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

Single Source of Truth
Eliminate data silos with a centralized database that provides a holistic and consistent view of your customers and enables better targeting.
One Platform for All Your Needs
Run cohesive campaigns by leveraging a single platform for customer engagement – from segmentation and personalization to experimentation, journey orchestration, data analytics, and beyond.
Maximise ROI
Get the most out of your marketing spends strategy by elevating customer loyalty and retention, thus increasing customer lifetime value (CLV).
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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