A Public Relations Podcast: Smoke Signal - The Rise and Rise of Martech

In this episode of Smoke Signal, I am joined by Scott Brinker, a.k.a Chief Martech, author of the Marketing Technology Landscape Supergraphic. 

Scott is in the envious position where is hobby and passion has become his career and vice versa. 

First launched in 2011 with 150 tools, the latest 2023 version, released last month, featured an unbelievable 11,038 tools and technologies. 

This exponential rise in Martech is mirrored in Commtech.

“Everything that marketing does is now connected or driven or powered some way by something digital but that was not always the case,” Scott says. “Back in the day, even senior marketing executives we're highly dubious about tech.  

“That is where the Martech Map was conceived, to show marketers the range of different software that was probably already being used in their organisation… and there’s a lot of them.”

Scott sees both supply and demand factors leading to this significant growth over the years. 

“Technology has essentially have lowered the barriers to entry. If someone has an idea for what they believe is going be a valuable software tool for marketers, they can get into the market with it. 

“But there's the other side of this too. I can't think of any other profession that has gone through so much change and so much expansion of scope over this past decade… So marketers as a result, are always open to  technology that's going to help.

“There's this symbiosis where there are lots of Marchech startups a year to tackle these new challenges, and a lot of demand among marketers to figure out how do we how do we do this.

It is not a podcast in 2023 without speaking about AI. So what impact with AI have on this Martech Map?

“It is  going to be incredibly disruptive to the existing Martech Map because I do think  a lot of things are going to change. One of the things AI is doing in the software world is yet another thing to dramatically reduce the barrier to entry. 

“Generally, I do not know. I am absolutely fascinated to see how this plays out. But I feel pretty confident it's going to be a lot of change in this industry.”