The fun-loving data department at Havas applied linear regression to 19,000 surveys with 30+ questions about 150 brands in three countries.  The result was unusually solid data on what drives satisfaction with customer experience.  Answers differ by country but for U.S. consumers the weights were 48% purchase experience, 29% relationship, and 23% brand image.  The idea is the weights should help allocate investments to the most effective projects.

IPG Media Lab and MAGNA also amped up the science, running sophisticated tests to measure the impact of optimized creative on purchases. The results were less than eye-opening: ads tailored to the customer’s journey stage work better than ads shown randomly. If you’ve been debating that at your company, find a new company.

Martech keeps taking larger bites out of marketing budgets: 17.3% last year, 19.9% this year, 23.5% next year, and 30.9% five years from now, according to the latest CMO Survey. This despite barely more than half (56.4%) of current tools being used and nearly half (48.8%) of the survey respondents reporting worse-than-expected results. Oddly enough, marketers rate selecting marketing technologies as the thing they do best.