Data management platforms (DMPs) are becoming the marketers’ tool of choice according to new research from Oracle Marketing Cloud and ExchangeWire.

Their study show that DMPs are becoming an essential tool – rather than an early adopter advantage – for marketers who want to better organise, make sense of and activate their data. The research showed that almost three quarters (73%) of those surveyed said that their awareness and knowledge of the benefits of DMPs was either good or excellent.

Although uptake remained below half (48%) for those media buyers and sellers surveyed, the results showed an increasingly compelling argument for adoption with more than 90% of current users experiencing positive impact on return on investment in the first twelve months. Only 10% of those surveyed had no plans to implement a DMP. The ad technology offers a unification across the media industry with publishers using them to support premium ad partnerships and media buyers using the insight gained from such DMPs in order to improve their understanding of audience buying and better improve their targeting across digital campaigns.

The research showed that a quarter (24%) of brand marketers who had implemented a DMP had done so in order to improve the ROI of their marketing and advertising activities. A third of publishers with a DMP said they chose it to integrate first party data to offer better targeting options to their advertiser clients.

Both publishers and advertisers also appear unified in their use and appreciation of the technology. Of the publishers all said that DMP implementation had been successful whilst 76% of media buyers said the same. In both parties DMPs were rated to have either achieved or overachieved against the individual objectives set for nearly 9 in 10 (87%) of those surveyed.

However despite all the benefits the research showed that DMP implementation isn’t necessarily as straightforward as both parties would like. For media sellers nearly half of respondents said that disparate data sets was a major challenge whilst 22% of media buyers said that removing or replacing legacy technology was the biggest impediment to their implementation.

Such challenges are not putting adopters off though. A fifth (21%) of both groups said that their organisation plans to implement a DMP within the next six months.

Zuzanna Gierlinska, Oracle Marketing Cloud’s director for data management platforms in EMEA said that marketers could no longer shy away from putting in place a centralised data strategy.  “As brands increasingly rely on digital channels and the technology vendors that power them in order to engage their audience having a holistic approach to data management is key to driving ROI.

“DMPs are fast becoming an essential tool to help marketers organise, make sense of, and activate their data. It’s no longer the sole preserve of the early adopters, and for modern marketers striving to deliver a personalised message at the right time on the right channel it should be at the heart of their operations.”

Source – MarketingTechNews.net