We should start by pointing out, that by now you would already have read our other blog posts on Marketing Automation and know what marketing automation is and what the thought behind marketing automation is.
In case you didn't, here's the tl;dr (Too long didn't read) version: Marketing Automation is a solution that replaces a large collection of individual tools. It helps you to optimise your marketing processes, identify larger pipeline and ultimately – convert more leads.
How does it do that? Well – hypothetical reader, that’s a good question! The answer itself is somewhat trickier.
To understand it, we need to go a bit deeper into the background behind marketing automation.
The Past
It all started off within big Fortune 500 companies. Being essential to demonstrate shareholder value, they needed a tangible way to prove the value of their marketing activities. After all, what good are your campaigns when you don’t know what your ROI was/is? Marketing automation gave them an easy way of calculating their return, cut costs and allowed them to use one tool instead of multiple siloed tools to do the same thing.
After realising the benefits such systems have, many other companies quickly caught on. This led to a rise in the number of providers offering their own marketing automation platforms, each with its own respective strengths.
The Present
Today, there is a vast array of choice with platforms varying in price and capability. This ensures that whatever the size and type of your business, there is a marketing automation platform somewhere that will suit your individual needs. We can choose what our priorities are, what we want to achieve from implementing marketing automation and based on the features, make an informed decision.
Now we’ve made our choice, we can set-up and personalise everything we need in order to start capturing leads, nurturing them and driving them into our sales pipeline.
This is where the “How” part begins.
Marketing automation will, depending on your implementation, allow you to capture leads through intelligent lead forms that include things like progressive profiling. Progressive profiling means a lead is asked for different information every time they visit your site. One visit you might ask for their email, the next for their names and the next for their contact numbers. This allows us to capture leads without seeming too intrusive. It also allows us to segment them based on specific criteria.
This brings us to the next part – segmentation. Why segment leads? Because we can then target them with much more accurate offers, resulting in a higher click-rate in newsletters and a lower website bounce rate.
Now how do we know someone is genuinely interested in a product? Well, we measure the amount of times they visit a page, if they downloaded a document, if they read reviews on it, etc. Thanks to marketing automation, we can set up a workflow that will automatically reach out to them if they reach a certain pre-defined “interest threshold”.
If they reply to this email, we place them into the sales pipeline and a sales person reaches out. Its as easy as that!
The misconception
“Oh but wait, we can do that with newsletter tools already!”
Really? Can your newsletter tool store the lead's information into a built in CRM? Is their contact information automatically updated when they complete website forms? How do you know where they went within your site after that first click? And how do you understand key elements of their buyer journey in order to make sure the lead is segmented and nurtured on time and in the right way?
Yeah, I didn't think so...
A common misconception is that marketing automation is a glorified newsletter tool, when the real purpose behind it is to support your prospect through their buyer journey. Marketing automation should be a core element of all your marketing efforts. It is a warm lead breeding machine meant to take in cold leads and spit out prospects that are ready to buy.
The future
Marketing automation is in a continual state of change, but this is necessary to ensure that it meets the ever evolving needs of digital marketers. Currently, things like artificial intelligence, virtual reality and new browsing experiences have to be accounted for and are actively promoted to encourage digital growth. The Systems that are used by marketers all need to be up to standard and support these ever evolving features. Marketing Automation is adjustable and can adapt to these new additions and changes easily.
Are you ready to boost your leads and sales with marketing automation? Or maybe you're not ready, but just want to find out more and prepare your business for modern world of digital marketing! Then it's time to reach out. We will guide you along the path to marketing enlightenment.
