Tony Byrne is the founder of Real Story Group, a technology analyst firm specialising in the evaluation of martech and customer experience (CX) technologies to assist enterprise tech stack owners. We spoke to him about his journey from being a Wisconsin cheesehead to the head of a successful technology analyst firm.
Tony grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and left to attend University of Toronto, where he earned a masters in international relations. After the fall of the Soviet Union, Tony led a group of tech-savvy Russian-speaking undergrads and post-grads to help establish internet hubs in the region, connecting ecologists in Nevada and Kazakhstan in an unprecedented way. This experience sparked Tony’s interest in technology and he went on to lead an engineering team at a systems integrator.
It was during this time that Tony discovered the disconnect between analyst reports and actual hands-on experience with technology. Frustrated by this gap, he founded CMS Watch, the precursor to Real Story Group, to provide an unbiased and accurate review of technologies. RSG only works with enterprise end-users and provides research and analysis of digital asset management, email marketing personalization tools, CDPs, and journey orchestration engines.
When it comes to tech stack building, Tony advises organisations to be deliberate about the tools they choose and to test them before adoption. He cautions against buying into the pitch of suite vendors, as they are unable to cover the entire stack. Ultimately, organisations are accountable for their own success and should not rely solely on single vendors.
Originally reported by Martech: https://martech.org/tony-byrne-spotlight-on-the-expert/
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