Pipeline podcast: Exploring the growth of the martech stack

BOSTON -- In the span of just a few short years, the marketing technology space has ballooned from a couple hundred applications to more than 5,000 choices. With that growth has come inevitable questions about the best ways to arrange a martech stack, and how to keep up with all the options available.

Earlier this month, hundreds of marketing professionals descended on Hynes Convention Center in Boston to find answers to those questions and more about the ever-growing marketing technology space. Attendees and dozens of vendors lined conference halls, representing only a tiny fraction of the market.

The convoluted market made the MarTech Conference valuable to marketers as a way to educate themselves about the market.

"One of the things this space has taught me is there are so many different lenses people use to look at their martech stack," said Scott Brinker, co-founder of Chiefmartec.com, and organizer of the conference. Brinker also recently accepted a position at HubSpot as the vice president of its platform ecosystem.

There are so many different lenses people use to look at their martech stack.

Reps from enterprises also spoke about the challenges and importance of arranging your martech stack, with employees from companies like Staples and The Economist speaking about how they changed their ways to keep up with the digital times.

"We had to create a new paradigm on how we approached customers," said Steve Lok, head of marketing technology and operations for The Economist. "Instead of looking at platforms, we had to examine what needs exist in our organization, then find the tools to fix those problems."

Lok added that The Economist increased its martech stack budget from $150,000 to $2 million in a three-year span.

All of this and more from the MarTech Conference is discussed in the latest episode of the Pipeline podcast.