The 2026 Definitive Customer Engagement Platform (CEP) Buyer’s Guide

A practical guide for evaluating, selecting, and procuring a CEP based on your company size and growth trajectory

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You don’t need more tools. You need the RIGHT one

In today’s AI-first world, most marketing teams struggle to meet customer expectations because they lack an integrated system to manage them. A unified Customer Engagement Platform consolidates your data, segments, and orchestration into a single workflow. This guide provides the framework to help you select the right, future-proof, and AI-enabled, platform considering:

  • Team & company size
  • Business objectives
  • Industry necessities
  • Current martech stack

What you will find in this guide

  • heartPrioritize Platform Features

    A checklist for determining “must-have” features from “good-to-have” features to ensure your budget drives actual ROI.

  • heartVendor Evaluation Checklist

    Access 50+ crucial questions to ask vendors during evaluations to see past the sales deck.

  • heartPoint Solutions vs. All-in-One:

    Understand the nuances between integrated platforms and fragmented point solutions to pick the right CEP for your growth stage.

  • heartHidden Costs

    An objective look at the hidden costs in the “build vs buy” debate along with signals for unplanned developer & integration costs.

  • heartPrioritize Platform Features

    A checklist for determining “Must-Have” features from “good-to-have” features to ensure your budget drives actual ROI.

  • heartInternal Approval Framework

    A step-by-step roadmap to navigate the internal evaluation process, from requirements gathering and setting up a buying committee to a successful proof-of-concept.

  • heartPlatform Scalability Roadmap

    Learn how the platform needs to change as your user base grows from thousands to millions and how to adapt to it.

Why Choosing the Right CEP Matters

10+ Channels
Learn to evaluate platforms that orchestrate engagement across a growing number of touchpoints into one cohesive customer journey framework.
Millions of behavioral signals
Learn how to identify infrastructure that handles millions of real-time signals.
50+ Evaluation Criteria
Use our 50+ point checklist to help you make an informed decision and ensure your chosen platform aligns with long-term business goals.
The Forrester Wave™ Cross-Channel Marketing Hubs, Q4 2024 Report showcases rankings of top cross-channel marketing platforms detailing the Forrester Wave methodology, CleverTap's key capabilities, and insights into leading players.

Built for Growth, Retention and Product Professionals

This guide is developed to help choose the right tool to handle customer engagement & data at scale, in today’s fast-paced, AI-first world.

  • Marketing & Growth: To increase Customer Lifetime Value at scale.
  • Product & Engineering: To minimize the burden of building and maintaining in-house tools.
  • Marketing Ops: To eliminate data silos and streamline the marketing processes
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