At Bridgeline, one of the prevailing lessons we’ve learned is that, despite increasing complexity and a plethora of choice ingredients, there’s a very basic recipe for digital marketing success that blends three major parts: the right team, the best tools and most effective technologies, all in appropriate proportions to produce strong, strategic results.

In this third installment of our series on “The 3T’s of Modern Marketing,” this post is focused on the technology your team (by now an undoubtedly well-oiled machine using near-perfectly appropriate tools) needs to be using to help insure consistent success of your digital strategies.

Does your business plan warrant an enterprise solution, custom- built and proprietary to it?

Is the ever-popular Open Source market/movement a good place for your needs?

Does your company’s main focus and process rest on a single function that would benefit from a self-hosted, self-supported and perpetually licensed solution – which would justify all the extra overhead? Or can you operate a spry, quick-moving business using a SaaS (sometimes called “Cloud”) hosting model and save on that extra hardware, IT and development cost?

Whichever sounds more appealing to you, there’s little doubt that you’re going to need to explain to someone – or a board of someones – exactly why you need it done just that way.  Bridgeline Digital recently published a whitepaper to help you make that assessment, and to come up with a truly informed answer. We’re also holding a webinar on Tuesday, March 27th, from 1:00 – 2:00 PM EST, to give you even more solid background information.

Our webinar will feature a Digital Marketing Expert panel that includes Joe Pulizzi (Content Marketing Evangelist and Founder of the Content Marketing Institute), Tony White (Founder & CEO of ARA Logica) and Brett Zucker (CTO of Bridgeline Digital).

To get in on this action, download the whitepaper, and then sign up for the webinar.

Read on for a sneak peek of what’s coming up…

Technology should breed efficiency

The final ingredient for successful digital marketing is the right technology. In order to tackle the new landscape effectively, consider which technologies will serve you best. Will you benefit more from installed tools, or a cloud-based, Software as a Service (SaaS) environment? While open source options seem appealing – they don’t always provide a model that fits. Many tools can come from many providers, but what about integration?

Installed versus SaaS

Purchasing the code and architecture and hosting it all on your own hardware – with perpetual licensing – may or may not be the right scenario for you. Meanwhile, SaaS options are exploding in popularity across the digital landscape, with concrete benefits, efficiency and cost options. A few basic considerations:

• Upgrading, patching, new features are easy with SaaS. SaaS environments, which by default are hosted in the cloud, mean upgrades are performed for you, every time. No need to ramp up, test, invest in new hardware, etc.

Enterprise versus Open Source

Is your business plan hearty enough to use an enterprise solution, or is Open Source more your personality? Some basic considerations:

• Initial and ongoing costs are affected by a few factors. While enterprise solutions require a stated investment, Open Source solutions are often billed as being free. Remember, though, that much of Open Source code requires customization to get your project off the ground, and constant in-house IT support to keep it running well, often bringing the cost inline with implementing an enterprise solution.

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To get more guidance on building the right team, download our latest whitepaper. And be sure to sign up for our Exclusive Webinar, taking place on Tuesday, March 27th, at 1:00 – 2:00 PM EST.