Digital marketing solutions have evolved significantly over the last decade. Marketers have seen an explosion in the number of digital marketing tools available to them, from a few dozen major email, analytics and advertising services at the beginning of the century, to as many as 2,000 marketing cloud applications today, according to Scott Brinker of ChiefMartec.com.
Ironically, what marketers are facing now is too much technology and data, and the problem is how to efficiently manage it. So what’s the solution? Here is where tag management system (TMS) comes in. In fact, it should be the foundation and step 1 of your digital marketing strategy. According to the Econsultancy and Tealium report, 87 percent of digital marketers now believe that tag management is key to their online success.
What is tag management? A tag, in this case, represents a piece of data-collecting code . Using a Tag Management system lets marketers easily insert snippets of code which enable third-party tracking, analysis, reporting, remarketing, conversion tracking, optimization, and much more.
How does it work? These tags act as a container to collect visitors’ information. This means that when users go to certain pages, or take particular actions, the system will trigger various tag/tracking scripts/snippets. This sends a notification to your analytics tool, paid search, affiliate, display, email, or other campaigns that an action took place or will launch some functionality on your site such as a chat window.
Why is it important? Tag management is one of those foundational marketing tools that runs on the back-end. Over the past few years, tag management has evolved into one of the sexiest marketing topic. In a recent report, Forrester describes how sophisticated firms have extended tag management to provide flexible customer data governance, scalable digital analytics, and data-driven customer engagement.
Stay tuned, in our next blog entry, we will go more in-depth to talk about the latest Forrester Release on TMS and how can it benefit your online marketing strategy.
