MarTech Audits: The Reality Check Your Stack Needs

Posted on March 26, 2026 by Giant - , ,

How many marketing technology platforms are actually working together in your marketing technology (MarTech) stack? How many licenses are you actually using? And how many are just…existing? 

In a new world of marketing and automation, choosing the right platforms to meet your desired sales, marketing and overarching business goals can be overwhelming. Knowing which platforms work well together—and how—is integral for operational efficiency and investments that move the needle.

We sat down with Michelle Rhatigan, Giant’s Digital Integration Strategist, to get a breakdown of MarTech audits and why they matter for your bottom line.

What are we actually talking about when we say MarTech audit?

A MarTech audit is a comprehensive evaluation of the platforms and tools that make up a company’s marketing and sales technology stack. We examine how each piece of technology fits into the company’s overall ecosystem of ROI trackers, gaining a clear understanding of how systems integrate and sync data to ensure alignment with business goals.

When companies go two or more years without an audit, red flags start to pop up. We often see teams:

  • Spending more time on pulling and connecting reports than analyzing data
  • Leaning on patchwork solutions and piecemeal reports
  • Arguing over attribution each month
  • Leveraging multiple tools to perform similar functions
  • Manually exporting data and tracking in silos

Honorable red flag: Sales teams working out of Excel sheets. Love the hustle, but I promise your life will be easier when you’re not having to VLOOKUP your way through the pipeline anymore.

Which systems are typically included?

We look at any and all Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms, Marketing Automation Platforms (MAPs), Account-Based Marketing (ABM) and sales enablement tools that a business is using to further their marketing and sales efforts.

CRM Platforms

Salesforce, Dynamics, HubSpot, etc.

CRM platforms provide a centralized database of customer and prospect data, including contact information, a record of interactions and opportunities that have been opened or closed, often with seats for sales, marketing and operations roles. Some CRMs, like HubSpot, can also double as MAPs!

MAPs

Marketing Cloud Engagement, Mailchimp, Marketo, Hubspot, etc.

MAPs streamline and automate routine marketing tasks like email and social media deployments. These platforms provide robust data reporting to assess marketing performance, support lead scoring and journey mapping and improve the marketing-to-sales handoff, while ensuring a more personalized audience experience.

ABM and Sales Enablement Tools

ABM: Demandbase, 6Sense | Sales Enablement: Zoominfo, Apollo, Sliq, SalesIntel

These tools are leveraged to target key accounts, identify new accounts within a client’s Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) and coordinate messaging across multiple channels, with ABM platforms providing a synced environment for marketing and sales to identify and prospect accounts together.

What are you looking for with the audit?

In short, everything.

We’re looking for how each system is being used and connects with the others, if roles and processes are defined and being used and—maybe most importantly—how CRM, MAP and ABM tools work together in alignment with business objectives to reach ideal customers.

Here are a few of the checks and balances we run through to get started:

1. Are connected systems fully integrated and intentional?

  • What data does each system source, and where is it pushing data/results?
  • Is the stack overbuilt, underutilized or redundant?
  • What’s the level of adoption and use among departments and teams?

2. Does reporting match reality?

  • Good data in is good data reported out. Are teams aligned and held accountable for maintaining accurate data across the ecosystem?
  • Does reporting flow easily between all systems, or has your team developed manual workarounds?
  • Are teams unified on lead stage definitions and supportive of open dialogue when misaligned?

3. Are workflows synced across existing platforms?

  • Are lead sources and lead scoring reliably tracked and regularly reviewed?
  • What processes are established, and are internal teams staying up to date with them?
  • Are there clearly defined and understood marketing-sales handoff procedures?
  • What automated functions are being used?

And the list of questions and checkpoints can grow from there. It may seem exhaustive (and exhausting), but our team thrives on this complex digital detective work—and it yields some pretty impressive results. Once we know what’s working well, what needs optimization and what’s missing, we’re able to pull together a highly detailed report, complete with long-term strategic alignment objectives and immediate recommendations that are prioritized according to their impact on:

  • Internal efficiency and adoption (easy and quick wins)
  • Sales and marketing team alignment
  • ICP lead generation efforts
  • Revenue generation and reporting

What does a strong MarTech stack look like?

True alignment and shared understanding between sales and marketing teams. There’s efficient communication, clearly defined roles and KPIs and unified knowledge of how each role intersects to move prospects and customers through the funnel, because their MarTech systems are:

  • Fully integrated with one another to enable seamless data transfer
  • Connecting reporting to revenue
  • Able to evolve and scale without constant troubleshooting
  • Driving increased lead volume and closed sales

What are the keys to maintaining a healthy MarTech stack?

Annual audits are a great baseline for most companies, but additional audits should be performed anytime there’s a major shift—leadership changes, new vendors or tool adoptions, mergers and acquisitions, ABM implementations or a move into a new vertical or market.

Between audits, Giant recommends setting up monthly and quarterly processes. Regular pulse-checks for lifecycle stage progression, sync errors, data integrity and lead definition alignment will help ensure hard work is maintained, and silent failures don’t occur.

Finally, what’s your favorite part of an audit?

I enjoy the intricate details—identifying operational fixes that immediately improve a team’s day-to-day workflow, while seeing how those fixes build a stronger, more efficient system for the company as a whole. Or, in the words of Taylor Swift (she really does have a lyric for everything), finding the “Invisible String” that ties strategic thinking to tactical execution for long-term impact and growth.

Stay Tuned…

Hungry for more MarTech content? We’ll be diving into the nitty-gritty of CRMs, MAPs, and ABM tools in our next blog—stay tuned!

ABOUT THE EXPERT

Michelle Rhatigan is an experienced digital integration strategist whose kind, creative, and data-driven approach helps clients generate strong leads and drive revenue through strategic and tactical digital initiatives.

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