The Must-Know Open Marketing Definitions

Today, companies are competing on a new battleground: the customer experience. CX is increasingly dependent on data, and as marketing and IT professionals are learning, legacy marketing technologies are unable to adapt to keep pace with modern demands. These solutions silo and restrict access to data; they limit capabilities and stifle creativity; they are centralized, stagnant, and closed. Companies are struggling with these outdated systems because they need the freedom to communicate with their customers wherever the next interaction takes place, and marketers need the freedom to innovate faster and integrate all of their technology. Acquia believes technology should be flexible to meet the demands of today and tomorrow. The world is moving away from outdated, closed systems because everyone can see what Acquia already knows, that the future of marketing is open.

At Acquia, our mission is to power the world’s greatest digital experiences -- experiences that live up to and surpass expectations. We help companies seamlessly unite all of their touchpoints, from their website to email, across mobile, social and everywhere else their brand may live. We do this with our digital experience platform (DXP). We do this with open marketing.

Now, in the spirit of being open, we’re answering some of the most frequently asked questions about open marketing. Let’s start with one of the main advantages of open marketing: better marketing automation.

What is marketing automation?

Marketing automation is technology that automates repetitive tasks, like sending multiple emails as part of a nurture or drip campaign. Instead of having to log in and send each of these emails individually to designated audiences, automation lets you set up rules at the beginning for how you want the campaign to work, and who you want it to go to. And then it executes that campaign automatically for you, adjusting to real-time engagement data from contacts to include or exclude them from appropriate next steps. 

Marketing automation saves marketers time, energy, and money, letting them focus less on managing individual emails and more on understanding their customers on a personal level. 

And what is a marketing automation platform?
A marketing automation platform is a multi-point solution, meaning it offers users a single environment to access multiple complementary capabilities, such as an email and landing page builder, a segmentation tool, a reporting tool, and a campaign builder.

Part of Acquia’s open DXP is Acquia Campaign Studio, an open marketing automation platform that goes above and beyond the constraints of traditional vendors to help digital marketers understand their customers better and build relationships through meaningful, real-time interactions. Your marketing automation platform can then be integrated with other marketing technologies like a CRM or event management tool to form a comprehensive marketing cloud that helps solve a variety of interrelated marketing challenges and objectives. 

So, then what makes an open marketing cloud?

In a traditional marketing cloud, technologies can be integrated when they are part of an approved marketplace. An open marketing cloud is different because it combines technologies that have been engineered to be far more flexible and adaptable. These critical characteristics help an open marketing cloud integrate not just with approved third-party plugins or applications, but also with proprietary, homegrown technologies. This level of customization is what empowers marketers to build truly personalized and holistic digital relationships with their audiences and deliver on the strategies that fit their business best. Powering that ability to integrate with new systems and build on customer data depends on all parts of the cloud being built with open APIs. 

Why should I care about open marketing in terms of customer experience? 

Unlike closed legacy solutions that can make data hard to access, and often fall short when gathering and understanding real-time data across multiple channels, open marketing gives you on-demand visibility into how your customers are engaging with your brand. Through segmentation tools, dynamic content capabilities and a whole suite of other customer-centric functionalities, open marketing technology lets you listen to exactly what your customers are saying and build meaningful relationships with them.

The customer journey today is unpredictable. To meet audiences at every touchpoint and offer content that will keep them coming back, brands need a marketing approach that is forward-thinking and open to new and increasing possibilities. 

For a further look at the benefits of an Open Marketing Cloud, check out our e-book, Open Marketing: The Future of Digital Experience Creation.