Nearly two-thirds (61%) of marketing software buyers have regretted a software purchase in the past twelve to eighteen months, according to this Capterra survey. Clear goals and stakeholder alignment are seen as the best way to avoid problems. Regret or not, marketing software is the second highest priority investment across all categories (28%), second only to IT security (32%).

It’s safe to say that a lack of software isn’t holding marketers back.  Dentsu reports that finding the right data is CMO’s biggest external challenge (38%), followed by understanding changes in consumer behaviors (35%).  Keeping up with emerging new tech (33%) and dealing with the fragmented tech landscape (30%) headed the list of media transformation challenges.

Traffic to ecommerce websites fell 1% year-on-year while ecommerce app sessions rose 13%, according to Similarweb. Shopper experience still needs improvement: 41% of shoppers feel like strangers to their favorite retailers and only 20% see frequent personalization. Convenience is king: 55% say they’d pay more to find the right item without scrolling through several pages of results.