Why email needs a new kind of technographic
Savvy sales teams rely on technographic data to win new business while spending less time researching prospects. Not surprisingly, MarTech sales teams are some of the heaviest user of this data. But if you rely on technographics to provide insights on the email tech stacks of senders, you may be surprised to learn that what you’re using could be worthless for your needs.
In this post we’ll describe what technographic data is, where it comes from and show why the most common means of gathering it doesn’t work for email.
What are technographics and where do they come from?
Technographics is a fancy term for data that reveals the hardware, software and services used by companies. It’s the kind of data that makes sales teams salivate just a little because it provides great leads quickly, and it leads to higher close rates.
Technographic data is typically gleaned from sources that are accessible to just about anyone. In a sense, it’s hidden in plain sight; you just need to find the right source. Perhaps the richest, most accessible source is company web pages, where a big chunk of a company’s tech stack is revealed right in the HTML.
Even if you’ve never looked at HTML in your life, chances are that right now you can open the URL of your favorite site, view the HTML source code and discover some interesting things about that company’s tech stack.
For instance, here’s a snippet of HTML from theguardian.com (as of March 8, 2019) that reveals a few of the tools their web presence relies on:
There’s more to it, of course — much more — but that’s the gist: clear signals of a company’s technology stack can be had just by looking. In theory, anyone can do this on a limited scale. But in practice, it’s the sort of tedious, time-consuming task that you wouldn’t want to have to do very often.
That’s where technographic services enter the picture. They build company tech stack profiles — their technographics — by scanning millions of web pages so humans don’t have to. Though there are additional techniques that can be used, the bottom line is that scanning web pages is the backbone of traditional technographic offerings.
The bottom line is that scanning web pages is the backbone of traditional technographic offerings.
But…technographics for email???
In case you’re wondering what any of this can tell you about any company’s email tech stack, the shocking is answer is… almost nothing. The reason is simple: the tech companies use in their emails is very different than what they use on their website; looking at one won’t tell you much, if anything, about the other. They’re different sides of the same coin.
Technographic data derived from by scanning web pages can’t tell you much more about a company’s email tech stack than reading Moby Dick can about mountain climbing.
If you’re already using technographics but email tech stacks are what you’re after, this is not good news. It’s much better to have no data than bad data, because the latter can mean bad business decisions and wasted time.
The bottom line is that reliable email technographics can only be sourced by tools that scan the actual emails companies send. There is no other way. If you’re currently paying for technographic data and email matters to you, what you’re getting probably isn’t what you think.
What can be detected by scanning emails?
Just like web pages, there’s an amazing amount of data to be found in an email. For instance, the promo email you deleted this morning can reveal dozens of things about the sender’s email tech stack. Here’s an snippet of an email sent by the Indianapolis Star.
From just this small section of the email we can see they’re using Salesforce Marketing Cloud (exacttarget.com), LiveIntent, ReturnPath (returnpathnet), Adobe Audience Manager (demdex.net) and Litmus (emltrk.com). The rest of this email is similarly rich with tech insights.
By tracking these and other elements over several years, it becomes possible to build detailed, email-specific sender profiles that answers questions like:
- What does their email tech stack look like right now?
- What did their email tech stack look like 6, 12 or even 24 months ago?
- Which services has the previously sender trialed?
- When does their contract with their current ESP end?
- How long have they been using their current providers?
- Are they frequent senders?
- Are they using one or more dedicated IP addresses?
Don’t look to traditional technographic services for that kind of info.
Summary
Technographic data is an extremely powerful tool for many sales teams, especially those in MarTech. When used properly, it yields better quality leads, quickly, and ultimately results in increased sales.
Just remember, though, that email falls below the radar of most technographic services. If email tech stacks are important to you, be sure to pay close attention to the source of any provider’s data, because the right source is going to make the difference between success and failure.
About Notablist
Notablist is a real-time sender intelligence platform for the email marketing landscape. We help sales and marketing teams succeed by providing technographics and data on the sending habits of 700,000 emailers worldwide.
To learn more, download a case study and discover how PostUp streamlined their sales development process with Notablist. If you’d like to speak with us, schedule a demo or get in touch.
