Download Magic Quadrant for Marketing Resource Management

G00274973
Magic Quadrant for Marketing Resource
Management
Published: 8 February 2016
Analyst(s): Kimberly Collins
This Magic Quadrant evaluates vendors of applications that support the
management of marketing resources, such as people, plans, budgets,
projects, tasks, assets and branded content. It will help IT leaders work with
marketing leaders to find an MRM solution.
Market Definition/Description
Marketing resource management (MRM) improves companies' ability to orchestrate and optimize
internal and external marketing resources by using a set of processes and capabilities (see "The
Five Competencies of MRM 'Re-' Defined").
MRM applications enable companies to:
■
Plan and budget for marketing activities and programs (strategic planning and financial
management)
■
Create and develop marketing programs and content (creative production and project
management)
■
Collect and manage content and knowledge (digital asset, content and knowledge
management)
■
Fulfill and distribute marketing assets, content and collateral (marketing fulfillment)
■
Measure, analyze and optimize marketing resources (analytics)
Vendors in this Magic Quadrant are assessed on their ability to support each of these five MRM
competency areas. Although digital asset management (DAM) is an aspect of MRM, this Magic
Quadrant does not evaluate DAM vendors that do not also provide other MRM functionality. Most
MRM vendors offer a light DAM capability to support marketing asset management for creative
production management and marketing fulfillment, but their focus is on supporting MRM
capabilities, not enterprise DAM.
Magic Quadrant
Figure 1. Magic Quadrant for Marketing Resource Management
Source: Gartner (February 2016)
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Vendor Strengths and Cautions
BrandMaker
BrandMaker is a Leader on the basis of its broad and robust MRM solution, commitment to MRM,
innovative focus, broad vision, expanding geographical presence and strong business model for
future growth.
Strengths
■
Growth: BrandMaker states that its MRM revenue grew by over 30% in euros from 2014 to
2015, with 82% of this revenue being recurring revenue (the lower exchange rate between the
euro and the U.S. dollar reduced its growth in dollar terms). Thirty-four percent of its revenue
now comes from North America, compared with 39% from Germany. Gartner estimates that
BrandMaker's MRM revenue for 2014 was between $15 million and $20 million.
■
R&D investment: In 2015, BrandMaker focused its development on connectivity, with online/
offline integration, Salesforce integration and integration with social media (Facebook, Twitter
and YouTube). Investments included a "do it yourself" importer that eliminates dependency on
the IT organization for importing Microsoft Excel spreadsheets; real-time spending management
to enable quick adjustments; and linkage between the global calendar and the social media
calendar to connect strategic planning with content planning. BrandMaker has integrated its
solution with Adobe Marketing Cloud and Adobe Creative Cloud for key clients, and it will
extend its integrations to other vendors in 2016. In 2015, it began building a business template
library with preconfigured templates, workflow and creative briefs. In 2016, it will work on a
media advisor tool that enables improved budget allocations.
■
Business model: BrandMaker has a strong business model for, and focus on, sales,
geographical expansion and customer success, which will enable it to scale its business and
increase its revenue more quickly. As a "pure play" MRM vendor, it is an attractive option for
clients who favor best-of-breed vendors and are seeking alternatives to large vendors. In 2016,
BrandMaker will shift most of its budget, resources and decision-making responsibility to North
America.
■
Deployment models: BrandMaker's enterprise clients can choose between two main
deployment options: enterprise SaaS (hosted) and on-premises. Both take the form of separate
instances. BrandMaker also offers a SaaS option for the midmarket. Hosting with cloud-based
applications is carried out by Equinix.
Cautions
■
Functional depth: Existing and prospective BrandMaker clients have identified issues with
functional depth, especially the flexibility of the workflow to enable changes and make quick
adjustments to processes. BrandMaker is working on preconfigured templates in this area.
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■
Market visibility: Although BrandMaker is gaining more market visibility, it is still less visible
than other MRM Leaders. It is known more for its brand and asset management capabilities,
particularly in Europe.
■
Competition: BrandMaker will increasingly be challenged globally, as integrated marketing
management vendors — such as IBM, Infor, Microsoft, SAP, SAS and Teradata — increase their
traction and marketing capabilities worldwide.
■
Potential acquisition target: BrandMaker could be an acquisition target for large companies
wanting to provide MRM capabilities. Its strong business model, growth and robust MRM
solution would make it one of the better acquisitions for vendors looking to enter this market.
BrandSystems
BrandSystems is a Visionary on the basis of its broad and deepening set of MRM capabilities and
its expanding geographical strategy.
Strengths
■
Growth and geographical expansion: Gartner estimates that BrandSystems' MRM revenue
was between $12 million and $13 million in 2015. It added 24 new clients in that year, and now
has over 400 clients in total. In 2015, BrandSystems expanded beyond Europe into the U.S.,
and Australian markets. It plans to expand into India in 2016, and into South America in 2017.
■
Broad MRM solution: BrandSystems provides a broad set of MRM capabilities for planning
and budgeting, creative production management and collaboration, graphic production,
marketing asset management, marketing fulfillment, and analysis and reporting.
■
R&D investment: BrandSystems' investments in 2015 and 2016 focused on integrating its
media generator solution and content management system; automated workflow (with a visual
drag-and-drop, Web-based editor); an enhanced resource manager for managing people and
tasks (with calendar views); an enhanced purchase manager; an enhanced widget library; and
improvements to its marketing shop. BrandSystems is also integrating its solution with that of
ConceptShare for proofing and annotation capabilities.
■
Deployment options: BrandSystems' software can be deployed as SaaS, on-premises or
hosted by a third party. BrandSystems is in the process of moving from SaaS delivery with
assisted setup to an approach that, by 2017, will enable clients to buy and set up its software
online.
Cautions
■
Market visibility: BrandSystems lacks the market visibility of some of the Leaders in this Magic
Quadrant. Gartner does not see it in as many competitive deals as the Leaders.
■
Increased competition: Consolidation in the marketing application market is creating larger
players in the MRM sector. BrandSystems will increasingly be challenged by larger integrated
marketing management vendors (such as IBM, Infor, SAP, SAS and Teradata).
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■
Geographical expansion and customization: BrandSystems is using partners to enter new
geographies and scale its business. Ultimately, it will need to have more of its own people and
offices selling and supporting its solution in order to compete with the larger vendors. It will also
need to rely less on customization. Reference customers and other clients report that its
software requires a high degree of customization.
■
Large enterprises: BrandSystems lacks the depth of functionality of some of the Leaders and
is better positioned to serve the midmarket than large enterprises. BrandSystems' focus is on
midsize businesses with revenue of between $500 million and $5 billion. It is not actively
pursuing large-enterprise accounts. BrandSystems will need to win more midmarket deals to
grow its revenue as quickly as MRM vendors that focus on the large-enterprise market.
Capital ID
Capital ID is a Niche Player on the basis of its focus on Europe (particularly Northern Europe). Its
core competency is in the brand management and marketing fulfillment aspects of MRM.
Strengths
■
Growth in recurring revenue: Capital ID continues to move its clients to a subscription model,
which is increasing its recurring revenue. Gartner estimates that Capital ID generated between
$9 million and $11 million in MRM revenue in 2015. It is increasing its staff numbers, particularly
in consulting.
■
Brand management and marketing fulfillment: The core competency of Capital ID's MRM
solution, ID Manager, is brand management and marketing fulfillment, including creative
production management, content management and media planning.
■
R&D: Capital ID's investments in 2015 included ID Manager 4.03, which was launched with a
focus on support for branded content in social media, support for tablets and smartphones,
dashboards for external data sources and social media, a "mobile first" user experience
framework, responsive design, and integration with third-party channels. Capital ID has also
developed capabilities in areas adjacent to MRM, such as reputation and crisis management.
■
Deployment options: ID Manager is available as an on-premises, hosted or SaaS solution.
Rackspace provides third-party hosting. Prepackaged "jump-start" solutions enable shortcycle-time deployments that allow for subsequent customization.
Cautions
■
Financial management capabilities: Capital ID provides some financial management
capabilities, but these are less robust than those of some of the leading MRM vendors. They are
used primarily for creative projects and marketing content.
■
Market visibility: We do not see Capital ID on as many longlists or in as many competitive
deals as other MRM providers in this Magic Quadrant. It has struggled to gain much recognition
and traction in the North American market.
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■
Increased competition in Europe: Consolidation has created larger players in the MRM sector,
which are also targeting Europe.
■
Market stability: More small vendors, particularly in Europe, are entering the marketing asset
management and marketing fulfillment areas of the MRM sector. As a small vendor, with less
than $15 million in annual revenue, Capital ID is susceptible to strong fluctuations in a market
that is rapidly becoming overcrowded.
Code Worldwide
Code Worldwide is a Visionary on the basis of its broad solution and innovative focus on the end-toend process for planning, managing, executing, and measuring creative advertising campaigns and
promotions.
Strengths
■
Growth: Code is a wholly owned subsidiary of Omnicom Group. Its MRM revenue and client
numbers continue to increase. Gartner estimates that Code's MRM revenue for 2015 was
between $14 million and $16 million.
■
Focus on creative advertising and branding: Code's adZU solution focuses on the end-toend and closed-loop process for creative advertising campaigns and promotions. It supports
planning, budgeting, creative production, asset management, fulfillment, and measurement and
reporting as part of this process.
■
R&D investment: Code has made improvements across its adZU solution by extending its
predictive financial analytics, rebuilding its content management component, adding new
channels for digital fulfillment, enhancing its measurement and analytics capabilities, and
adding integration with Domo and Tableau software for analytics.
■
Deployment options: Code's solution can be deployed on-premises, hosted or purchased as a
public cloud service (multitenant SaaS). The cloud is Code's preferred option.
Cautions
■
Agency reliance: Recommendations or reselling by Omnicom Group and Rapp could present
at least a perceived agency bias to potential clients and those looking to separate MRM
technology investments from agency-based decisions.
■
Market visibility: Code is less visible and less well known than other vendors in this Magic
Quadrant. Gartner does not see it in as many competitive deals as the other leading vendors
that sell directly to customers.
■
Financial management and workflow capabilities: Although Code provides more advanced
capabilities for budgeting and planning than other vendors focused on brand management,
these capabilities are tightly linked to creative advertising and media promotion campaigns.
There is no visual drag-and-drop workflow tool for routing, reviews, approvals and markups.
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■
Small and midsize businesses (SMBs): Code focuses on selling to large enterprises. It does
not aim adZU at SMBs.
Direxxis
Direxxis, a Broadridge company, is a Challenger due to its improved viability and continued strong
growth following its acquisition by Broadridge. Its focus on MRM capabilities for asset management
and fulfillment as part of a distributed marketing process also contributes.
Strengths
■
Growth: Direxxis grew strongly in this market from 2014 to 2015 — its MRM revenue almost
doubled. Gartner estimates that Direxxis generated between $25 million and $35 million in MRM
revenue in 2015. The acquisition by Broadridge gives Direxxis improved viability, opportunity for
global expansion, access to data centers and infrastructure, and potential to integrate with
Broadridge's existing software and services.
■
Marketing asset management and marketing fulfillment capabilities: The core value
proposition for Direxxis' MRM solution focuses on marketing asset management and marketing
fulfillment capabilities to support a distributed marketing process in decentralized marketing
organizations, with local marketing enablement. The acquisition by Broadridge expands
Direxxis' marketing capabilities beyond MRM to campaign management, lead management,
event management and presales support.
■
R&D in MRM: Investment in 2015 focused on using Broadridge's capabilities for marketing
fulfillment in relation to print production and distribution, and for marketing asset management
with access to prebuilt content and the ability to satisfy Financial Industry Regulatory Authority
(FINRA) requirements. Improvements were made to analytics and dashboards for user metrics
and marketing performance.
■
Deployment options: Direxxis prefers to deploy its application as a multitenant, SaaS solution
or as a hosted solution. It plans to use Broadridge's data centers for hosting.
Cautions
■
Creative production management capabilities: Although Direxxis has added an approval
module and has made enhancements in this area, it does not provide a visual drag-and-drop
workflow tool. Nor does it support all project management capabilities and tasks, as do other
MRM vendors.
■
Financial management capabilities: Although Direxxis offers some financial management
capabilities, it does not currently have the Leaders' robust capabilities to support enterprise
marketing financial management.
■
On-premises deployment: This is not a standard option, but only a custom option available on
request.
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■
Industry focus: Direxxis focuses on the financial services industry, including banks, investment
firms and insurance companies, although it does have some clients in the consumer packaged
goods sector. Broadridge has a similar focus on the financial services industry. Organizations in
other industries should consider alternative providers.
Elateral
Elateral is a Visionary on the basis of its innovative focus on marketing fulfillment and brand
management. The expanding business opportunities that arise from its new infrastructure as a
service (IaaS) platform and growing partner network also contribute.
Strengths
■
Significant growth potential and customer satisfaction: Elateral now has a scalable IaaS
platform and a growing network of partners that can sell, refer, implement and service its MRM
solution, so it is poised for significant growth in 2016. Gartner estimates that Elateral's MRM
revenue in 2015 was between $12 million and $13 million. In addition, reference customers gave
Elateral some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings in this Magic Quadrant.
■
R&D investment and innovation: Elateral has completed its transition to a public and private
cloud IaaS offering, and migrated all its customers to this new platform. The new platform has
resulted in a 65% reduction in the total cost of ownership and a higher level of performance; it
has also given Elateral greater scalability. All seven of Elateral's pending patents have cleared
the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) filing stage, and several will be issued over the next few
months. More patents are expected to be filed later in 2016. Other investments include
enhancements to advanced analytics, value scorecards, and expansion of integration points
(such as to Domo and Oracle Eloqua software).
■
Partner ecosystem: Elateral is expanding its partnerships for infrastructure and other business
applications (such as campaign management, digital marketing, DAM, content production,
delivery and support services). It has added several large agencies as strategic platform
partners.
■
Deployment options: Elateral supports public and private cloud options, with support from
Microsoft (Azure).
Cautions
■
Planning and financial management capabilities: Although Elateral offers some planning and
budgeting capabilities, they are not as robust as those offered by the Leaders in this Magic
Quadrant. Its capabilities lack depth in terms of financial management and advanced features
for quoting and procurement.
■
Creative production management capabilities: Although Elateral offers workflow capabilities
to support marketing fulfillment, it lacks a robust workflow tool for managing creative projects,
generating reviews and approvals, and allocating and managing people, teams and resources.
■
On-premises deployment: Elateral does not offer an on-premises deployment option.
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■
Potential acquisition target and competition: ElateraI's innovative value proposition in
marketing fulfillment could make it an attractive acquisition target for vendors looking to expand
their capabilities in this area. Elateral is one of the smaller MRM vendors, and it faces
competition from new entrants. It will need to continue to raise its visibility by making full use of
its new IaaS platform and expanding its partner network to enable faster deployments and
growth.
IBM
IBM is a Challenger on the basis of its broad MRM solution, large client base and renewed MRM
investments. In 2015, it launched the IBM Marketing Cloud with new embedded MRM features, but
it is too early to tell how this new SaaS solution will impact its execution.
Strengths
■
Financial viability: IBM is a global company that generated $92.8 billion in overall revenue in
2014. Gartner estimates that IBM's MRM revenue was between $35 million and $45 million in
2015. Such figures make IBM one of the most financially viable vendors.
■
Broad solution: IBM provides a broad MRM solution that covers all five MRM competencies,
with strengths in planning, financial management and creative production management. It uses
internal teams (IBM Enterprise Content Management [ECM] and IBM Digital Experience) and
external partnerships (with Elateral, Quark and Saepio) for content management and marketing
fulfillment.
■
R&D investment: In 2015, IBM launched the IBM Marketing Cloud with embedded MRM
features, drawing on its Silverpop SaaS architecture. In 2016, it will continue to embed MRM
capabilities for creative production in this new cloud-based platform. Investments in 2015
included the introduction of new workflow features (work requests and approval requests) as
part of Journey Designer. IBM also launched a partnership with Allocadia for planning and
financial management capabilities, which are available both on a stand-alone basis and as part
of the Enterprise Edition of IBM Marketing Cloud. For its on-premises marketing operations
solution, IBM has extended cross-device support for viewing and acting on approval requests.
■
Deployment options: IBM offers on-premises, private cloud hosted and on-demand
deployment options via two different solutions. IBM Marketing Operations is an on-premises or
hosted solution. IBM Marketing Cloud is an on-demand, multitenant SaaS solution that includes
Journey Designer and planning and budgeting capabilities powered by Allocadia.
Cautions
■
Marketing asset management and marketing fulfillment capabilities: IBM relies on
partnerships with external vendors like Elateral, Quark and Saepio, and internal partnerships
with IBM ECM and IBM Digital Experience, to support these capabilities. Clients typically prefer
to have a fully integrated MRM solution, rather than rely on partnerships or purchase multiple
products from a vendor's portfolio.
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■
Market perception: Over the past two years, clients have stated that they do not believe IBM is
investing in MRM, and that its solutions are outdated, especially the SaaS solution. IBM must
promote its new cloud-based solution to overcome this perception and keep developing its
product. Reference customers gave IBM low satisfaction ratings for pricing, and clients have
informed Gartner that the cost-to-value ratio for IBM's MRM capabilities is high, compared with
other vendors.
■
Reliance on Allocadia: IBM relies on its partnership with Allocadia for planning and financial
management capabilities in its cloud-based solution. Allocadia is a fast-growing company in an
attractive area for new MRM growth. If a competitor were to buy Allocadia, this would
jeopardize its partnership with IBM.
■
Hybrid model: IBM will promote both its on-premises and on-demand MRM solutions, as well
as other IBM or partner solutions, when a broad set of MRM capabilities is required. Many new
capabilities for MRM will be available as shared services between its cloud and on-premises
solutions. Therefore, many MRM customers that want a broad solution will need to consider a
hybrid deployment model.
Infor
Infor is a Leader on the basis of its broad MRM vision, scalable pricing and robust capabilities for
planning, financial management and creative production management.
Strengths
■
Growth: Infor is nearly doubling its salesforce to sell marketing applications, and using the
value-added reseller channel it acquired with Saleslogix. Gartner estimates that Infor's MRM
revenue in 2015 was between $30 million and $35 million. Infor plans to have an additional 50
resources by the end of March 2016.
■
R&D investment: Infor is investing in its product organization by adding nearly 170
development resources dedicated to customer experience and digital transformation. It has
enhanced its marketing asset management capabilities (better file management and easier
signoffs), collaboration capabilities (improved in-app and external collaboration features, a new
request form and a requester portal) and marketing insights (role-based dashboards with
greater visualization). It is moving to a responsive HTML5 design and UI that will be more
consistent with other marketing applications. Areas of focus in 2016 include new role-based
home screens, improved calendaring and scheduling, and in-context/in-line reporting and
dashboarding. Infor will integrate with Infor Ming.le to improve collaboration.
■
Pricing: Clients state that Infor's pricing for functionality is lower than that of other Leaders.
■
Deployment models: Infor supports on-premises, multitenant SaaS and separate-instance
hosted (private cloud) deployments. Its current hosting partner is Rackspace, but all hosting will
move to Amazon Web Services in the first half of 2016.
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Cautions
■
Marketing fulfillment capabilities: Infor's capabilities for marketing fulfillment are still not as
robust as those of some of the niche/specialty vendors.
■
Market visibility: Despite increasing media coverage of its CRM marketing applications in
2015, Infor is still not well-known as an MRM provider. Clients contacting Gartner about MRM
are often unfamiliar with Infor, and frequently have not heard about the Orbis MRM solution.
■
Product management changes: Infor saw significant turnover in the senior management of its
marketing application portfolio in 2015. It recently announced new managers.
■
Market momentum: Gartner is not seeing Infor in as many competitive MRM deals as it did a
year or two ago. Infor also received lower satisfaction scores from reference customers,
particularly in the following areas: performance and scalability, ongoing R&D investment, ability
to meet current and future requirements, ease of use, workflow, reporting, ease of installation,
and integration with other business applications.
MarcomCentral
MarcomCentral, a Ricoh company, is a Niche Player on the basis of its focus on marketing asset
management, fulfillment and distribution within the MRM sector.
Strengths
■
Customer base and geographical expansion: MarcomCentral reports that it has over 400
MRM clients, with more than 70 added in 2015. Gartner estimates that MarcomCentral's 2015
MRM-related revenue was between $12 million and $13 million. It is using Microsoft's Azure
cloud for overseas expansion into Europe and Japan.
■
Marketing fulfillment capabilities: MarcomCentral's solution provides robust capabilities for
marketing fulfillment and personalization. Budgeting, workflow and asset management features
are used to enhance the marketing fulfillment process and capabilities. Key use cases for the
solution include brand and regulatory compliance, local-area marketing and sales enablement.
■
R&D: Investments in 2015 included enhancements to search, HTML output for email, DAM,
Salesforce integration, and reporting and analytics, as well as a new video bookend product.
MarcomCentral has also moved from a waterfall development process to an agile/scrum
method using Microsoft Azure.
■
Deployment models: MarcomCentral supports SaaS and hosted single-instance deployments.
Hosting is by Microsoft, ScaleMatrix and XO Communications.
Cautions
■
Financial management and workflow capabilities: MarcomCentral has some capabilities for
budgeting for content and collateral, but does not provide a robust enterprise financial
management solution for marketing. Workflow is tied primarily to the customization, fulfillment
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and distribution of marketing content, and has not been prepackaged for the creative
production and review process. MarcomCentral does not offer project management capabilities.
■
On-premises deployment: MarcomCentral does not currently support the on-premises model.
■
Transition after Ricoh acquisition: Software sales are very different from hardware sales,
particularly when applications are marketed to business users, such as those in marketing.
Ricoh's success in the MRM market will depend on its ability to retain MarcomCentral staff (in
the areas of sales, customer service and implementation) and attract new talent. It also depends
on Ricoh enabling MarcomCentral to continue to operate independently.
■
Third-party sellers: Some customers who bought MarcomCentral software through third-party
agencies and service providers have identified difficulties with these third parties in terms of
expanding product capabilities beyond print production. Prospective customers looking for
capabilities beyond print production should buy the solution direct from MarcomCentral, not via
a third party.
Microsoft
Microsoft is a Challenger on the basis of its overall viability, the opportunity presented by the
Microsoft Dynamics CRM customer base, and its broad MRM solution and midmarket appeal.
Strengths
■
Microsoft Dynamics opportunity: In 2015, Microsoft generated over $93 billion in overall
revenue. Microsoft Dynamics CRM has growing momentum (80% growth in 4Q14), with over
40,000 customers. Although the bulk of this revenue is generated by sales force automation
(SFA) sales, the SFA client base presents a tremendous cross-selling opportunity for Microsoft
Dynamics Marketing and its MRM solution. Microsoft reports that 27 of its largest
MarketingPilot customers are upgrading to Dynamics Marketing. Gartner estimates that
Microsoft generated between $15 million and $25 million in MRM revenue in 2015.
■
Broad solution: Microsoft offers a broad set of MRM capabilities for planning, budgeting,
procurement, project management, content/asset management, media buying and performance
management.
■
Functionality improvements: Microsoft continues to increase its MRM investment.
Investments in 2015 focused on DAM improvements, using HTML5 to enhance the viewing,
searching and annotation of assets. Analytics improvements focused on role-based dashboards
for managing asset effectiveness, tracking project effectiveness, and analyzing budgets and
costs. Integration with Microsoft Skype for Business has improved marketing collaboration.
■
Deployment option: Microsoft Dynamics Marketing is available as a public SaaS offering.
Hosting of the SaaS solution is managed by Microsoft data centers globally.
Cautions
■
Marketing fulfillment and financial management capabilities: Although Microsoft offers
some marketing fulfillment and financial management capabilities, they are not as robust as
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those of the specialty marketing fulfillment vendors in the Niche Players quadrant or the leaders
in financial management.
■
Large-enterprise market: Microsoft's MRM capabilities are not as deep or complex as some
of the Leaders, which makes it more attractive to midmarket buyers than to large-enterprise
buyers. Although Microsoft has sold to a few large enterprises, in general we do not see it in
competitive deals in the large-enterprise market.
■
Market visibility: Gartner is seeing less of Microsoft in stand-alone MRM deals where clients
are not already Microsoft Dynamics CRM customers for SFA. Many Gartner clients inquiring
about MRM are not aware that Microsoft has an MRM solution. Microsoft will need to raise the
visibility of its MRM capabilities to win more best-of-breed deals.
■
Client feedback: Judging from inquiries from Gartner clients, some customers are considering
a move to other vendors' MRM solutions as they do not believe that Microsoft is investing as
much in MRM. Reference customers contacted for this Magic Quadrant gave Microsoft one of
the lowest ratings for overall satisfaction. They also gave it low satisfaction ratings for ease of
installation and integration with nonmarketing business applications.
Saepio
Saepio is a Niche Player on the basis of its core focus on marketing asset management and
marketing fulfillment for distributed teams, such as franchisees, primarily in the U.S.
Strengths
■
Growth in recurring revenue: Saepio reported a 40% increase in monthly recurring revenue
over the past 10 quarters (3Q13 to 4Q15), with a compound annual growth rate of 17%. Its goal
in 2016 is to have 90% of its revenue come from subscriptions and only 10% from one-time
projects. Gartner estimates that Saepio had MRM revenue of between $8 million and $11 million
in 2015.
■
Focus on local marketing enablement: Saepio's MRM solution focuses on distributed
marketing, sales enablement and brand management in local markets. Its distributed marketing
solution provides capabilities focused on the dynamic assembly of localized advertising and
marketing communications for use in local markets. It also provides budgeting and project
management capabilities for the marketing fulfillment process.
■
R&D investment: Saepio made over 85 product enhancements to its MarketPort platform in
2015. Investments covered all five MRM areas: financial management (a native budget manager
and Saepio OnePay for a multimerchant gateway); creative production management (new
commenting features, the ability to configure alerts and communication management for
approvals); marketing asset management (a new capability for tagging assets, the ability to
publish assets to third-party systems, HTML5 support); marketing fulfilment (a new advanced
search capability, streamlined check-out, and new fulfillment and order modules); and analytics
(more out-of-the-box reports).
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■
Deployment model: Saepio offers a hosted, multitenant SaaS option. Amazon Web Services
supports the hosting.
Cautions
■
Financial management capabilities: Saepio offers some basic financial management
capabilities, but these are not as robust or complex as those of the leading MRM vendors.
These capabilities are typically used to augment marketing fulfillment.
■
Creative production and project management capabilities: Saepio offers some creative
production and workflow capabilities, which are used primarily to support downstream
fulfillment and distribution of content. However, they are not as robust or complex as those
offered by the leading MRM vendors, and they are typically used to augment marketing
fulfillment.
■
Increased competition: The number of small vendors targeting the marketing asset
management, marketing fulfillment and content marketing areas of MRM is increasing rapidly.
Larger MRM vendors are likely to make acquisitions in these areas of MRM to be more
competitive. This will increase the level of competition from larger players and make Saepio an
attractive acquisition target.
■
Global expansion: Many of the market's European vendors are starting to expand globally and
enter the U.S. To compete on a global scale, Saepio will need to develop a plan for expansion
outside the U.S., into Europe and eventually Asia/Pacific and South America.
SAP
SAP is a Leader on the basis of its broad and robust set of MRM capabilities and market execution
and traction, particularly within its installed base.
Strengths
■
Market momentum: SAP has rebranded its marketing products under the SAP Hybris
Marketing umbrella. SAP Hybris Marketing now offers a broad marketing platform, based on
SAP Hana, that is available with a wide range of deployment options which include a new public
cloud offering. SAP Hybris Marketing remains an area of growth for SAP, with over 50% of SAP
Hybris Marketing customers including its MRM capabilities in their purchase. Most of SAP's
licensed MRM customers are in EMEA and Asia/Pacific, but its MRM deals have been
increasing in North America. Gartner estimates that SAP's MRM-related revenue was between
$75 million and $100 million in 2015.
■
MRM R&D: Recent MRM enhancements to SAP's on-premises product have focused on
budget planning, spending management and financial integration, program management,
content development, DAM integration, and analytics and performance management, including
a new dashboard for chief marketing officers. SAP has also launched SAP XM (Exchange
Media) in a co-innovation mode, which will provide an end-to-end digital advertising platform
based on Hana in-memory technology. SAP plans to integrate SAP Hybris Marketing with SAP
XM to enable advertisers and publishers to maximize their return on media. In addition, SAP has
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released a public cloud (SaaS) solution built on SAP Hana — S/4HANA Cloud Marketing Edition
offers the same MRM functionality as the on-premises version, except for a few integration
points (such as DAM and financial integration) that are on SAP's 2016 roadmap.
■
Partner ecosystem: SAP continues to expand its partner ecosystem for MRM, to include
advertising platforms, data management platforms, marketing agencies and independent
software vendors (ISVs). It is also developing prebuilt integrations with ISVs.
■
Deployment options: SAP offers on-premises, hosted, on-demand and hybrid deployment
options. About 50% of SAP's new deals are for the SaaS solution.
Cautions
■
Market perception: Some prospective customers believe that, if they are not also considering
SAP purchases in other areas of CRM and ERP, it does not make sense to pursue SAP MRM
software as they think it is too difficult to engage large vendors for best-of-breed MRM
solutions. Gartner does not see SAP in best-of-breed MRM deals where the client is not already
an SAP customer.
■
Multiple solutions: SAP relies on integration with OpenText for DAM and marketing fulfillment
capabilities. Some existing and prospective clients have stated that there are differences
between the UIs of the SAP and OpenText solutions, and that integration is not always
seamless.
■
SaaS for creative production management: One of the hottest areas for SaaS in the MRM
market is creative production management for reviews, approvals, annotations and project
management. SAP, however, does not have native capabilities for this area in its SaaS solution.
■
Workflow: SAP's business rules and workflow remain less flexible than those of the more
mainstream MRM vendors. This is an area of concern for some existing and prospective clients.
SAS
SAS is a Leader on the basis of its broad and robust set of capabilities across the five MRM
competencies, its improving customer satisfaction scores, its growing momentum, its architectural
investments, and its vision for next-generation MRM capabilities.
Strengths
■
Financial viability and growth: SAS is a large, privately owned company with revenue of
approximately $3.1 billion in 2014. Gartner estimates that its MRM revenue grew by between
30% and 40% in 2015, to over $40 million.
■
Robust MRM solution: SAS's Marketing Operations Management solution provides a strong
set of capabilities for planning, financial management, creative production management,
marketing asset management, marketing performance management and marketing mix
optimization. Satisfaction scores from reference customers have greatly improved for this
product, as they have for SAS's customer service and ongoing R&D investment.
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■
R&D investment: SAS invests an average of 23% of its revenue in R&D. New features in
Marketing Operations Management 6.4 include improved usability and navigation, setup and
maintenance, performance, and reporting. In addition, enhancements have been made to
Workbench, Planner, Digital Asset Management, Resource Management, Calendars and
Artwork Producer. Integration with third-party vendors, applications within Marketing Operations
Management and other SAS applications (including those of the broader Customer Intelligence
suite), is also a focus.
■
Deployment options: Marketing Operations Management is primarily deployed as SaaS, but
also available via on-premises, hosted and hybrid models.
Cautions
■
Marketing fulfillment capabilities: SAS provides some marketing fulfillment capabilities, but
they are not as robust as those of the "pure play" marketing fulfillment vendors, such as
Elateral, MarcomCentral, Saepio and Wedia.
■
MRM visibility: There remains some confusion regarding SAS's MRM capabilities outside its
installed base. Consequently, SAS misses out on some best-of-breed MRM deals for which it
would have been an ideal candidate for shortlisting.
■
Competition and pricing: SAS will increasingly be challenged by SaaS-only vendors with
robust capabilities, particularly in the midmarket where pricing is more important. Customers
express concerns about SAS's pricing model, and pricing was the main reason why some
reference customers surveyed for this Magic Quadrant, after considering SAS, chose a different
vendor.
■
MRM versions: SAS is currently developing its next-generation Customer Intelligence platform,
Customer Intelligence 360. Over the next two years, it will develop its functionality in this
platform. Clients will need to evaluate whether the current version of the platform, 6.x, meets
their MRM requirements better than the new platform, or whether they prefer to integrate the
current version with the next-generation version. Once SAS's new version has most of the
capabilities of its current Marketing Operations Management suite, existing and prospective
clients will be encouraged to start using Customer Intelligence 360.
Teradata
Teradata is a Leader on the basis of its broad and deep solution, MRM experience, client maturity,
focus on client value, and continued market traction. It has, however, shifted downward in the
Leaders quadrant due to uncertainty created by the sale of its marketing application business and
declining satisfaction ratings from reference customers.
Strengths
■
Growth: Teradata continued to increase its MRM revenue in 2015, and it is one of the top three
vendors for appearances in the shortlists and final contract negotiations seen by Gartner. We
estimate that Teradata's MRM-related revenue in 2015 was between $80 million and $100
million.
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■
Robust solution with mature implementations: Teradata provides a broad set of MRM
functionality, with capabilities in each of the five competency areas, including deep functionality
in planning, budgeting and creative production management. It has some of the most advanced
MRM clients in the market.
■
R&D investment: Key areas of investment for 2015 included a new Portfolio Planner, a new
Task Inbox, an improved calendar, and a new Workflow Mover and library of tools. Teradata has
a new common UI across its marketing applications and is using a new REST API framework.
Its acquisition of FLXone provides it with a data management platform, the Teradata Data
Management Platform, to help with media spending for budget management, marketing mix
modeling and planning. Teradata Interactive provides an agency-based solution for value
realization services focused on strategy, creative services and execution.
■
Deployment options: Teradata offers on-premises, hosted and SaaS options for its Marketing
Operations solutions. Hosting partners include Accenture, Capgemini and Cognizant.
Cautions
■
Uncertainty over sale of marketing application business: At its third-quarter 2015 earnings
call, Teradata announced it was selling its marketing application business (that is, the assets
acquired from Aprimo, eCircle and others). Until the new owner is named, uncertainty will exist
in the marketplace, which could disrupt sales cycles in the short term and cause attrition in the
long term, if it takes too long to find a buyer. Teradata's MRM product and business remains
solid, and Gartner expects this product to find a new home. However, we have noted a decline
in satisfaction among some clients and reference customers contacted for this Magic Quadrant,
in areas such as customer service and support, ongoing R&D investment, pricing and value
relative to cost.
■
Increased competition: Given the uncertainty created by the announced sale, Teradata will find
itself increasingly challenged by its competitors, particularly other Leaders. Expect competitors
to use this uncertainty against Teradata during sales cycles and in competitive campaigns to
target Teradata clients.
■
Marketing asset management and marketing fulfillment capabilities: Although Teradata has
expanded its capabilities for DAM and marketing fulfillment, they are still not as robust as those
offered by niche providers or "pure play" DAM vendors. Teradata does, however, have, a reseller
partnership with Adam Software, and is cultivating partnerships with other vendors, such as
Contentserv.
■
Partner risk: Adam Software and Contentserv could be attractive targets for acquisition for
their DAM capabilities. Teradata's marketing asset management and fulfillment capabilities
could be at risk if another vendor, particularly a competitor, were to buy one or both of its
partners.
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Wedia
Wedia is a Niche Player on the basis of its focus on creative production, marketing asset
management and marketing fulfillment, as well as its predominantly European client base.
Strengths
■
International expansion: Wedia, which is based in France, raised €1 million for the first phase
of its expansion into other European countries, the Middle East and Asia. It is cultivating
partnerships in each of these countries to help sell its solutions. In the second phase, Wedia
plans to expand into North America. Gartner estimates that Wedia's MRM revenue was between
$9 million and $11 million in 2015.
■
Marketing asset management: Wedia's strength is in managing creative projects and review
cycles, storing digital assets and marketing content, and fulfilling marketing content to local
markets via its brand portal and through mobile, print, email, social media and website
channels.
■
R&D investment: Wedia enhanced its functionality for DAM, project management and analytics
in 2015 with Wedia CrossMedia 11. In version 11.1, it focused on enhancing the UI. In version
11.2, it improved the search capabilities through integration with Elasticsearch.
■
Deployment options: Wedia's solution is SaaS-based, but it can be deployed in a hosted
(single-tenant) model on Amazon Web Services by customers that do not want to share their
application and database instance.
Cautions
■
Market visibility: Gartner does not see Wedia on as many longlists or in as many competitive
deals as many other MRM providers, particularly outside Europe.
■
Financial management and creative workflow capabilities: Although Wedia offers some cost
information and tracking capabilities for creative projects, it does not provide an enterprise
budgeting and financial management tool for marketing. Workflows and creative review and
approval processes are geared to creative content campaign execution as part of marketing
fulfillment.
■
Market stability: More small vendors, especially in Europe, are entering the marketing asset
management and marketing fulfillment sectors of the MRM market. As a small vendor, with less
than $15 million in revenue, Wedia is susceptible to strong fluctuations in a market that is rapidly
becoming overcrowded, and in which it faces competition from larger vendors.
■
On-premises deployment: Wedia defaults to a cloud service implementation, but on-site
system implementation is an option available on request.
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Workfront
Workfront is a new Leader on the basis of its rapid growth, increasing resources for MRM,
expanding capabilities, growing partner network, geographical expansion, high customer
satisfaction scores, and focus on creative project and resource management.
Strengths
■
Growth and customer satisfaction: Workfront is one of the fastest-growing vendors in this
Magic Quadrant. It now has over 650 MRM clients. Gartner estimates that Workfront's 2015
MRM revenue was between $28 million and $33 million. Workfront received one of the highest
overall satisfaction ratings from reference customers surveyed for this Magic Quadrant.
■
Resource and project management focus: Workfront's MRM solutions focus on its core
competency of project management to meet the needs of creative project and resource
management for marketing organizations. Its robust people resource management capabilities
are a competitive differentiator. It improved its proofing capabilities for creative production
management with the acquisition of ProofHQ in July 2015.
■
Partnerships: Workfront has a strong partnership with WebDAM (a Shutterstock company) for
DAM and marketing fulfillment. The associated product is available on an OEM basis and sold
as Workfront DAM. Workfront also has DAM partnerships with Adobe, Canto, Extensis, North
Plains and Widen. It also partners with Allocadia for marketing financial management and
Tableau for MRM analytics. In addition, Workfront has partnered with Adobe (Adobe Creative
Cloud) for a plug-in to Adobe InDesign, and with Oracle for integration with Oracle Eloqua and
the Oracle Marketing Cloud.
■
SaaS: Workfront's software can be deployed as a multitenant SaaS or single-tenant hosted
solution. Ninety-four percent of Workfront's customers use the multitenant SaaS model. Clients
with strong regulatory or security requirements have the option to deploy an on-premises
version.
Cautions
■
Financial management capabilities: Although Workfront offers some useful calendaring and
resource-planning capabilities, it does not offer robust budgeting and financial management
capabilities. Workfront is partnering with Allocadia in this area, but clients often look for financial
management and project management capabilities in an integrated solution from one vendor.
■
Marketing fulfilment capabilities: Although Workfront DAM has some marketing fulfillment
capabilities for publishing marketing content, it does not provide the shopping cart and
procurement features seen in the offerings of vendors focused on marketing fulfilment.
■
Partner risk: Workfront has numerous partners, including Allocadia and WebDAM, to provide
an expanded set of MRM capabilities. If one of these partners were to be acquired, acquire a
competitive solution or decide not to partner with Workfront any longer, Workfront could find
itself having to find a new partner. Gartner finds that prospective MRM customers often prefer
an integrated solution from a single vendor.
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■
Competition: Workfront's core competency in creative production and resource management
differentiates it from other specialty MRM vendors that focus on marketing asset and brand
management. However, it also brings Workfront into more direct competition with some of the
larger vendors and Leaders in this Magic Quadrant, such as Infor, SAP, SAS and Teradata.
Vendors Added and Dropped
We review and adjust our inclusion criteria for Magic Quadrants as markets change. As a result of
these adjustments, the mix of vendors in any Magic Quadrant may change over time. A vendor's
appearance in a Magic Quadrant one year and not the next does not necessarily indicate that we
have changed our opinion of that vendor. It may be a reflection of a change in the market and,
therefore, changed evaluation criteria, or of a change of focus by that vendor.
Added
■
None. Note, however, that MarcomCentral replaces Ricoh (PTI Marketing Technologies).
MarcomCentral is now the official name of the subsidiary, bought and owned by Ricoh, that was
part of PTI.
Dropped
■
North Plains Systems. This vendor did not meet the inclusion criteria for numbers of new
customers and did not provide sufficient information for evaluation. North Plains is positioning
itself more toward DAM and cultivating partnerships with vendors in this Magic Quadrant for
broader MRM capabilities in creative production management and marketing fulfillment.
Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria
To be included in this Magic Quadrant, vendors had to meet the following criteria.
Market Traction and Momentum:
■
Vendor must have at least 30 production customers for MRM functionality.
■
Vendor must have had at least 15 new customers for MRM in 2015.
■
Vendor must have generated at least $10 million in revenue from MRM offerings in 2015.
■
Vendor must sell to, and support, clients in at least three different industries.
■
Vendor must have appeared on Gartner client lists at least once per quarter in 2015.
MRM Product Capabilities:
■
Vendor must provide a prepackaged enterprise-class software solution targeted at MRM buyers
and support ongoing R&D for its software.
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■
Vendor's MRM solution must be available for sale independently of other solutions (that is, a
customer must be able to purchase the MRM solution separately, without having to purchase
other business or marketing applications first or at the same time).
■
Software (as opposed to consulting services) must account for 60% or more of the MRM
solution.
■
Vendor must support MRM functionality for at least four of the following five areas of
functionality:
■
Planning and financial management
■
Creative production management
■
Marketing asset management
■
Marketing fulfillment
■
MRM analytics and optimization
■
At least one of these areas of functionality must be for (1) budgeting and financial management
or (2) workflow for creative production management (such as for internal project management
and reviews/approvals).
■
The purpose of MRM solutions is to manage multiple types of marketing resource. New vendors
whose focus is only one of these resources (such as content, assets and information) were
ineligible for inclusion in this Magic Quadrant. To be considered for inclusion, new vendors had
to support at least three of the following resources:
■
Budgets and costs (money)
■
Projects and tasks
■
People and skills
■
Content, assets and information
Evaluation Criteria
Ability to Execute
Product or Service: Product and service remains one of the key differentiators of vendors'
capabilities and an important selection criterion for companies looking for a competitive advantage.
Subcriteria include specific functionality and solution capabilities for planning and financial
management (25%); creative production management (25%); marketing fulfillment (20%);
measurement, reporting, dashboards, analysis and optimization (15%); architecture, in terms of, for
example, openness, flexibility, usability and workflow (10%); and marketing asset and content
management (5%).
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Overall Viability: In a market with many small vendors, viability is an important criterion. Subcriteria
include overall financial viability (50%), MRM-related revenue (40%) and partner strategy (10%).
Sales Execution/Pricing: A vendor's ability to provide global sales and distribution coverage for its
MRM solution, whether directly or through partnerships (or both). Pricing structures that support
both large enterprises and SMBs, and both in-house and SaaS-based deployments, are also
important.
Market Responsiveness/Record: A vendor's responsiveness to the market is key, as are the
market's responsiveness to a vendor and its solution, and customers' experience of working with
that solution in their particular geographic location and industry.
Marketing Execution: A vendor's ability to consistently generate market demand and awareness of
its MRM solution through marketing programs and press visibility. This criterion evaluates a
vendor's marketing strategy and execution to build recognition for its MRM solution in ways that
gain traction across regions and industries.
Customer Experience: This criterion assesses aspects related to ensuring that each customer has
ongoing success with its MRM deployment. Aspects considered include implementation services
and partners, global technical support (direct and via partners), account management, user groups/
panels and customer communities.
Operations: This criterion explores a vendor's ability to meet its goals and commitments. A vendor
must have sufficient professional services (delivered by in-house resources or third-party business
consultants and system integrators) to meet evolving customer requirements. Its customer service
must also be sufficient to meet demand for different customer support request tiers. Subcriteria
include customer service and support (50%) and professional services (50%).
Table 1. Ability to Execute Evaluation Criteria
Evaluation Criteria
Weighting
Product or Service
High
Overall Viability
High
Sales Execution/Pricing
Medium
Market Responsiveness/Record
High
Marketing Execution
Medium
Customer Experience
High
Operations
Medium
Source: Gartner (February 2016)
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Completeness of Vision
Market Understanding: A vendor's understanding of the MRM market, and its specific value
proposition for marketing personnel, are critical factors for buyers looking for a vendor with a vision
that meets their needs. This criterion therefore receives the highest weighting.
Marketing Strategy: A vendor's marketing strategy supports its ability to gain broad recognition for
its MRM solutions. This criterion assesses that strategy's consistency, clarity and differentiation with
regard to the positioning of MRM both internally and externally, and in line with the company's
overall vision.
Sales Strategy: A vendor's sales strategy supports its market penetration and global expansion.
We assess the go-to-market approach to selling MRM products and services, both directly and
through partnership networks globally.
Offering (Product) Strategy: Innovation and vision across the breadth and depth of product
capabilities are critical if a vendor is to keep meeting the needs of a maturing market in the five
areas of MRM competency. This criterion therefore receives the highest weighting. Subcriteria
include specific functionality and solution capabilities for planning and financial management (25%);
creative production management (20%); marketing fulfillment (20%); measurement, reporting,
dashboards, analysis and optimization (20%); architecture, in terms of, for example, openness,
flexibility, usability and workflow (10%); and marketing asset and content management (5%).
Business Model: This criterion includes an evaluation of how well a vendor mobilizes resources and
uses partners to go to market and execute.
Vertical/Industry Strategy: This criterion evaluates a vendor's go-to-market strategy for industries,
solution capabilities (product verticalization), industry templates and packaging.
Innovation: This criterion assesses a vendor's innovation in new and emerging areas of MRM, such
as collaboration, mobile connectivity, advanced MRM analytics, marketing resource optimization,
scenario planning/forecasting and digital extensions for fulfillment.
Geographic Strategy: This criterion assesses a vendor's understanding of global MRM
requirements, as well as its strategy and plans for geographical expansion, including marketing,
sales, implementation and customer support.
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Table 2. Completeness of Vision Evaluation Criteria
Evaluation Criteria
Weighting
Market Understanding
High
Marketing Strategy
Medium
Sales Strategy
Medium
Offering (Product) Strategy
High
Business Model
Medium
Vertical/Industry Strategy
Medium
Innovation
High
Geographic Strategy
Medium
Source: Gartner (February 2016)
Quadrant Descriptions
Leaders
Leaders in the MRM market demonstrate exemplary performance. They deliver a breadth and depth
of integrated MRM functionality for large, enterprisewide and global implementations that extend
MRM across the marketing organization. Leaders articulate business propositions that resonate with
buyers.
Challengers
Challengers have entered the MRM market primarily to provide offerings that complement their
established business applications. In doing so, they expect to benefit from their large installed
bases. They typically offer a breadth of functionality, although often at the expense of depth and
innovation. They provide value in terms of ease of integration with their enterprise applications, but
have a limited understanding of market trends and marketing buyers. Challengers are either unable
to articulate their visions consistently and effectively, or have not mobilized their resources to excel
in this market.
Visionaries
Visionaries have a strong vision for applying technology to MRM-related issues, but have yet to
mobilize resources or develop a robust business model for global expansion. Visionaries are
thought leaders and innovators in most of the five areas of MRM competency. They need to achieve
greater scale in the MRM market and execute more consistently, if they are to become Leaders.
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Niche Players
Niche Players perform well in a small segment of the MRM market, but they have limited ability to
innovate outside their core competency area(s) or to outperform other vendors with a broader focus.
They focus on a specific geographic area or industry, or on only some of the five MRM
competencies. They have limited implementations and support services for MRM, and may not have
achieved the necessary scale to solidify their market positions.
Context
As more companies invest in campaign management and digital marketing solutions, decisions to
purchase MRM solutions are becoming more mainstream. Companies are finding they need to
manage their marketing resources, partly due to the growing complexity of their marketing
organizations and partly to promote greater agility across the marketing mix. Given the complex and
strategic nature of MRM, IT and marketing leaders must work closely together when selecting
vendors and during the implementation of an MRM solution. As a best practice, many companies
rely on marketing operation directors, who sit between marketing and IT executives, to lead MRM
initiatives.
MRM investments continued to grow in 2015, particularly in North America and Europe, but we also
saw more interest in Asia/Pacific and Latin America. Most vendors continued to increase their
revenue. A few, especially those competing in the marketing fulfillment area, were flat in terms of
revenue growth, and a few suffered slight revenue declines.
The gaps between vendors appear to be widening, due largely to differences in their product
capabilities and market execution.
Judging from the vendors that Gartner tracks, we estimate that there are over 6,300 MRM
implementations worldwide in midsize and large companies, which collectively generate over $1
billion in annual revenue. There were over 850 new MRM implementations among the vendors we
evaluated for this Magic Quadrant in 2015.
Gartner sees MRM growing within organizations due to companies' global expansion, increases in
the number of users across different regions, and the expansion of capabilities across the five areas
of MRM competency. MRM is establishing a firmer presence in the midmarket, especially through
SaaS and hosted deployment options.
The MRM competency most commonly asked about by Gartner clients is creative production
management. This is mainly due to interest in the following: the compliance review process;
managing and tracking collaborative reviews and approvals with annotations in one system; and
project management to ensure tasks and marketing initiatives are delivered on time.
The number of client inquiries Gartner receives about marketing financial management is also
increasing, with more clients asking about these capabilities in 2015 than in any previous year.
Clients are often interested in implementing marketing financial management capabilities on either a
stand-alone basis or as a second-phase initiative after implementing creative production
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management capabilities. Interest in financial management is being driven by rapid growth in digital
marketing; these capabilities enable marketers to make real-time budgeting decisions and
reallocate funds to increase marketing agility in the era of digital business.
Gartner is also receiving more inquiries about vendors with both marketing financial management
and performance management capabilities. Examples of such vendors are Allocadia and Beckon,
two companies that we are tracking for potential inclusion in a future edition of this Magic Quadrant.
By contrast, growth in clients' interest in marketing asset management and fulfillment capabilities
has leveled off somewhat.
As the market matures, it is attracting larger vendors, and some vendors are experiencing explosive
growth. In this context, small vendors — particularly those with less than $10 million in annual
revenue — may not survive, and they are increasingly likely to be acquired by larger companies. We
expect approximately half of the market's smaller vendors to go out of business or be acquired
during the next three years. We expect consolidation between the smaller vendors to broaden these
companies' MRM capabilities and geographical footprints. We also expect larger vendors to acquire
smaller MRM vendors in order to enter the MRM market for the first time or to expand their existing
MRM capabilities.
Market Overview
Customers are more astute about their MRM requirements now than they were two years ago. Firsttime buyers are surveying a broader set of MRM competencies and examining the global impact of
MRM initiatives. MRM veterans are looking to enhance their functionality, and expand globally, while
consolidating prior purchases. Early buyers are re-evaluating their prior choices as the market
matures.
Among the reference customers surveyed for this Magic Quadrant (70 participated in an online
survey), the most important reason for selecting a vendor was that its MRM functionality met their
organization's requirements (59% of respondents). Other common reasons for selection were the
robustness of the MRM functionality (33%), the vendor's MRM expertise (30%), pricing (26%), and
a good response to an RFP or a strong presentation of capabilities (26%). In addition, 33% of the
surveyed reference customers used an on-demand/SaaS solution, 23% had deployed an onpremises solution, 19% were using a solution hosted by a third party, and 14% were using a hybrid
model.
Implementation times (to full production deployment) ranged from three to 16 months among the
reference customers, with the average being eight months. Sixty-four percent of these customers
stated that the implementation time generally met their expectations; 25% reported that it was
longer than expected; 4% said it was shorter than expected; and 7% didn't know.
Seventy-eight percent of the reference customers used their own staff for MRM implementation,
52% used their vendor's professional services, and 16% used one or more external system
integrators.
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Forty-five percent of the reference customers stated that their MRM solution required configuration
and customization; 22% said it needed configuration only (with no custom writing of code); 19%
said it required only customization (writing of code); 13% were using a solution as supplied, with no
customization or configuration; and the rest said that they didn't know about this.
The extent of customization varied greatly from one vendor to the next, from less than 7% to 80%
of the implemented solution. Clients should carefully evaluate what proportion of their requirements
can be met "out of the box," and what proportion will require configuration or customization. They
should aim to keep customization to 20% or less, if possible, by selecting a vendor that offers 80%
or more of the functionality they require "out of the box."
For further help with identifying and evaluating MRM vendors that meet your requirements, see
"Toolkit: How to Create a Marketing Resource Management Application RFP."
Gartner Recommended Reading
Some documents may not be available as part of your current Gartner subscription.
"How Markets and Vendors Are Evaluated in Gartner Magic Quadrants"
"Toolkit: How to Create a Marketing Resource Management Application RFP"
"12 Best Practices to Implement a Marketing Resource Management Solution"
"The Five Competencies of MRM 'Re-' Defined"
"IT and Marketing Need to Work Together to Support Marketing Planning and Financial
Management"
"The 12 Key Functional Capabilities for Marketing Creative Production Management"
"Marketing Fulfillment Is the Last Mile of Marketing Resource Management"
"Cut Waste, Not Marketing Programs, Using MRM"
Evaluation Criteria Definitions
Ability to Execute
Product/Service: Core goods and services offered by the vendor for the defined
market. This includes current product/service capabilities, quality, feature sets, skills
and so on, whether offered natively or through OEM agreements/partnerships as
defined in the market definition and detailed in the subcriteria.
Overall Viability: Viability includes an assessment of the overall organization's financial
health, the financial and practical success of the business unit, and the likelihood that
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the individual business unit will continue investing in the product, will continue offering
the product and will advance the state of the art within the organization's portfolio of
products.
Sales Execution/Pricing: The vendor's capabilities in all presales activities and the
structure that supports them. This includes deal management, pricing and negotiation,
presales support, and the overall effectiveness of the sales channel.
Market Responsiveness/Record: Ability to respond, change direction, be flexible and
achieve competitive success as opportunities develop, competitors act, customer
needs evolve and market dynamics change. This criterion also considers the vendor's
history of responsiveness.
Marketing Execution: The clarity, quality, creativity and efficacy of programs designed
to deliver the organization's message to influence the market, promote the brand and
business, increase awareness of the products, and establish a positive identification
with the product/brand and organization in the minds of buyers. This "mind share" can
be driven by a combination of publicity, promotional initiatives, thought leadership,
word of mouth and sales activities.
Customer Experience: Relationships, products and services/programs that enable
clients to be successful with the products evaluated. Specifically, this includes the ways
customers receive technical support or account support. This can also include ancillary
tools, customer support programs (and the quality thereof), availability of user groups,
service-level agreements and so on.
Operations: The ability of the organization to meet its goals and commitments. Factors
include the quality of the organizational structure, including skills, experiences,
programs, systems and other vehicles that enable the organization to operate
effectively and efficiently on an ongoing basis.
Completeness of Vision
Market Understanding: Ability of the vendor to understand buyers' wants and needs
and to translate those into products and services. Vendors that show the highest
degree of vision listen to and understand buyers' wants and needs, and can shape or
enhance those with their added vision.
Marketing Strategy: A clear, differentiated set of messages consistently communicated
throughout the organization and externalized through the website, advertising,
customer programs and positioning statements.
Sales Strategy: The strategy for selling products that uses the appropriate network of
direct and indirect sales, marketing, service, and communication affiliates that extend
the scope and depth of market reach, skills, expertise, technologies, services and the
customer base.
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Offering (Product) Strategy: The vendor's approach to product development and
delivery that emphasizes differentiation, functionality, methodology and feature sets as
they map to current and future requirements.
Business Model: The soundness and logic of the vendor's underlying business
proposition.
Vertical/Industry Strategy: The vendor's strategy to direct resources, skills and
offerings to meet the specific needs of individual market segments, including vertical
markets.
Innovation: Direct, related, complementary and synergistic layouts of resources,
expertise or capital for investment, consolidation, defensive or pre-emptive purposes.
Geographic Strategy: The vendor's strategy to direct resources, skills and offerings to
meet the specific needs of geographies outside the "home" or native geography, either
directly or through partners, channels and subsidiaries as appropriate for that
geography and market.
Gartner, Inc. | G00274973
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