Marketing Gets With the Program

Marketing relationship management software can boost productivity and campaign effectiveness, but successful deployments must overcome technical and cultural hurdles.

By Drew Robb

May 24, 2004 12:00 PM ET

Computerworld - Linda Hecht faced a disconcerting fact: Sales success was leading to a marketing failure. "As we grew and added more people to marketing, we hit a limit on productivity," says Hecht, director of marketing at geographic information systems vendor Environmental Systems Research Institute Inc. (ESRI) in Redlands, Calif. "No matter how many more people we added to marketing, we couldn't become more productive."
Hecht has a marketing staff of 180, but with 40 products to market to 40 industries worldwide, she couldn't manage the workload. "It got to be impossible for us to do any long-term campaigns, since we had no way of managing the results," she says.
Last year, ESRI turned to marketing resource management (MRM) software to automate routine actions and improve strategic planning. "Before, we had a system that could do e-mails, but not campaigns. Now we are getting our marketing managers to start designing and building campaigns rather than just mailing something out," Hecht says.
MRM tools, provided either as extensions to CRM packages or as stand-alone offerings, are designed to incorporate every aspect of marketing, from initial concept through the evaluation of completed campaigns. While the number of MRM implementations is still relatively small, analysts expect strong growth in this area as companies look to extend efficiencies gained in traditional CRM strongholds, such as sales force automation.
"Marketing is one of the last bastions of full right-brain creativity, no holds barred and no accountability," says Robert Blumstein, an analyst at market research company IDC in Framingham, Mass.
"In a more budget-conscious era, MRM will let marketing stand up to scrutiny on ROI so it can gain the funds it needs," he adds. But users say that a gradual approach is best when bringing these tools into play.
A Logical Extension


Linda Hecht, director of marketing at Environmental Systems Research Institute Inc. Image Credit: Manuello Paganelli

MRM follows in the footsteps of enterprise tools such as ERP, CRM and sales force automation that automate and standardize business processes. Like those tools, MRM software uses a central database and establishes workflow procedures. The database contains the information on potential customers. MRM involves workflows for creating and executing marketing campaigns, including budgeting, designing promotional pieces, generating mailing lists and tracking marketing responses. Programs often include analytic features that help measure the results of campaigns and frequently hook into other enterprise applications.
MRM tools work well when addressing specific marketing challenges. For instance, ESRI was struggling to convert leads into sales. Only 2% of its prospects purchased products. The company wanted

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