Blending technology and marketing for SME success 

London, ON-based Pulp and Press, a wellness beverage venture offering organic cold-pressed juices, wellness shots and smoothies, had its humble beginnings in 2014, to now having its presence in major Canadian and US retail stores. Crossing the landmark of successfully selling 3 million bottles in 2019, this TechAlliance’s i.d.e.a. Fund recipient is well on its path to becoming a standout success story coming out of the Forest City. While the business itself is known for its high-quality, no-added-preservatives line of beverages, its rapid success and global expansion is also credited to its strong MarTech strategy.   
  
Cory Dubeau, Partner and Senior Vice President of Strategy at one of Canada’s leading integrated marketing agencies, Northern Commerce, has worked closely with Pulp and Press since its beginning to develop and execute some of these successful digital strategies that helped transform the brand into a popular household name. Success stories of companies such as Pulp and Press emphasize the importance of leveraging digital technologies to gain a competitive edge. In this ever-evolving digital landscape where traditional marketing methods are often supplemented by data-driven strategies, MarTech emerges as a crucial tool for SMEs aiming to enhance customer engagement, optimize marketing efforts, and drive growth.   

From e-commerce, digital advertising using first-party data, marketing automation, to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms, MarTech involves the deployment of technological solutions to better optimize marketing efforts. “Typically, things that are done in a more automated fashion now use software solutions to increase efficiency and performance of their marketing and advertising strategies,” says Dubeau. Working with industry and size-agnostic clients, Dubeau has only seen the rise of MarTech solutions throughout his career at Northern Commerce. An agency focused on helping brands navigate their digital transformation, Northern provides engagement and marketing solutions, innovative e-commerce technology strategies and expertise in UX and UI with a keen focus on creating the perfect customer journey. “Since we work on all three of these components, this helps us in covering the entire gamut of digital efforts for our clients and building the best customer journey for their target audience,” says Dubeau. From working with startups, scale-ups, SMEs and enterprises, with specialization in the retail sector including large Canadian retailers such as Canadian Tire, Rexall, and Staples, Dubeau has seen a common thread in the MarTech space – these (MarTech) solutions have now evolved and revolutionized to become more consolidated, “The industry is heading towards a more blended marketing strategy that involves leveraging technical capabilities with an increase in the personalization factor.”

While AI and Machine Learning are disrupting every industry, it is no surprise that MarTech solutions are also using the power of AI to collect data from all different systems to create better experiences and better performance marketing strategies. That’s not all – one of the other emerging trends in this space is leveraging first-party customer data to gear marketing strategies accordingly. “This is so important for small businesses, as they do have access to a lot of their first-party customer data. They also know their customers on a more intimate level than other larger organizations. This helps them in creating a more tailored and personalized experience based on individual behaviour,” says Dubeau. Leveraging accessible data while combating privacy restrictions can help brands target and segment their audience at the right time in the sales funnel. Recognizing this, Northern Commerce launched Convertevent, a Facebook Conversion API solution that helps brands better understand their customers by leveraging their server data. In simple terms, this tool helps companies improve their ad performance, grow their retargeting pools, and collect deeper data by tracking their website’s server, not the user’s website activity which might have cookie and ad blockers, disabling data tracking altogether. How does this work? “This solution enables us to collect first-party data that we own as a brand or that our clients own as a brand, and then informs the advertising platform in a way that is still compliant with privacy and security updates,” says Dubeau. Since this data belongs to your website and has been acquired through your own customer’s purchase information with consent, this helps ventures leverage their own data in a way that helps them create better advertising and user experience for all.   

All these innovations in the marketing industry have not only created smarter ways of targeting audiences but also paved the way for precision, automation, strategic optimization, and predictive data analysis. Earlier, reaping the benefits of everything that MarTech offers seemed like a dream. According to Dubeau, that’s not the case anymore. With multiple easy-to-use, affordable technologies in the market, Dubeau shares how accessibility is not a prominent hurdle for most SMEs in today’s world. “There are so many different solutions out there that you’ll typically find something for the objective that you’re trying to hit,” says Dubeau. However, with many options comes the dilemma of choosing the right platform. “Start small, start focused.  Pick the right solution that solves the current problem that you’re looking for. Understand the marketing platform that you are working with and try to get the most out of that platform before you then integrate another one. That’s crucial for SMEs, so that this process doesn’t get intimidating,” shares Dubeau.   
  
The only challenge of using these platforms? The learning journey of understanding and fully utilizing the MarTech platform to flourish your business. “That’s why agencies like us exist. It really comes down to more of the in-house expertise or time, at the end of the day. You might be capable of doing it, but as an SME, your time is very valuable, and you want to focus on the items that grow the business the most,” says Dubeau.

As SMEs try to create greater brand awareness, tap into bigger audience groups, and aim to provide better digital experiences for their customers, the evolving revolution in MarTech with innovations like AI and first-party data utilization will only create more accessibility and potential for these tools, especially for SMEs. The key lies in selecting the right solutions, understanding their full potential, and efficiently implementing them to enhance customer engagement and business outcomes, as evident from Pulp and Press’ success story on this front. As Dubeau says, “You can’t make a marketing strategy these days without using any type of MarTech solution in some capacity or the other.”