Microsoft Customer Insights: wrong choice or untapped potential in the hands of marketing?
„It’s too expensive, lacks features, and isn’t fully developed,” I recently heard from a marketing director when we were talking about Microsoft Dynamics…
„It’s too expensive, lacks features, and isn’t fully developed,” I recently heard from a marketing director when we were talking about Microsoft Dynamics 365 Customer Insights – Journeys. Sound familiar? If you’ve ever compared this solution to other marketing automation platforms, similar thoughts have probably crossed your mind.
The question, however, isn’t „is Customer Insights bad?” but „is it the right tool for your marketing, data, and company development stage?” This is important because CI competes not so much with cheap newsletters as with platforms like HubSpot, ClickDimensions, or advanced marketing automation (MA) for e-commerce.
Where does the opinion “too expensive and weak” come from?
Let’s start with the obvious: compared to popular, „lighter” marketing automation tools like Customer Insights, Journeys isn’t the cheapest option on the market. Cheap plans, free versions, and „newsletter for the price of a coffee”—you won’t find any of that here; Microsoft positions this solution as part of a larger business platform, not as a standalone „mailer.”
The second reason is complexity. For a team that has previously worked with a simple email tool, the interface associated with CRM, events, segments, real-time rules, and—horror of horrors—the Marketing Consent Center can be overwhelming. Add to this the inherent „infancy problems” of the new generation of Journeys—for example, issues with forms or specific travel scenarios, as described in the documentation—and it’s easy to label it „underdeveloped.”
Advantage 1: One customer view across the entire ecosystem
This brings us to the first real advantage of Customer Insights, one that isn’t immediately apparent: it’s not just another separate database of marketing contacts. CI-Journeys uses the same data model as Dynamics 365, so marketing, sales, and customer service all see the same profile, the same interaction history, and the same transactions.
Most traditional marketing platforms (HubSpot, ClickDimensions, or dedicated e-commerce marketing platforms) must „add” to CRM, ERP, or e-commerce through integrations, APIs, and connectors, which generates delays, data quality issues, and additional maintenance costs. In CI, data doesn’t live in a separate „marketing island,” but in a central business ecosystem that also encompasses finance, service, and logistics. This makes it easier to link campaigns not only with leads but also with real revenue, margin, and retention.
Customer Insights Data: Fuel for Advanced Segments
What often distinguishes Customer Insights from traditional marketing automation platforms is its Data module – a full-fledged CDP (Customer Data Platform) that becomes the „engine” of advanced segmentation. Instead of basing segments solely on marketing data (email opens, clicks, forms), you can build them on a complete customer picture: transactions, behavior, service data, loyalty data, scoring, and signals from external systems.
For the marketing team, this means moving from simple groups like „active/inactive customers” to precise, business-smart segments, such as „high lifetime value customers who haven’t purchased in 90 days, have an open service case, and are responding to email campaigns.” These segments can then be used directly in Journeys – real-time or schedule-based – without manually exporting lists between systems.
This allows Customer Insights Data and Journeys to work as one: the CDP delivers rich, up-to-date segments, and the Journeys module transforms them into specific communication paths across multiple channels. In practice, this combination – advanced segmentation + journey orchestration based on shared data – is one of CI’s key advantages over many traditional MA tools.
What does Customer Insights actually bring to marketing?
From the marketing team’s perspective, it’s crucial that Customer Insights – Journeys isn’t just a tool for sending emails. It’s a platform that combines three areas: real-time customer journey orchestration, integrated customer profiles, and AI supporting personalization, segmentation, and analytics.
The system can listen for signals from multiple touchpoints—page views, link clicks, abandoned carts, completed forms, and changes to a lead’s status in CRM—and, in response, automatically trigger the next steps in the journey. Instead of static „add to list” campaigns, you build dynamic scenarios where customer behavior determines what happens next.
Advantage 2: CDP + journeys instead of "MA only"
The second advantage of CI becomes apparent when you compare them to tools like HubSpot or traditional marketing management: where CDP is often an add-on, and the customer profile is based primarily on marketing data (forms, email, web), with a rather simplified data model. Customer Insights combines the data/insights module with journeys, allowing you to build segments based on a complete customer picture—transactional data, behavior, signals from multiple systems, and external data.
In B2B and B2C scenarios with a more complex customer journey (manufacturing, services, energy/utility, retail with loyalty programs), CI is better than many mid-market tools at combining signals from various systems into a single, coherent profile. From a marketing perspective, this means moving from „mailing list campaigns” to a true Customer 360, which you can use for both communications and analytics and predictive models.
One of the biggest challenges marketing departments face today is data fragmentation: separate mailing systems, separate CRM, separate e-commerce, and separate post-sales service. Customer Insights attempts to solve this pain by offering a unified customer profile and a shared database for marketing, sales, and service.
In practice, this means you can see in one place what a customer has purchased, what content they’ve read, which campaigns they’ve used, and what complaints they’ve filed—and based on this, you can build segments, predictive models, and communication sequences. For the marketing director, this represents a shift from „campaigns by feel” to a data-driven strategy that’s consistent across the entire organization.
Advantage 3: Real-time scenarios based on business signals
Another area where CI outperforms many competitors (especially lighter MAs) is advanced real-time paths triggered by business events, not just „clicked on an email/visited a website.” Thanks to integration with CRM/ERP, you can trigger journeys based on events such as a change in service case status, exceeding a purchase threshold, contract expiration, or inactivity over a given period, rather than simple email triggers.
Compared to typical newsletter or MA e-commerce tools, CI offers more opportunities to build „always-on” scenarios, linked to the entire customer lifecycle within the company. This is especially important where communication doesn’t end with a single online purchase but encompasses long-term relationships, contracts, service, partners, and various sales models.
Advantage 4: AI and analytics embedded in a broader data strategy
Many marketing automation tools today offer „AI for email subject lines” or „AI for content,” but these are often point-based features, disconnected from a broader data strategy. In Customer Insights, AI (Copilot) is embedded in the Microsoft ecosystem – you can use it for segmentation, recommendations, forecasts, and then analyze campaign results within a common data layer (e.g., Power BI, Fabric).
For marketing, this means that AI isn’t a gadget, but a decision-making tool: which segments have the highest potential, which journeys generate real profit, where budgets are worth increasing, and which activities are wasting resources. Compared to typical MACI, CI performs better where the organization thinks about data strategically, not just tactically (one more campaign).
Limitations worth knowing about
This doesn’t mean that Customer Insights is without flaws. First, to truly leverage its potential, you need a mature organization: structured data, a collaborative process with IT and sales, and a team ready to work within a single ecosystem, not across three tools at once. Otherwise, you end up with a very complex machine that works like a regular newsletter – only much more expensive.
Second, there are still known issues and limitations described in the documentation: from details related to forms and configuration to specific travel behaviors in unusual scenarios. Microsoft is developing the product rapidly, but a marketing director must be aware that it is a living platform, not a „frozen,” finished tool.
Advantage 5: Scaling in Enterprise Organizations
In larger companies, the advantage of Customer Insights – Journeys lies in its compliance with IT, security, and compliance department requirements, as well as the ability to centrally manage the environment. Organizations already standardizing on Microsoft 365/Dynamics 365/Azure often choose CI not only for its marketing capabilities, but also for its consistent architecture and governance across the entire company.
Compared to „best-of-breed” MA tools in other clouds, CI can win at the enterprise level: it’s easier to manage access, security, auditing, data retention, integration with financial systems, and management reporting. For the marketing director, this means a reduced risk of „tool wars” with IT and a greater chance of long-term solution stability.
For whom does Customer Insights make sense and for whom will it be a disappointment?
For organizations that:
- already have Dynamics 365 in sales or customer service,
- operate across multiple channels (web, email, events, e-commerce, social),
- want to integrate marketing with real business results in a single data ecosystem,
Customer Insights – Journeys can become a key element of a customer experience strategy, not just a campaign tool. In such an environment, the higher licensing cost begins to pay off through better data utilization, automation, and increased campaign effectiveness.
On the other hand, for companies primarily looking for a simple tool for sending mailings, small-scale lead nurturing, and occasional landing pages, Microsoft’s solution will likely be too heavy, too complex, and simply unprofitable. In these cases, lighter, less expensive MA solutions will be preferable.
Bad product or bad choice?
Returning to the question in the title: „Is Microsoft Customer Insights really a bad product?” – no, it’s not a bad product. It’s a demanding product: in terms of budget, data quality, interdepartmental collaboration, and marketing process maturity.
From the marketing director’s perspective, the key question isn’t „does it work?” but „does it work for my business model, my data, and my team.” If the answer is yes, Customer Insights can become a strong foundation for modern, data-driven marketing with real advantages over traditional marketing automation. If not, it will be just an expensive, frustrating tool that we’ll unfairly call a „bad product.”
How can KTBnet help you decide on Customer Insights?
For many marketing directors, the biggest risk is not the choice of tool itself, but making a decision without taking into account real data, processes, and team capabilities. KTBnet works with both companies that have chosen Customer Insights – Journeys and those who have been honestly recommended simpler solutions because they better suited their situation.
In practice, we can help on three levels:
- Decision-making workshop: We organize marketing and business requirements, demonstrate real-world CI scenarios using examples from your industry (e.g., energy, retail, manufacturing), and compare them with other MA platforms.
- Pilot or PoC: We run a limited scenario (e.g., customer onboarding, re-engagement, lead nurturing) to demonstrate the effects CI will have on your data, rather than in a manufacturer’s presentation.
- Implementation and development: We design data architecture, integrate with Dynamics 365, set up journeys, segments, and reporting, and support the marketing team in their daily work with the platform so that the tool actually generates value, not just costs.
If you’re wondering whether Customer Insights – Journeys is an investment that will pay off in your business, consider: Organizations, let’s start not with licensing, but with a brief discussion of data, processes, and marketing goals. Based on this, you can honestly decide whether CI will be a real advantage for you, or whether a lighter marketing automation platform would be a better choice.
Useful links:
Customer Insights: https://www.microsoft.com/pl-pl/dynamics-365/products/customer-insights#carousel-occb7f-3
Customer Insights and Journeys: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/dynamics-365/products/customer-insights