survey: tools used in digital marketing

SURVEY: DIGITAL MARKETING TOOLS

USED BY PROFESSIONALS (2014)

Our survey reveals the tools digital marketers used in 2013, plus the biggest challenges digital marketing agencies face in 2014.

You will also discover all the latest tools which digital marketers are using to up their game.

INTRO01

METHODOLOGY

PARTICIPANT PROFILE

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS

CONTENTS02

3Funnel surveyed 111 marketing executives on the software tools they use on a regular basis. The respondents were whittled down into 83 digital marketing professionals.

The respondents were mostly based in London and Dublin with a few from the US.The survey was conducted via online questionnaire between Dec 10th and 27th 2013.

METHODOLOGY03

Participants ranged from the executives in large digital marketing agencies to in house marketers or growth hackers / freelancers who are involved in digital marketing on a day to day basis

PARTICIPANT PROFILE04

Q: Roughly what is your companies monthly budget for digital marketing tools?

PARTICIPANT PROFILE04

Participants broken down by spend on digital marketing tools. 6.25% are spending more than €10,000 per month.

Majority of respondents want their digital marketing tools to measure everything with a simple dashboard displaying results

Google Analytics still dominates the free tools space with Moz and Hootsuite growing in popularity

Email and Adwords are the services the vast majority of people are paying for

Over 77% do not use software to present digital marketing plans

Most respondents are trying to monitor at least six metrics

15% of respondents are spending between $500-2k on digital marketing tools

Content marketing was the most successful tactic for those surveyed in 2013

Communicating with customers is the biggest challenge faced by agencies

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY05

Q: What do you like most about the digital marketing tools you are currently using?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS06

Answered: 80 / Skipped: 3

The majority of people surveyed want to measure everything (61.25%). A simple dashboard and deep dive analysis are the next most important

things people look for in digital marketing tools. Helping people win business features strongly as well (33.75%).

ANALYSIS:

Wanting to track everything takes time and expertise. This is in conflict with managements requirements for simple dashboards that focus on the main KPI’s. Reinforces the data analyst (detail) vs management divide (strategic).

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS06

Q: What digital marketing tools are you using for free?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS07

Answered: 82 / Skipped: 1

As expected Google Analytics is used by the vast majority of respondents (96.34%). Hootsuite, Moz and Screaming Frog also feature. Interestingly Yoast, the Wordpress plug in, features in the comments we received. Other free tools which digital marketers are using include Buffer, Tweetdeck, Xovi, Awstats, Localytics, Distimo and Quick Sprout.

ANALYSIS:

People are complementing Google Analytics with a wide range of free tools to dig into the data most relevant to their needs / client needs.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS07

Q: What digital marketing tools are you paying for?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS08

Answered: 63 / Skipped: 20

Email and Adwords dominate the paid digital marketing tools space. Kissmetrics, Marketo and Hubspot are now established in the market, with Hubspot having 12.5% market penetration amongst our survey respondents. Other products which got a mention include Crazy Egg, Facebook Ads, the Glow Machine and Topsy.

ANALYSIS:

From our respondents there are a wide range of niche tools used by digital marketing agencies. Besides the well-known tools mentioned above there is trend towards light weight tools focused on specific needs.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS08

Q: Do you use software to present digital marketing plans?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS09

Answered: 80 / Skipped: 3

The vast majority of people are not using software to present digital marketing plans (77.5%). People are still using the old reliables such as spreadsheets word docs, Prezi, Keynote and Powerpoint. We were surprised that products such as Visually or Tableau did not feature.

ANALYSIS:

Proposals and client communications are the life blood of digital marketing agencies. New software / tools to be adopted to present digital marketing plans and manage client communications.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS09

Q: What metrics do you monitor?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS10

Answered: 81 / Skipped: 2

Most respondents are trying to follow at least six metrics. The biggest priority is unique visits (70%) closely followed by Google Rankings and Click Through Rate.

ANALYSIS:

Metrics that are easiest to monitor are the most popular. While the harder to measure metrics like Return on Investment least popular. This shows a lack of transparency in key areas.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS10

Q: Roughly what is your companies monthly budget for digital marketing tools?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS11

Answered: 80 / Skipped: 3

The majority of our respondents (60%) are spending up to $500 on digital marketing tools, with 15% spending between $500 and $2,000 per month. Just 6.25% are spending over $10,000+ per month on tools.

ANALYSIS:

Key pressures appear to be pushing marketing professionals towards increased use of paid tools. Saving time, Deep Dive Analysis and Client Reporting appear to be the main drivers of this trend.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS11

Q: On average, what are you clients spending per month on Digital Marketing?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS12

Answered: 64 / Skipped: 19

All of the respondents’ clients are spending money on digital marketing. The majority (60%) are spending between $1,000 and $2,000 per month. There is a sizeable group who’s clients are spending more than $20k+ per month (9.38%).

ANALYSIS:

The more clients are spending on digital marketing the more the agency tends to spend on digital marketing tools. Clients spending more demand more analysis and reporting.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS12

Q: What digital marketing tactic worked best for you in 2013?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS13

Answered: 78 / Skipped: 5

A range of tactics worked best for the respondents in 2013. Content marketing got the highest score at 20.5% with PPC advertising close behind on 19%. Search engine optimisation (18%) and email campaigns (14%) were also a successful tactic over the course of 2013.

ANALYSIS:

It was surprising that video and mobile marketing were deemed to have had less success in comparison. This seems to demonstrate that marketers have not fully got to grips with these tactics and are not seeing a return. Also of note is that no respondents felt that location based marketing was their best tactic. Another feature is the importance of trip advisor and other review and referral sites which were popular for niche industries.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS13

Q: What business challenges do you anticipate in 2014?

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS14

Answered: 79 / Skipped: 4

The big surprise here is that communicating with customers was the single biggest issue for digital marketing agencies (39%). The four other main challenges anticipated for 2014 were all close together in a following pack. These were decreasing margins (18%), retaining good staff (16%), increased competition (14%) and sourcing finance to expand (11%). Other respondents added comments on separate challenges they anticipated and these included personalisation, increasing revenue and expansion.

ANALYSIS:

Agencies start to use software specifically to tackle the problem of communicating with customers. Comments suggest retaining good staff will also become a bigger problem in 2014 with a strong growth year predicted for Digital Marketing.

SURVEY RESULTS & ANALYSIS14

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