This chart probably makes the point best: Marketing Technology has EXPLODED over the past five years.
In 2011, the Chief Marketing Technologist Blog identified 100 Marketing Technology firms. As of January this year, that number approached 1900. Little doubt it will have passed the 2000 mark by the time January rolls around again.
So what does this mean for your agency?
It means your firm needs to be like a Chimpanzee, in order to thrive in an increasingly competitive and complex industry.
The Chimpanzee is a creature with a strong ability to learn. Chimpanzees can even devise ways to use tools.
In terms of your agency and the pace of marketing technology development, your firm needs to be proactive in continuously studying, learning and applying new tools and technology to build YOUR business.
This is not to say that your agency has to go out and study up on all 1,876 marketing technology offerings that the Chief Marketing Technologist identified in January 2015. Rather consider animal traits we have already presented:
- The Honey Bee: be selectively specialized. Understand which marketing technologies support your agency’s specialization and acquire them.
- The Ant: curate and contract. How many marketing technologies apply within your agency’s area of specialization? Do they need them all NOW? Do they need the expertise with them in-house, or can they strategically align with a firm that possesses the expertise in the technologies that will benefit your business?
Chimpanzees are very good students. It turns out they are teachers as well.
Encourage your agency team to be proactive students of marketing technology. As they learn, empower them to share the knowledge they’ve developed with you and others in your organization.
Our industry has entered a phase of continuous and increasingly rapid change.
One thing is certain, your agency needs to be an active student.
Always be learning.
BE THE CHIMPANZEE.