Editorial
The Gist
- Composability insight. Stack composability leverages technological innovations, fostering flexibility and resilience.
- Center platforms. Integrating central platforms with specialist apps ensures seamless data flow and customer experiences.
- Innovative strategy. Combining marketing agility with IT stability builds a flexible, robust martech stack.
“How can we effectively harness generative AI in our company stack?” is the single most heard question in conversations, webinars and events today. Our research among 1,500 real-life company stacks over seven years shows that the answer does not lie in predicting the future. The solution lies in applying what has proven successful in the past decades to harness technological innovations: stack composability, an important structural phenomenon in martech stacks overlooked for decades.
While many companies fail to recognize the profound dynamics within their martech stacks, stack composability remains conspicuously hidden in plain sight. Despite this successful approach, it is not widely accepted, as it collides with conventional wisdom. It’s time for companies to acknowledge and leverage stack composability as a proven and widely-spread practice that embraces the full potential of innovations like generative AI.
Conventional wisdom has long advocated for comprehensive multiproduct marketing suites as the panacea for martech management. Another conventional wisdom is that Shadow IT is a costly, hard-to-govern, subpar functionality. Adding to that the fury of flashy AI features flying at us every week, companies today face the daunting task of managing their martech stacks efficiently.
What Is Stack Composability Exactly?
Simply put: composability lets you combine things together to create something new. This composable approach allows companies to mix and match tools like Lego blocks, creating a flexible and resilient martech stack that keeps brand experiences relevant and companies future-proof. The ingredients for composability are a balanced combination of both center platforms and specialist apps.
Here is the recipe:
- Identify Your Center Platform: Ensure your central platform integrates seamlessly with other tools to support your core business processes and is managed by your IT department to “run the business.”
- Experiment With Specialist Apps: Use specialist apps to rapidly prototype new ideas and innovations that “change the business,” driven by marketing and sales.
- Build a Composable Martech Stack: Develop a protocol for transitioning successful prototypes from marketing to IT.
Let's break those down more in depth:
Related Article: The Heart of Composable Architecture
1. Identify Your Center Platform
Despite their marketing as all-encompassing solutions, multiproduct marketing suites are seldom utilized for what they were built. Our research, which included responses from 168 companies, shows that only 4.2% consider these suites the center of their martech stack. Instead, companies often use specific modules from these suites, such as CRM or MAP, while integrating a variety of other tools around them.
A central platform is crucial for maintaining a coherent martech stack. According to our findings, 72% of companies have a central platform that integrates over 50% of their tools. This central platform, whether it's a CRM, MAP, CDP, or CDW, acts as the backbone, ensuring seamless data flow and consistent customer experiences.
The choice of the central platform often depends on the business model. B2B companies typically prefer CRM and MAP due to the need for a lot of detailed data points about a small number of accounts. Conversely, B2C companies favor CDP or CDW to manage a small amount of data points about a vast amount of customers.
The choice of the central platform also depends on integration capabilities. Many stacks are managed as some sort of plug-and-play architecture. 83.9% find APIs important when evaluating a new martech product. While 82.7% of the respondents are using specialist apps in combination with their central platforms, about half, 46.4%, find it easy to do so. What a gap.
If the conventional wisdom dictates that a multiproduct suite inherently comes with integrated modules, then this gap comes as no surprise. Note for martech vendors: 83.9% of your buyers consider integrations as a top or core requirement, yet only 17.3% believe their current central platform excels in this area.
A significant opportunity awaits. Are you paying attention?
Related Article: Composable Architecture: How to Unite Old & New
2. Experiment With Specialist Apps
Further data shows that martech stacks consist of over 50% of specialist apps that integrate with the center platform(s). Surprisingly, many companies admit to having duplications of tools and features in their stack. In particular between their center platform and specialist apps. That is a puzzling insight if we follow the conventional wisdom.
Contrary to conventional wisdom, duplicating tools and features is not an oversight but a deliberate strategy. Our survey indicates that 82.7% of respondents use alternative apps alongside the built-in features of their central platforms.
On closer inspection, the respondents have solid reasons for "duplicating features by design."
- Functionality: Specialist apps often offer superior functionality tailored to specific needs, which is difficult for a single suite to match comprehensively. Despite huge R&D budgets for the entire suite, large vendors allocate one developer to a particular feature, whereas a small specialist app has 3-5 dedicated developers for the same feature.
- Economics: The cost associated with configuring, integrating and training for built-in features can easily exceed the expense of adopting an out-of-the-box specialist app.
- User Experience: Specialist apps, with their focused development often in close collaboration with users and clients, provide better user experiences and more refined functionalities.
- Governance: Marketing departments need agility to experiment and adapt quickly. Specialist apps allow for this without disrupting core systems, enabling rapid innovation.
Related Article: Emerging Trends Shaping the Future of Digital Experience Platforms (DXPs)
3. Build a Composable Martech Stack
Composability is not a strategy. It is a daily practice. By focusing on a well-integrated central platform, leveraging the strengths of specialist apps, and implementing a clear handover process, companies can create a martech stack that is both flexible and robust. This approach not only addresses the challenges of managing a growing number of tools but also enhances the ability to innovate and adapt to changing market needs.
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For marketing and IT departments, the key takeaway is to work collaboratively. Both have a different technology approach that complementary. By aligning their practices and embracing composability, they can build a martech stack that truly supports the company's growth and agility in an ever-evolving digital landscape.
To harness the full potential of composability (and generative AI), companies should adopt a structured approach that marries the agility of marketing with the stability of IT. There are three principles to guide this process.
Let's leave you with three actionable steps to ensure stack composability:
3 Steps to Structured Stack Composability
1. Identify Your Center Platform
- Integrate seamlessly with other tools in your stack.
- Support your core business customer journeys, i.e., “run the business” to support the current revenue streams.
- Task the IT department to ensure stability and scalability.
2. Experiment with Specialist Apps
- Use specialist apps, e.g., generative AI, to test new ideas and innovations.
- Support new business, i.e., “change the business” to support future revenue streams.
- Rapidly prototype legally compliant customer experiences (corporate policies often missing here) and IT security guardrails.
3. Implement a Clear Handover Process
- Develop a protocol for transitioning successful prototypes from marketing to IT.
- This process should involve cleaning up the prototype, briefing IT and deciding whether to integrate the specialist app into the core stack or find a compliant alternative.
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