Common MDM Integrations to Link Data Analytics Platforms

If you don’t connect your master data management (MDM) software with your existing digital infrastructure, you might as well not have it at all.

Master data management only works smoothly if it talks to the other applications and tools your organization uses. That’s why, when you’re considering MDM software, it’s important to consider how it will fit into your existing set of tools and applications.. 

A master data management solution works best when integrated with other applications such as customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP), and business intelligence (BI) platforms. Read on to learn more about how software integrations can connect MDM systems with other tools. 

What is Master Data Management?

The definition of master data management is a technology that merges data from multiple sources to create a single source of truth. 

MDM provides unified data to drive digital innovation. By showing all information in a single view, a master data management solution enables organizations to share it easily. This improves operational efficiencies, reduces costs and aids in decision-making

Why do MDM Integrations Matter?

A Planview study reveals that the average team loses more than 20 hours per month to poor collaboration resulting from data silos. That’s six work weeks per year that teams are not being productive.

If you don’t integrate your master data management tool with your other applications, you risk having siloed data that can’t be effectively used to make decisions or drive business processes. This can frustrate business users who have to work with multiple systems that don’t talk to each other.

Common Integrations for Master Data Management Software

Integrations link MDM software with existing data management applications, allowing them to work together to provide a single view of the data. Here are some of the most common types of integrations for MDM software:

1. CRM Integration

A CRM system helps organizations track customer interactions, understand their needs and offer them the best possible experience. A study by Nucleus Research shows that the improved data accessibility offered by CRM technology can reduce the complexity of the sales cycle by 8-14% on average.

In addition, a 2020 report on the State of Sales by LinkedIn found that the top-performing salespeople possess a higher confidence level in CRM data than their counterparts. Of this group, 53% were very confident that CRM data helps them exceed their quota.

However, a CRM alone won’t help the sales department collaborate with other business units. Integrating CRM and MDM systems consolidates all customer data from multiple sources into a single view.

Integrating master data management with CRM systems helps organizations with customer data management. The accurate, real-time information it provides improves messaging and sales through better customer service and hyper-personalization.

2. ERP Integration

Most ERP systems are built on legacy architecture and use batch-oriented processes to exchange data. As a result, as companies grow, critical data can become disjointed and inconsistent. 

According to a 2022 ERP Report by Software Path, gaining functionality and increasing efficiency accounted for a combined 33% of companies’ main reasons for implementing an ERP. 

Integrating ERP data with MDM makes product information management easy. It creates a single view of all data related to production, operations, supply chain, products, inventory, maintenance, regulatory mandates, distribution, and more. 

3. Data Warehouse Integration

A data warehouse stores historical and current data from multiple sources in a centralized location. Data warehouses are often used with business intelligence tools to analyze data and make better decisions. 

Integrating MDM with a data warehouse unites all customer, product and supplier data, past and present, on a single platform. It can also improve the accuracy of reporting and analysis and make tracking changes easier.

4. Business Intelligence (BI) integration

According to reports from McKinsey, investing in big data and data analytics yields a 6% average increase in profits, which increases to 9% for investments spanning 5 years. It also suggests that business intelligence (BI) integration is key to successful master data management. 

Integrating BI tools and techniques into your master data management strategy can help you more effectively manage and govern your data by collecting, cleansing and transforming data from multiple sources. This will give you a comprehensive view of your data, which can help identify trends and patterns. 

BI integration also helps organizations track progress and measure performance against objectives so they can optimize their MDM strategy.

Integration with Cloud Platforms

Cloud platforms offer many benefits including scalability, flexible remote access through personal devices, and cost savings thanks to pay-as-you-go pricing models. They also offer increased security and reliability, as well as the ability to leverage the latest technologies.

A Gartner survey found that 81% of public cloud users have two or more providers.

Whether your organization is running a hybrid or multi-cloud architecture, Reltio helps you integrate data, automate workflows and eliminate redundant data from cloud platforms like Amazon AWS, Kafka, Google Cloud Platform, Salesforce and Azure. 

Integration with SaaS Apps

According to Blissfully’s 2020 SaaS Trends report, enterprises use an average of 288 different SaaS, and the typical department uses more than 10 apps. This makes SaaS integration more important than ever. 

SaaS integration is the process of connecting two or more cloud-based applications so they share data. Without integration, data needs to be manually transferred between apps, which is time-consuming and error-prone.

Reltio helps organizations integrate data from business applications like Anaplan to financial platforms like Workday. Some of Reltio’s most popular integrations are Salesforce, SAP Concur, Service Now, Pega, Netsuite and Microsoft Dynamics.

Integration with MarTech Apps

A 2020 report by Chief Martec reports that the average enterprise uses 120 MarTech apps. 

While most MarTech applications have their own dashboards, they don’t offer a complete view of customer data unless they’re integrated with other systems. This can lead to poor marketing decisions and a lack of understanding of how customers interact with different channels and devices.

Reltio helps organizations connect data from various sources like Adobe, Marketo, Google, Eloqua, ActionIQ, LinkedIn, Lytics, and Twitter and provides a complete, accurate and up-to-date view of customer data that can be used to make better decisions about marketing campaigns and strategies. 

Additionally, understanding how customers interact with different channels and devices enables businesses to create targeted messages that improve customer satisfaction.

Integration with Third-Party Data Sources

In a 2018 Survey by Forbes Insights and The Trade Desk, nearly one in five respondents said that one of their top data challenges is a lack of third-party data.

Third-party data is a necessity for many marketers today because first-party data isn’t enough to power large campaigns. However, data privacy regulations like GDPR and CCPA have made it difficult for companies to use third-party because of compliance concerns. 

Reltio’s integrations ensure control and compliance from third-party data sources like Experian, Lexis Nexis, IQVIA, Dun & Bradstreet and ensures that the data is accurate and up-to-date and that it conforms to the organization’s internal standards.

Integration with Analytics, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence

To leverage all available data for a competitive edge, many organizations are adopting a more holistic approach to data management integrating analytics, machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI).

Reltio helps to reduce complexity using an efficient, low-code integration environment and pre-built connectors for applications like Snowflake, Data Bricks, Google Big Query, Amazon Athena, Azure Synapse Analytics, and more.

Take the Pain out of MDM Software Integration with Reltio

The Reltio Integration Hub is a core component of the Reltio Connected Data platform that simplifies integration using a low-code/no-code platform. It helps you connect to popular CRM, ERP and BI tools and apps like SAP, Oracle, Salesforce, Adobe, and Microsoft, and comes with over 1,000 connectors you need to build data pipelines right out of the box. 

Our Integration Hub features seamless, bi-directional, real-time integration secured through rotating-key end-to-end encryption. It also includes masking and retention settings that can help you reduce IT workload. 

The intuitive drag-and-drop GUI can help you create simple replication pipelines (i.e., Recipes) for complex data extraction and transformation tasks. You can also set up integration workflows within just a few clicks.

Unlock innovation and find new ways of using unified, trusted data across your organization today with the Reltio Integration Hub. Reach out to request a demo today!