, Oracle Marketing Cloud.

“The survey results indicate that Australian marketers understand the need to adopt modern marketing technology and best practices in order to meet these demands. While it is evident that many organisations have quite a way to go in their journey to modern marketing, the strong correlation between marketing maturity and business success clearly demonstrates how modern marketers can take on a more strategic and impactful role within their organisations.”

Additional findings from the report include:

• Revenue growth: 44 percent of modern marketers reported that their organisation’s revenues exceeded their plan by 10 percent or more over the last 12 months, versus only 25 percent of their non-modern marketing peers.
• Market leadership: 95 percent of modern marketers reported they have some form of market leadership position, with 49 percent claiming that they are the sole market leaders.
• Workplace excellence: 70 percent of modern marketers claimed that they had received national recognition as a “best place to work” at least once in the past three years, compared with only 38 percent of what the study defined as novice marketers.

Despite a clear and measurable impact on revenue, many businesses have yet to adopt modern marketing best practices. In fact, only 12 percent of respondents were considered “Modern” marketers, and most respondents were either identified as “Experienced” marketers (33 percent), “Developing” marketers (41 percent), or “Novice” marketers (14 percent).

To deliver on the full promise of customer centricity and achieve the business benefits of modern marketing, many marketers still need to rethink practices in the following areas:

• Customer conversion and acquisition: More than half of the respondents (52 percent) still focus marketing efforts on conventional conversion and customer acquisition processes, and only 17 percent of marketers extend activity to include lead scoring, nurturing, behavioral triggers, and lead recycling.
• Customer communications: Even while marketers strive to enhance engagement, 56 percent still conduct mostly one-way, outbound communications.
• Cross-channel integration: More than half of marketers (56 percent) admit their marketing infrastructure is separated by channel and lacks integration.