Personalization at scale using MarTech

Abstract

The Indian consumer landscape is extremely fragmented, with differences in demographics, cultures, and other sensibilities. In the 1930s, a major emphasis was laid on the products, which can also be seen in the advertising communications of those eras. However, a paradigm shift toward brands was witnessed in the 1970s – creating product differentiation and significant brand value to get consumers to buy the products: E.g., the availability of a wide variety of soaps led to brands differentiating their products vis-à-vis distinct positioning. Gradually, with an increase in the number of brands, a shift was further seen toward consumer orientation in the 2000s and 2010s with a need to serve consumers better. The consumer was at the heart of all product innovation. Finally, in the 2020s, brands and firms are now looking to build strong customer experiences across the prospect and customer lifecycle. The average Indian retail player has moved beyond product, sales, and distribution networks as consumers increasingly seek omnichannel experiences in the post-pandemic world. These changes are crucial to create a sustainable competitive advantage in the long run and drive better results in terms of ROI. Fig. 1. Evolution of marketing initiatives focus over the years (Source) While most organizations yet interact with consumers only episodically, certain brands and digital-only/ digitally native businesses have been able to leverage technology to enable contextual and personalized interactions with consumers. Marketing today no longer relies on traditional channels such as mass media or seasonal content but is focused on delivering the right experiences at the right time to the right consumer, all enabled using a tech stack. That is how MarTech (an acronym for Marketing Technology) has recently taken center stage. MarTech is an ecosystem of several software and technologies that aid marketers in engagement, brand building, NPD, lead generation, etc. It has been termed every marketer’s dream as it equips them to instantly see the impact of any marketing stimuli such as email, creative, etc., automates processes and campaigns, and creates dashboards for analysis and forecasting. The MarTech landscape has evolved rapidly over the years. However, most solutions and tech stacks are built around creating and managing the customer journey. MarTech enables an agile way of content creation and measurement that is quick and largely data-driven.