By
Rachel Daggett
There is no shortage of tools in modern marketing. In fact, there are too many. For every slice of the customer journey, another app claims to simplify it. Write faster. Post smarter. Analyze better.
This cycle is not new. Industries have long swung between point solutions and “all-in-one” suites. For millions of office workers, Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, and later G Suite each consolidated fragmented workflows, but over time–particularly recently with the advent of AI solutions–users have turned to specialized tools that offer more depth. The tradeoff is always the same: precision without cohesion, or breadth without depth.
Marketing technology is now caught in its own version of this pendulum. Point solutions like Birdeye, Descript, Jasper, and Sora offer precision. Platforms like HubSpot, Apollo, and SEMrush promise breadth. Few, however, meaningfully reduce workload.
Behind every campaign, the reality is the same. Dozens of micro-decisions, multiple logins, and a tangle of disconnected systems. The efficiency of new and specialized tools has unfortunately introduced new kinds of operational noise. Smart marketers spend more time managing workflows than executing strategy. Innovation is not the problem. Integration is.
There are three different types of solutions on the market that all promise some sort of efficiency. However, these tools and platforms often fall short of what marketers are looking for and need.
Efficiency doesn’t come from how fast a single feature performs. It comes from the absence of unnecessary steps. When tools operate in isolation, every campaign becomes a maze of handoffs. Manual exports, reformatting, Slack threads for file routing, and spreadsheet tracking for attribution all drain energy.
The best platforms solve this by delivering operational continuity. They move campaigns from creation to launch to measurement inside the same environment. Execution accelerates, feedback loops close faster, and focus returns.
The strongest platforms are not those with the longest list of capabilities. They are the ones that replace clusters of disconnected tools with coherent, continuous workflows. In practice, the rare tools that matter most are the ones that remove the most friction.
Questions worth asking:
A tool that helps you do more by giving you fewer things to manage, is worth paying for.
No two organizations need the exact same software tech stack. The right mix depends on team size, strategy, and operating model. The platforms that truly matter are those that reduce workflow steps rather than add layers—systems where strategy, execution, and measurement occur in one connected environment. These don’t just offer features; they replace clusters of tools with coherent, continuous workflows.
Here are three common approaches we see:
Lean Growth Stack
Best for: Small, budget-conscious teams that need flexibility and can customize tools around specific workflows.
Pros:Highly adaptable, cost-efficient, tailored to the business case; quick to implement.
Limitations: Lacks depth in specialized areas such as advanced SEO, review monitoring, and enterprise-grade analytics. Scalability can become a challenge as teams grow. Requires further integrations or APIs. As these teams scale, they often begin incorporating elements of ABM platforms, enrichment tools, and sales sequencing technologies to extend reach and personalize outreach without shifting to a full enterprise stack.
Best for: Teams where content production, distribution, and performance measurement are the primary growth levers.
Pros:Strong publishing-to-performance flow; ideal for repurposing and tracking content across multiple channels.
Limitations: Requires tighter integrations across platforms; risk of redundancy between analytics and scheduling tools. Many of these teams eventually explore lighter-weight ABM and sales sequencing tools as they grow, even if they’re not operating at full enterprise scale.
Best for: Large, multi-function teams with complex go-to-market operations that need scalability and governance.
Pros:Customizable, scalable, accommodates multiple departments and channels under a unified framework.
Limitations: Higher cost and complexity; risk of fragmentation without strict governance and integration discipline.
It’s also worth remembering that the stack visible in the chart above is only the shared foundation. In nearly every company I work with, there’s another layer of tools that individual functions bring into the process.
Creative teams lean on Adobe Creative Suite, Canva, and stock libraries like iStock. Growth and PR teams turn to EIN Newswire, Eventbrite, or other syndication services. Go-to-market teams add Adobe Acrobat, Zoom Webinars, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, enrichment databases, or data-cleaning tools like NeverBounce. Content and operations staff patch gaps with transcription tools, HTML email builders, or lightweight landing page software.
Each of these tools solves a problem in isolation. But layered on top of an already fragmented foundation, they multiply complexity. A single campaign can end up weaving through a CRM, a MAP, analytics dashboards, plus a half-dozen department-specific tools before it ever reaches the audience.
This is why consolidation and operational continuity matter. The goal isn’t to strip away the specialized tools people need, but to strengthen the core system so those one-offs remain useful enhancers rather than additional friction.
Marketing teams don’t need more specialized tools, they need fewer steps. A platform that could combine CRM, MAP, and lightweight content management in one shared UI, with embedded AI to handle routing and formatting, built-in collaboration that doesn’t live in another workflow, and campaign-level visibility across channels would answer a very real need. No one has nailed it yet, which is why so many teams are piecing solutions together on their own.
That’s where the temptation comes in. Some enterprises, frustrated by fragmentation, consider building their own AI-driven workflows in-house. On the surface it feels logical: if off-the-shelf tools don’t fit perfectly, why not design something custom with AI? What could go wrong? “Vibe coding” sounds fun and easy and inexpensive! The risk is that what looks like a shortcut often introduces heavier costs—onboarding, governance, duplication, and long-term technical debt.
I explored this in more detail in my recent article, [AI-Built Apps Are Easy (But Don’t Fire Your Developers Yet)], where I tested what it takes to create a custom system entirely with AI.
For most organizations, the smarter move isn’t to build from scratch but to rethink what already exists: consolidating platforms, embedding AI where it supports real execution, and stripping away unnecessary layers.
The goal isn’t more software. It’s fewer steps and a more resilient stack. We work with marketing teams to assess, simplify, and realign their technology stacks. Whether your team is looking to replace five tools with one, embed AI into your daily flow, or reduce your campaign cycle time by half, we can help you design a martech ecosystem that actually works for the way your team operates.