Namics study: Headless digital marketing in companies

Namics - A Merkle Company, the leading full-service digital agency from Switzerland, publishes the Digital Marketing Monitor 2020. The representative study examines the maturity of digital marketing in companies from Germany, Austria and Switzerland (DACH). The result: Companies recognise the opportunities of digital marketing, but lack the strategy, budget and internal know-how to exploit the potential of trends such as personalisation.

With the Monitor, Namics is pursuing the goal of sustainably strengthening digital marketing in German-speaking companies. The study is based on a qualitative and quantitative survey. The analysis was conducted over the course of the year with over 200 marketing decision-makers of different company sizes and evaluated by Namics experts.

Customer data is the treasure for companies. The better a company knows its consumers, the better it can make them personal offers. Marketers therefore see great potential in the personalization of their measures, alongside social media and artificial intelligence (AI).

• Personalization is one of the most important trends for respondents. In concrete terms, the aim is to better manage, evaluate and align existing data on customers. More than a third of large companies intend to address this issue in the coming months, but only around one sixth of small companies.
• Social media marketing is just as important. 40 percent of marketers from small companies want to concentrate on social media marketing in the future, compared with 35 percent for large companies. For both groups it is the top trend of the year - medium-sized companies, on the other hand, attribute less importance to social media.
• Another important trend cited by marketers is artificial intelligence (AI), which is used to predict consumer behaviour, among other things. While more than half of medium-sized companies are very sceptical about AI, more than 70 percent of small and large companies believe in the benefits of using it. Nevertheless, only just under 50 percent of large companies use the technology, while only 13 percent of small companies use it.

Digital marketing encompasses many different disciplines. Three-quarters of marketers use social media for marketing. Slightly more than half are concerned with search engine optimization (SEO) and content marketing. Mobile marketing, on the other hand, is used to a much lesser extent.

In detail: Social Media Marketing - Most important discipline

• Social media is the most important instrument. Three-quarters of respondents rely on it, almost as many have a strategy. More than half of them leave it in-house. For implementation, companies are looking for agencies: one third each to plan campaigns, create content or for monitoring and analytics.
• Almost 90 percent of companies use Facebook, regardless of company size and industry. Almost half of the respondents use the Microsoft subsidiary LinkedIn, which thus overtakes Xing as a business platform. Just as many companies use the real-time medium Twitter. Instagram, YouTube or Pinterest play a lesser role.

In detail: Content Marketing - Quality does not play a major role

• More than half of those surveyed have already done content marketing, and just as many have a strategy for doing so. Three quarters create content themselves, almost as many maintain it independently, agencies take on the role of strategic consultants.
• Only one third see "target group relevance and personalization" as a success factor. They also attribute little influence to the quality of the content - i.e. "journalistic quality", "SEO-optimized editing" and "compelling storytelling". No wonder that three quarters see the greatest difficulty in arousing customer interest.

In detail: Search Engine Marketing - SEO is expensive and complex

• More than half of the companies adapt their websites to the requirements of search engines. 40 percent complete all activities in-house, almost one third outsource the tasks. Just as many rate SEO as too expensive and costly. In addition, one third believes that it takes too long for SEO to achieve visible results.
• At 80 percent, Google is the most frequently used search engine for ads. However, less than half of them are concerned with the positioning of ads. Classic text ads are the first choice for 60 percent. 40 percent rely on display ads that appear as image or text ads within texts on other websites.

The monitor examines how companies from the DACH region are positioned in online marketing. The Digital Marketing Monitor 2020 examines trends, tendencies and challenges and shows how the various measures, instruments and channels are currently being used.

The monitor is based on a qualitative and quantitative survey. Namics interviewed marketing managers from Germany and Switzerland on qualitative data collection. They work in companies of different industries and sizes. Namics analysts have developed hypotheses from this data and validated them using questionnaires with a panel of 200 DACH marketing experts. Namics evaluated and processed the data obtained in the monitor.

Download the entire study here.

Here you can download the images of the Digital Marketing Monitor:

– Kanika Kundra is a consultant and digital marketing expert at Namics

– Namics - A Merkle Company publishes the Digital Marketing Monitor 2020

– The monitor examines the maturity level of digital marketing in DACH and examines trends, tendencies and challenges

– These trends are promising and have the greatest influence

– These social media channels are currently used by companies in the DACH region

– Content Marketing has these tasks

The press release can be downloaded here.