The new marketing automation systems are boosting sales as employees spend far less time manually updating information to be posted online, and apps automatically update visitors’ orders for restaurants, coffee shops, and other merchants. HubSpot estimates that companies can save approximately 6.8 hours per month just by managing the information they’re posting online and on apps, and even more with improved marketing automation. It can be challenging to manage leads when your company is expanding and more people are visiting your web platforms. However, maintaining contact with consumers and attending to their demands is crucial for the development of your company.
What Is Marketing Automation?
Marketing automation is the use of software and technology to streamline, automate, and measure marketing tasks and workflows. This allows businesses to become more efficient and effective in their marketing efforts. No matter the size of their business, marketing automation is a must for all marketers, regardless of whether they market goods or services. Those who overlook marketing automation are missing out on effective tools. Forty percent of B2C businesses intend to utilize this technology, while 56% of businesses now utilize some form of marketing automation. You can enhance client satisfaction and lessen the strain on your resources with the aid of automated marketing, which is particularly beneficial for small businesses, saving them a considerable amount of time and money.
However, with so many platforms, connections, and services to choose from, marketing automation can be confusing. How can you know what is most effective for your company? Not to worry, you’re not alone. We have created an ultimate guide for you. First of all, we start with creating a marketing strategy. Let’s discuss how a marketing strategy should be.
Create A Marketing Strategy
To implement marketing automation, you should first have a marketing strategy. Creating a marketing strategy involves setting clear, achievable goals for your marketing efforts. Start by identifying your target audience and understanding their needs and behaviors. Develop specific objectives, such as increasing brand engagement or driving more traffic to your website. Your strategy should include a mix of content types and channels to reach your audience effectively. Utilize marketing automation to schedule and track your campaigns, ensuring consistent messaging and timely delivery. Regularly review and adjust your strategy based on performance data to continuously improve your results.
Example: Goals like “Building brand engagement” and “Increasing thought leadership” help provide direction and focus for your marketing efforts.
Know-How Of These Tool
Marketing automation tools are designed to streamline and optimize your marketing efforts but its really important to know how these tools works to make the most of their features, saving time and resources while boosting your marketing efficiency.. You can learn about these tools from your selected tool’s documentation. They automate repetitive tasks, such as sending emails, posting on social media, and managing ad campaigns. They can also track and analyze customer behavior, allowing you to segment your audience and tailor your marketing strategies to individual preferences. This leads to more personalized and effective marketing campaigns, improving customer engagement and conversion rates.
How To Launch A Marketing Automation Campaign
Marketing automation was once thought to be difficult to comprehend and set up, but because of tools like our own Zoho Marketing Automation, everything has changed. Businesses of any size may effortlessly automate their marketing thanks to the ease of use of these technologies and the combination of an action plan. Here are some simple ways, you can get started with Marketing Automation:
Simple Ways to Begin Using Marketing Automation
- Identify Your Goals: Clearly define what you aim to achieve with marketing automation, such as increasing leads or improving customer retention.
- Choose the Right Platform: Select a marketing automation tool that fits your business needs and budget.
- Segment Your Audience: Divide your leads into targeted groups based on their behaviors, interests, and demographics.
- Create Automated Workflows: Design workflows for different stages of the customer journey to nurture leads effectively.
- Personalize Your Content: Ensure your automated messages are personalized to increase engagement and conversion rates.
- Measure and Optimize: Continuously monitor your campaigns and make necessary adjustments to improve performance.
Create And Divide Up Your Lead Pool
Marketing automation’s ability to produce quality leads is one of its key advantages. This implies that you will only collect leads who express interest in your company by joining your email list, interacting with you on social media, attending your webinars, and other actions. Lead generation is far more effective when several advertising sources are used to direct users to your landing page.
With these high-quality leads in hand, you can divide them into groups based on shared traits, requirements, or interests, as well as shared patterns of purchasing. Because segmentation enables you to identify the needs of your leads and engage them deeper, everything from campaign open rates to customer happiness increases. To make your nurturing process simple and effective, you can create subgroups like “Website visitors” or “Leads who browsed the pricing page.”
Facts About Marketing Automation
Here are some facts from different industries which can make you try Marketing automation:
Save Time and Money:
The major advantage of marketing automation is that it can save time and money by automating routine processes like sending emails or posting on social media, which can lower marketing expenses.
Example: By automating its student communication, a company was able to save 28 employee salaries and $100,000 annually.
Increased Sales:
Sales can be increased by marketing automation since it enables businesses to expand their marketing initiatives across several touchpoints, campaigns, and channels at the appropriate moment.
Example: The addition of exit-intent automation helped a sports nutritionist produce $50,000 in eight weeks.
Higher Lead Conversion:
58% of B2B businesses don’t follow up on sales leads, according to Drift. By automating the first and subsequent contacts with prospects and customers, marketers may enhance sales funnels and boost revenue.
Improved Engagement or Customer Service:
By addressing numerous consumer requests or difficulties in real time, automation enhances customer service. Common inquiries like “What is the status of my order?” can have automatic answers made.
Better Analysis and Reporting:
Automation can give marketing teams access to data, information, or insights that are easier to comprehend.
Example: Ahrefs’ Rank Tracker, which incorporates data with this Google Data Studio report, allows you to keep tabs on both your rank and that of your rivals.
Top Platforms For Marketing Automation
When it comes to marketing automation solutions, you have a lot of alternatives. Knowing your target audience and main objective is crucial. Before making a decision, it is important to take into account additional aspects including cost, resources, and software integrations. The list of marketing automation platforms that follows is exhaustive. Your sales and marketing teams will adore what these products have to offer. Here are some established marketing automation with example:
- Automate and manage your marketing initiatives using Marketo.
- Manage contacts and purchases easily with Drip.
- Create new leads and manage existing leads with HubSpot.
- Automate your marketing and take control of your sales with Pardot.
- Track, manage, and improve customer connections with AgileCRM.
- Use Mailchimp to stay in touch with your leads and customers.
- Manage your social media marketing with Hootsuite.
- If you are looking for all-in-one marketing solution, you can try Zoho Marketing Automation and Hubspot.
Some Real-Life Examples Of Marketing Automation
We have been talking about marketing from a few minutes but what are widely-used Marketing campaigns? Let’s find out.
Welcome Series:
Automated welcome emails sent to new subscribers to introduce them to your brand and products. An e-commerce store can increase its engagement rate by sending personalized welcome emails to new subscribers.
Drip Campaigns:
A drip campaign is a series of emails that are sent out automatically and gradually and that educate prospects about a problem or solution. A consultant can develop a drip campaign to entice customers to buy his book by educating them on pricing methods.
Re-Engagement Campaigns:
Automated emails sent to inactive subscribers to re-engage them with special offers or content. A software and app company can re-engaged its inactive users by sending a series of targeted re-engagement emails.
When Should You Spend Money On Marketing Automation?
Investing in marketing automation is worthwhile when your business is growing and managing leads manually becomes impractical. It’s also beneficial when you aim to scale your marketing efforts, improve efficiency, and enhance customer engagement. Consider investing it if you want to save time on repetitive tasks, improve lead management, and gain valuable insights from data analytics. Evaluate your business needs, budget, and the potential ROI before choosing an automation platform that fits your requirements.
By understanding and implementing marketing automation, you can save time and resources, increase sales, improve customer engagement, and gain better insights into your marketing efforts. Marketing automation is a powerful tool that can significantly contribute to the growth and success of your business.
If you’re looking to get started with automation, you can benefit from our free consultancy. We have helped numerous clients, including Paveco, in automating their marketing.
