What is the use of having a great product to sell if no one knows about it, right? As the saying goes, Marketing is the lifeblood of any business. Pushing a marketing department to its full potential can contribute heavily towards a business’ overall success. This isn’t always straightforward because the tasks associated with a marketing strategy can take plenty of time and effort to execute. There is, however, an efficient way to drive a company’s marketing efforts forward. And that way is through marketing automation.
Marketing Automation is the use of software in order to complete basic to advanced marketing strategies. These strategies and tasks include CRM, marketing campaign management, and automated actions on email and social media.
Marketing Automation software cannot be a substitute for a marketing manager or staff. It merely assists a marketer in becoming more efficient and accurate in their work. This leads to more work that can be completed at a faster rate. Apart from completing various marketing tasks efficiently and accurately, automation means that businesses can begin to serve their customers after hours and in different time zones as well.
In the past, companies would have had to spend plenty of time and resources in executing their marketing campaigns manually. With marketing automation, similar tasks can be performed through software. This makes for a much more efficient marketing strategy that can focus on things such as sales, data collection, and customer service.
Automating various aspects of a business has become more popular in recent times. Automation can assist businesses to have a better control on company expenses, sales, and staff. Marketing is one of the latest departments to adopt software automation. This allows for endless opportunities that can result in further engagement with clients.
This is great news because customers are beginning to engage positively with automated messages from companies. Apart from consumer engagement, there are a few more aspects of a business that are bound to prosper. Below are some of the areas of a business worth mentioning.
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There is an instant advantage behind automating key functions such as social media and email marketing. These are proven strategies that can be measured through collected data. Analyzing this data can assist in making the correct decisions towards increasing productivity.
It is possible to gather an entire week worth of content and schedule them as posts on social media accounts. This can assist in spreading out multiple posts over time, instead of posting everything at once.
There's also no need to continuously remember when to post on social media as the software will take care of everything. Some social media management software can even automatically post at the “best time”. This means that your post will go online at the moment when the social platform is most busy and engaging.
Email marketing is another strategy that can be fully automated. Today, it is possible to email personalized messages to all of the leads that you have gathered in an email list. You can even create a call to action button that will lead the reader to the company’s website. This will assist in creating more traffic to the website and awareness to the company’s products.
A website can also be automated to collect and build an email list from its visitors. Including a welcome program which sends a customized email to every new subscriber can benefit the company in building a lasting relationship. Sending out additional emails informing the client of what to expect from the brand, can entice them to start shopping.
Sales are what keeps the doors open every month. Marketing and Sales go hand in hand. Creating an automated marketing solution within your business can lead to more sales. There’s no time constraints and limits when executing a successful automated marketing campaign. This can be very useful when planning global campaigns in different time zones.
Marketing automation can assist in directing prospective clients towards a sales or product page of a company’s website. If the sales page has a proper sales funnel setup, then a percentage of the traffic generated from marketing automation can be converted into sales. If set up correctly, this process can be executed at any given time of the day without human assistance.
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Marketing automation can lead towards a better customer experience. This can be achieved by sending a personalized email via marketing automation software. These emails can be triggered by certain actions or events. An example would be an email reminding a customer that they have items in their basket. These emails are highly effective as customers will be able to click the link open the email to follow through to the website’s product page or basket.
Another popular tactic is sending out emails notifying customers of their wish list items that are now on sale. These behavioral emails along with a well-designed website make for a highly personalized and strong customer experience. Continuously building upon personal marketing experiences for clients will entice them to stick to your brand.
The best way to measure progress in a marketing campaign is to analyze measurable data. Manually collecting this data can be time-consuming and difficult. However, most marketing automation software does record every transaction it makes as well as the responses and engagement made by the target audience.
Apart from customer responses, it is possible for some software to also track expenses related to specific marketing campaigns. All of this data can be automatically tracked, then delivered to the company’s marketing manager for further analysis. This kind of data is vital in determining the success of a marketing campaign. It can also assist a business in optimizing their marketing efforts.
Marketing automation software can provide a business with the right sort of tools it needs in order to perfect its communication with its customers. Acquiring new clients while retaining older ones is key to running any successful business. This is one of the principles that is supported by a healthy marketing strategy. Modern marketing automation software is designed to support a well-planned marketing strategy.