Marketers keep replacing major martech apps, integration #1 factor for replacements

My mates at MarTech.org just lately introduced their most recent Martech Substitute Study 2022, wherever marketers shared which applications they’ve replaced in excess of the previous 18 months, what their major commitment was in doing so, and what were being their most important aspects in choosing the substitution solution.

Advertising automation (24%), CRM (23%), Search engine optimization (23%), email marketing and advertising (22%), and function/project administration (19%) apps were the most routinely replaced.

As I highlighted in blue in the chart over, the #1 most generally cited variable in picking their alternative remedy was integration abilities/open API — picked by 56% respondents, up 13% factors from the exact study in 2021.

It’s a top 5 concept of this 10 years in martech: platforms, networks & marketplaces.

Of system, this is not to say that the other components — value, assist, protection, and many others. — weren’t critical much too. But the factor that most entrepreneurs agreed on was integration. If it will not integrate with the relaxation of the tech stack, every thing else is moot. It is the tree that falls in the forest without having any person all around to listen to it.

The 2nd most typical factor was details centralization/info capabilities (picked out by 50% of respondents), which is closely tied to integration. After all, information is the foundational layer of integrations.

Tied in second also with 50% was “ability to measure ROI” — which is likely to be on the top of everyone’s minds in our tighter economy. But to measure ROI, you will need the knowledge. And to get the info, you need to have integrations. These 3 aspects are certain jointly by atomic forces.

But what determined marketers to find out a substitution option in the first position?

When wanting to exchange a business application (the study handles substitution of homegrown apps independently), the #1 inspiration was much better characteristics (53%). Of course, this will make perception. Marketers appear to martech to give them the abilities essential to carry out in continuously shifting and evolving markets. What you can do matters.

Nevertheless, I would have anticipated the #2 inspiration to be charge — trying to get an choice remedy to cut down prices. That was the survey result in 2021.

But in 2022, improved/less difficult integration was the second most popular enthusiasm (24%, up 5% factors from 2021) to seek a substitution app. In essence, a drive for superior integration triggered 1 out of each and every 4 martech app alternative tasks.

Which is fairly exceptional.

I have reported this many situations before to martech product teams: the current market is speaking to you with a fantastic booming voice in the sky, “Treat integration as a initially-class characteristic!”

Significantly, the martech marketplace — and the SaaS universe far more broadly — have taken this to heart. A new exploration report from Pandium on the State of Integrations and APIs at 400 SaaS Firms displays that 86% of the Top 100 SaaS businesses in the entire world now have a community integration marketplace. (73% of them have an in-app market.)

That’s extraordinary and a strong testament to the value of application ecosystems for important SaaS firms.

But what’s even a lot more telling is that 31% of seed-phase SaaS startups now characteristic a community integration market much too. Practically 1 out 3 SaaS startups — which are primarily strapped for time and sources, forced to make very really hard possibilities about what to prioritize — have chosen to prioritize acquiring each integrations and a marketplace to make it quick for buyers to discover and use them.

It’s heartening to see martech customers and sellers agree: integration is essential.

We even now have even further to go on this journey of martech platforms and ecosystems. But as an field, at least’s we’re all marching in the exact same way with a a great deal more seamlessly and powerfully integrated long run on the horizon in advance.