The Most Painful Marketing Headaches Revealed

New research has uncovered the biggest marketing pain points in the digital age.

Turning insights into actionable segments, lack of a single customer view and difficulty tracking customers across channels and devices have been found among the challenges that cause the biggest headaches for modern marketers, according to a new report by Econsultancy in partnership with SmartFocus.

The 'Marketing Pain Points and How to Overcome Them' report identifies the most significant challenges marketers face in today's digital age as concluded from a survey of 500 global marketers.

Key challenges identified within the report are:

• Turning insights into actionable segments to drive effective marketing content (45 per cent)
• Inability to create a single customer view (42 per cent)
• Difficulty keeping track of customers across different channels and on different devices (41 per cent)
• Complexities of using multiple data sources (40 per cent)
• Defining attribution and assessing touch points required to convert a customer (40 per cent)

One of the biggest challenges emerging seems to be the lack of ability to extract true value from data; from turning it into actionable content, creating a singular view or even to sort through the wealth of data available to connect a customer's journey across channels and devices.

Linus Gregoriadis, Research Director of Econsultancy, explained: "Digital technology and changing consumer behaviour have created a near infinite number of opportunities for marketers to reach and engage customers, while also creating a whole host of new problems for marketing teams to wrestle with."

So how do you make sure that you're able to can align your data and turn it into actionable segments for effective marketing?

First of all, less can be more. Gathering more to-the-point information that align with the goals you're trying to achieve, rather than compiling every bit of costumer data you can get your hands on, can be beneficial in ensuring that you don't drown in a sea of data.

Secondly, ensure you have an omni-channel strategy in place. This will not only help you provide a consistent customer journey, but it will also aid in aligning your contact points.

Have you faced any of the above highlighted pain points? We'd love to hear how you overcame them. Email Zarina.deRuiter@iqpc.com