Dispelling the Myths of Marketing Automation Migrations

It’s easy to think of a marketing automation platform (MAP) migration as a simple tool swap. In reality, it’s more like rebuilding your entire marketing engine while continuing to drive at highway speed. If you’ve been around the marketing “block” for a while, you’ve probably heard and/or experienced a horror story or two. Change is always hard, and with it comes uncertainty. Unfortunately, that leads to a lot of misinformation about MAP migrations out there.

Let’s take a moment to set the record straight. Here are the 5 most common myths we hear, and what marketing leaders need to know.

Myth 1: “Changing out our MAP will solve our marketing problems”

If you’ve ever struggled with a MAP that is not delivering the results your company expects, it may be a knee-jerk reaction to blame the tool. But technology is just one of the three elements of organizational success, according to the PPT Framework. The other two sides of the triangle are People and Process. Swapping out your MAP isn’t going to fix your deliverability, open rates, or net-new names acquisition if your problem actually lies in your data, your marketing practices, or even the members of your team.

Before deciding to go the RFP route to search for a new MAP, take a good, hard look at your data, its cleanliness, and the data ingestion process.

• Do you have the data you need in your MAP to personalize your communications?
• Do you bring in purchase and opportunity data to tailor your user journeys to their lifecycle stages?
• Are you consistently cleaning your marketing database to eliminate duplicate and flawed data?
• Have you documented all the places where data is coming into your MAP and routinely verified that you are still receiving the right data?
• Are your processes as automated as possible to avoid human error?

We also need to think about the third side of the triangle – the people element.

• Do you have the right people in the right seats in your department?
• Are there inter-department communication issues? If IT makes a data or process change, are they involving Marketing in the decision making process and the change rollout?
• Is there more that your team can and should be doing like cross-training between roles or participating in learning opportunities to upskill in your current MAP?
• If you make a MAP switch, will your team members be able to continue their effectiveness?

Remember that changes in one side of the triangle, like introducing new technology, is not done in a vacuum. It affects the other two sides, people and processes. These impacts need to be factored into the costs of MAP migration and planned for accordingly.

Myth 2: “It’s just a lift-and-shift”

No…Just no. This is probably the most common, and most dangerous, misconception we hear from clients. Put simply, migration isn’t a copy-paste job. Each platform has its own logic, language, features, and data structures. Trying to replicate everything usually leads to broken workflows and campaigns, and missing data. Your triggers, scoring models, workflows, and even the most basic segmentation rules don’t always translate between MAPs. It also leads to underutilized capabilities in the new platform as you try to shoehorn what you’re doing today into a new box. Trying to copy and paste your Platform A setup to Platform B will almost guarantee you experience a horror story for your migration experience. And, all you’ve done is move your problems to a new house.

Instead, treat your migration as an opportunity to optimize your marketing efforts. Evaluate what is working, what’s not, and rebuild in a smarter way. The whole reason you’re going through this migration experience is likely because you’ve trapped yourself into a corner with your current MAP. The workflows, programs, and processes put in place today are too difficult to re-engineer in the current structure. So use this time to strategically think about what is going to propel you forward for the next 3-5 years and insist on the MAP that most closely aligns with your business goals.

Myth 3: “We’ll lose all our data”

This one gives CMO’s nightmares. You have years of behavioral history, lead data, and campaign performance metrics. It’s a scary thought, but thankfully false. If your migration is done right, your data can be retained and maintained. It means planning ahead and prioritizing data mapping. It is important to understand where your data lives, how it is and will be used, and how it will be structured in your new platform. Test and validate repeatedly during the pre- and post-migration phases. And don’t forget to think about your custom fields, scoring models, and form behaviors as you map  your data to the new MAP.

Myth 4: “All marketing platforms are basically the same”

Yes, at its most basic level, all MAPs do the same thing – send out your marketing and transactional communications to your audience and have background workflows. But MAPs differ wildly in the way they approach the data, native integrations, reporting dashboards, AI capabilities, CRM sync behavior, privacy tools, and so much more. Some are better at ABM, others excel in AI personalization or compliance. Assuming MAPs are interchangeable most often leads to disappointment and missed opportunities.

The key is to pick the platform based on your current and future marketing goals. Let me repeat that – pick the one that fits your business goals, not just the one that is cheapest or feels most familiar. Take a moment to document what is most important to you today and as far into the future as your crystal ball can foretell. This needs to go beyond a simple features list. It needs to define your must-haves based on business goals. Then, pick the platform that most aligns with your strategic goals.

Myth 5: “We can just figure it out as we go”

Please don’t. Would you launch a major product campaign without a plan? Of course not! So don’t risk your entire marketing infrastructure with a “winging it” migration. Underestimating the complexity of a migration can create long-term issues. Without a solid plan, and the right partners, your migration is going to be painful. Migrations require cross-functional expertise from IT, legal, operations, and more often than not, compliance. Without them, you risk misconfigurations, broken forms, missed integrations, and regulatory missteps (think GDPR, CASL, CAN-SPAM, CCPA). It pays to bring in an external partner who has done it before, but if that isn’t an option, at least take the time to map out a smart strategy, create a migration tiger team and have a dedicated project manager to guide your migration project.

Migration Readiness Checklist

Make sure you have all of the following checked off  before you press “go” on your migration.

• Ensure you have executive buy-in
• Set your migration budget (including training & post-migration support)
• Document your platform selection rationale including clear use cases and data requirements
• Audit your existing MAP and create an inventory of assets, programs, and data
• Assign clear owners across Marketing, Operations, Sales, and IT
• Create a project plan and timeline with milestones and QA checkpoints
• Develop a change management communication plan for internal stakeholders
• Ensure you set aside 4-6 weeks for IP warming and deliverability prep
• Create a Go-live support plan and a 30/60/90 day roadmap

Final Thoughts

A marketing automation migration can feel like an overwhelming task. If we’re honest, it’s also not something anyone wants to do in their spare time. But a MAP migration is a golden opportunity, not just to switch tools, but to optimize your strategy, improve processes, and enable smarter marketing. With  the right planning, the right partners, and the right perspective, it’s a strategic move that can massively improve agility, performance, and ROI. Don’t let outdated fears hold you back from transforming your entire marketing engine.

Approaching a MAP migration? Whether it’s helping to compose your RFP documentation to assisting in your MAP evaluation process, we are here to help. We are experts in a number of MAPs, and can help you migrate to a new platform and dispel any remaining myths along the way.