DECEMBER 2024MARTECHOUTLOOK.COM9The key factor when talking to loyalty and messaging vendors was the ability to integrate with our data. Who was going to be able to get data out of our POS (whichever one we chose), our app / olo system (which was not going to change) and our advanced ordering (catering) system? Initially, we thought Salesforce was going to be that solution, but the integration was too steep of a climb. To build the system we needed, it would have been hours and hours and thousands and thousands of dollars of development work to get it stood up.While I was moving in one direction with sourcing new vendors, our tech team was also sourcing CDPs so a marketing platform would ultimately only have to integrate with one system instead of 3-4. After many demos and hours of calls and meetings, mParticle was chosen as our CDP.And ironically, we decided to stick with the current POS because they had acquired another company with technology to support enterprise systems like ours. With only a flip of a switch at headquarters we were going to be able to transform our POS functions from the backend without disrupting reporting and provide an identical experience for our restaurant crews. Additionally, some of the loyalty features had been upgraded so an immediate need to switch had disappeared.Messaging was still an issue, though, so the hunt for a perfect solution was ongoing. The team at mParticle recommended we speak to Braze because they already had an integration in place between the two systems. We went through multiple demonstrations, I met with numerous other clients of Braze and had many discussions among ourselves in determining if Braze was the correct solution for us. Ultimately, we selected it as our messaging partner and a major reason was the integration.With our new tech stack of mParticle as our CDP, Snowflake as our data warehouse and Braze as our messaging pattern, we are set to grow sales in 2023 because of the personalized marketing we will implement. We intend to slice and dice our customers into buckets by time of purchase, order mode, item purchased, visit frequency, etc. The possibilities are almost endless. When we started the onboarding process with mParticle they asked us what information from each order we wanted to record. My answer was, everything! Every single component of that ticket is another aspect of our customers that we need to know.As I write this, we are only days away from mParticle getting completely stood up and the Braze onboarding has commenced. My excitement about the future possibilities can hardly be contained! We've never been able to reach customers in any customized way other than location, which was itself suspect because a purchase made at any location put the customer into that store's bucket, leading to confusion when a customer in South Carolina received an email about a special in Nashville because they had visited that location once on vacation two years ago.This journey may sound similar to one your team experienced or maybe you're in the midst of it now. I often felt like I was a novice and the most non-technical person on our team, but I learned so much this past year. While I still don't know the why or how of the technicalaspects, I know what I want the end result to be and am excited to get going with these new systems! MTTHE KEY FACTOR WHEN TALKING TO LOYALTY AND MESSAGING VENDORS WAS THE ABILITY TO INTEGRATE WITH OUR DATA
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