MRM, MOM, DAM, EMM, MPM and sometimes even CRM are terms that are used when people are talking about marketing automation. Not entirely surprising because you can automate various processes in marketing. Mostly when talking about marketing automation, people are referring to:

• Storing all marketing information and assets at one place, for availability anywhere.
• Managing projects and budgets in marketing.
• Driving efficiencies in marketing projects.
• Getting insight in local marketing processes, budgets and communications.
• Automating marketing productions of print like advertising and digital like emails.
• Automating one-to-one communications in order to get higher conversion rates at low cost per contact.
• Guarding brand identity.

MRM is getting increasingly more attention because marketing directors are becoming more educated in the possibilities of automation, because they are being asked about the accountability of their campaigns and operations and because communication is happening cross channel while amount of channels are growing.

Marketing automation can result in better budget management, cost savings, time savings, decrease of errors and increase of consistencies over the whole process of creating marketing communications:

Phase	MRM capability
Strategy, planning and creative brief	Inspiration based on previous campaign results and creative concepts
Creative concepting	Asset management, project management, resource allocation and budget management
Approval process	Online approval management
Production	Automated reproduction, project management, budget management
Distribution and publishing	Media placement, Asset management, Workflow automation, campaign management, contact strategy automation and portal communication
Local reproduction	Automated reproduction, Local portal communication, budget management, brand management and contact strategy automation
Analyzing and evaluation	Business Intelligence, ROI analysis, customer and campaign analysis
Follow up and leads management	Lead management, budget management
Customer relationship management	Campaign management, contact strategy automation, budget management, customer analysis

So MRM is being used for analysis and (budget) management, for managing the creative process and central production process, for rolling out campaigns globally and rolling out campaigns locally.

With MRM solutions marketing directors will have the tools to manage budgets and progress better. They can drive efficiency and effectiveness and prove accountability. They basically become more important than the sales manager as they are increasingly able to tell exactly why a sales lead won, by tracking all personal communications.

With increasing globalization and increasing amount of communication channels, brand management is becoming more complex. MRM tools provide many ways to guard the brand identity of all communications initiated wherever, by whomever, for whatever channel.

Marketing will become a science again. Measurable, directable, manageable, with KPI's, clear budgets and more procurement power.