Once upon a time in Marketingland there lived a courageous and noble knight called George.

As a knight of the Marketing Roundtable George had many sleepless nights but then one inspirational night George had a striking dream.

In the dream, all the citizens saw that George was the best marketer in the land. They gave him all of their gold and crowned him King of Marketingland.

Waking from his slumber, George knew that this dream had told him his future.

And so George packed his bags, and set out on his quest for marketing perfection.

Survey Results: What aspect of the job keeps marketers awake at night?

• 38% said ‘trying to prove marketing ROI’
• 34% worry about having too many data silos
• 29% worry about duplicates
• 23% are concerned about not knowing their customers well enough

As George set out upon the first leg of his journey, he spotted a brilliant blue light glowing atop a hill.

As he reached the top of the hill, he found a mystical blue sword stuck in a stone. George pulled the sword from the stone, admiring the curious symbol on the hilt.

“BlueVenn”, George shouted to the clouds. “What a glorious name!” “This will prove useful in my quest for marketing perfection!” and he went on his journey filled with a new sense of courage.

Survey Results: Marketers are searching for better and more efficient ways of managing their data

• 41% of marketers have to manage more than 20 data sources for every customer
• Nearly a third spend 50% or more of their time and resource managing, analysing and presenting data
• 68% would like to get that figure below 50%

Soon George encountered a fearsome marketing beast: the Hydra of Customer Segmentation.

One head was that of an old lady; the second a white van man; the third a millennial, (a hazy and indistinct beast, but the most fearsome of all).

“How can I segment this beast effectively?” wondered George, fearing that his quest had come to a premature and ineffective end. Suddenly George remembered the sword at his side. Wielding BlueVenn aloft he swiftly and accurately targeted the heads and carved the beast into easily identifiable customer segments. “Oh, that was easy!” thought George, as he went on with his journey…

Survey Results: Without effective segmentation a knight will fail in their quest for marketing perfection

• 39% of marketers believe that data segmentation is the most important skill for businesses to acquire over the next two years
• 80% feel they are not yet effectively segmenting their customers in real-time

Having mastered his first mythical beast, George was confronted by a fearsome cyclops sat on a rock.

“I am the Cyclops of Single Customer View,” exclaimed the beast. “I shall eat you for my supper, tasty sir knight!” “How will I ever tackle this fearsome beast?!” thought George. “He is the biggest beast in Marketingland and so difficult to overcome!”

George again swung his trusty sword, BlueVenn, into action. Pointing the blade to the sky, he reflected the sunlight into the cyclops’ single eye, dazzling the beast. “Ow! My eye!” yelled the cyclops, as George quickly made good his escape…

Survey Results: Single Customer View is truly the most terrifying marketing beast

• 54% of marketers believe that a difficulty accessing data is making their marketing less targeted
• 82% feel that they are not yet able to bring multiple data sources together into a 360-degree customer view
• 43% answered a 360-degree customer view would give the greatest ROI to the business

Can you help George decipher this curious scroll to aid him on his quest for marketing perfection?

Help George work his way through the maze and escape the Minotaur of Multi-Channel Marketing

Soon, George came across two of his fellow knights at a crossroads. Neither had a magical sword and both looked lost and worried about the outcome of their journeys.

Then George had an idea. “If we could compare notes on our separate journeys,” he said, pulling out a blue notepad, “all three could be better optimised!”

And so the three combined data about their journeys onto the blue pad. The second and third knight learned more about the BlueVenn sword, the Hydra and the Cyclops. And George learned that he soon had to find his way through an enchanted forest.

“Thank you brave knights!” said George, as he went on his way. “By aggregating the data about our separate paths it has ensured better journey optimisation for all of us!”

Survey Results: Cross journey optimisation is of growing importance to marketers

• 38% pick cross journey optimisation as one of the top factors that would directly boost their marketing ROI
• 66% of marketers still aren’t using any form of cross journey optimisation
• 50% are attempting to implement cross journey optimisation

Then, as he wandered through the dark and lonely forest, George met a wizard in a bright purple robe. “I am the Wizard of Predictive Analytics! But why do you look so worried brave knight?”

“Because I’m not sure where this journey is going to lead,” said George. “Never fear bold sir knight!” proclaimed the wizard. I have imbued your sword with the ability to look into the future. Simply glance into your sword and your journey shall become clear.”

“Thank you kind wizard!” exclaimed George, glancing into BlueVenn. “Now I can see what will happen on my journey before I’ve gone there!” And George saw that his quest was almost at an end.

Survey Results: Nearly 1 in 5 marketers believe that Predictive Analytics is a mythical beast that cannot exist in the real world

• 76% of businesses also feel they cannot currently predict customer behaviours before they happen
• 34% think thatthe biggest barrierto achieving predictive analytics is a lack of internal skills or capabilities

Having defeated all the mythical beasts of marketing, George reached the end of his quest, and discovered there a chest of gold. George was the richest knight in all of Marketingland!

When he returned to his castle his fellow knights were so impressed by his defeat of the Hydra of Customer Segmentation, the Cyclops of Single Customer View, his mastery of Predictive Analytics, and his ability to undertake Journey Optimisation, that they made him King of Marketingland and gave him a regular column in Marketing Week./p>

Survey Results: Understanding how to work with data effectively and having the right skills is critical in your quest

• 72% said data analytics is the most important marketing skill
• 65% said social media
• 31% said web development
• 23% said graphic design
• 13% said SEO

And as George looked back on all of his achievements, he thought to himself: ‘Thank goodness I had BlueVenn to help me!’

In the enterprise space, 1 in 5 marketers agree that their existing data analysis tools need to improve.