There is a Data Layer. There is an Engagement Layer. But what's generally missing - a Decisioning Layer. Let’s discuss why this is fast becoming essential for modern marketing teams.
I couldn’t agree more about the importance of the decisioning layer - my question is what tooling does this well today?
Pega is clunky. Evergage got bought by salesforce. Adobe’s vision if bold but expensive and requires a lot of support. Everything else in between is ultimately just a hard to use rule builder that’s hard to use without a dedicated “cdp” team.
My take is that there isn’t current an offering in market that elegantly solves the problem of real-time, cross-channel decisioning. Though I do believe we should expect to see new entrants to a category I’ve coined as “vibe decisioning” - ai powered web personalization and channel orchestration tools that work way better than the legacy rule builders ever could have.
Hi Juan - fair point and I agree that the tooling space for Decisioning is still maturing. The gap you’ve highlighted is real - many of the current options either require heavy operational muscle (Pega, Adobe, etc.) or lean too far toward channel-specific, hard-coded rule builders that don’t scale well across the stack.
My intent with this series - and eventually the book - is less about endorsing specific tools and more about defining the design patterns, principles, and architectural choices that brands can use to build Decisioning capability the right way, regardless of vendor stack. I firmly believe there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution yet, but we can equip marketing and tech teams to make smarter decisions by understanding the foundations.
That said, I do think composability could be a big part of the answer - combining modular tools that plug into existing ecosystems, while still maintaining governance, guardrails, and a unified decision logic across channels in a centralised fashion. It’s about striking that balance between flexibility and control, which is where many implementations struggle today.
Love your term “vibe decisioning” by the way - and would like to learn more. Though, I think that channel orchestration and web personalisation is only part of the Decisioning landscape.
Shawn - I have spent over a decade in the decisioning space and completely agree with your statement. To find that gem, I have moved to a company called FlexRule. We make real-time decisioning accessible to all organisations. An open decisioning platform, design, configure & deploy quickly. And you don't need an army of SIs maintaining and scaling. Inhouse team can operate seamlessly. Get in touch.
I couldn’t agree more about the importance of the decisioning layer - my question is what tooling does this well today?
Pega is clunky. Evergage got bought by salesforce. Adobe’s vision if bold but expensive and requires a lot of support. Everything else in between is ultimately just a hard to use rule builder that’s hard to use without a dedicated “cdp” team.
My take is that there isn’t current an offering in market that elegantly solves the problem of real-time, cross-channel decisioning. Though I do believe we should expect to see new entrants to a category I’ve coined as “vibe decisioning” - ai powered web personalization and channel orchestration tools that work way better than the legacy rule builders ever could have.
Hi Juan - fair point and I agree that the tooling space for Decisioning is still maturing. The gap you’ve highlighted is real - many of the current options either require heavy operational muscle (Pega, Adobe, etc.) or lean too far toward channel-specific, hard-coded rule builders that don’t scale well across the stack.
My intent with this series - and eventually the book - is less about endorsing specific tools and more about defining the design patterns, principles, and architectural choices that brands can use to build Decisioning capability the right way, regardless of vendor stack. I firmly believe there isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution yet, but we can equip marketing and tech teams to make smarter decisions by understanding the foundations.
That said, I do think composability could be a big part of the answer - combining modular tools that plug into existing ecosystems, while still maintaining governance, guardrails, and a unified decision logic across channels in a centralised fashion. It’s about striking that balance between flexibility and control, which is where many implementations struggle today.
Love your term “vibe decisioning” by the way - and would like to learn more. Though, I think that channel orchestration and web personalisation is only part of the Decisioning landscape.
Shawn - I have spent over a decade in the decisioning space and completely agree with your statement. To find that gem, I have moved to a company called FlexRule. We make real-time decisioning accessible to all organisations. An open decisioning platform, design, configure & deploy quickly. And you don't need an army of SIs maintaining and scaling. Inhouse team can operate seamlessly. Get in touch.
Alex.
Sorry Juan :)