Results from the ADMA Global Forum 2014 show the vast majority of respondents consider the current role of the marketer to be highly complex, with the interdependence between technology and marketing set to increase over the next three years.
While 83 per cent of respondents described the role as challenging, a further 15 per cent said marketing is like rocket science.
The research was conducted by Oracle Marketing Cloud who surveyed 96 marketers at ADMA Global Forum Sydney.
Survey results uncovered that more than half (52 per cent) of businesses are leveraging cloud technology to support the marketing function, with a further 30 per cent planning to implement cloud technology by 2017. This is indicative of the rapidly changing marketing landscape, demanding today’s marketer to demonstrate technical skills, traditionally the domain of IT professionals, in addition to their marketing expertise.
Paul Cross, Vice President of Customer Success, JAPAC at Oracle, said, “The role of marketing is undergoing a significant transformation as organisations adapt to increasing consumer demands for personalised and relevant experiences. While the survey findings highlight increasing complexities in the role, the increasing ability of marketing to drive business growth is significant, and this is why we can expect to see marketing budgets increasing and teams growing.”
Also reflected in the survey findings is the potential increasing value of marketing in an organisation. 44 per cent of those surveyed said their team had increased in size over the past 12 months while 55 per cent of respondents anticipate their marketing budget will also increase over the next twelve months.
Findings indicate that marketers are planning to implement new tools into their marketing strategy, with 62 per cent of respondents looking towards a social solution and 54 per cent to cross channel marketing. Marketing Automation and Data Management are also on the agenda, with the majority of respondents (91 per cent) looking to implement either one of these tools.
“At the core of modern marketing is customer centricity, delivering a highly personal customer experience enabled by the use of data,” said Cross.
“Knowing how to use data can be viewed as complex, however the survey findings demonstrate that savvy marketers are looking to new tools which allow them to further innovate whilst also achieving greater marketing simplicity. Today’s modern marketer can gain real returns from cross-channel marketing with highly personalised customer outreach but in an automated and orchestrated manner.”
