Marketing is the heart of your business. It’s the Holy Grail that your business relies on for boosting its brand image, offering promotions, inducing brand recall, capturing leads and customers, increasing sales and the list goes on. Marketing is everywhere and in everything. As an entrepreneur or small business owner, you are keenly aware of the impact it can have on your business growth when done well and done consistently. Enter Marketing Automation.
Webster defines marketing as “the process or technique of promoting, selling and distributing a product or service” and automation as “automatically controlled operation of an apparatus, process, or system by mechanical or electronic devices that take the place of human labor.”
Combine them and you get the definition of marketing automation ― software or system that automates or streamlines marketing workflow and tasks. It helps marketing channels operate more rapidly via automation, which makes measuring performance much simpler.
The Importance of Marketing Automation
Today’s saturated market of products and services is offering customers numerous touchpoints, through which they can make a decision. The level of expectation of engagement has greatly increased and is more individual-focused. Customers demand that the marketing message be more personalized so that they can have a meaningful interaction. Based on data analytics, you can easily come up with your brand’s core message. Throw a little creative marketing into the mix and you have got a brand that speaks to the audience on a material and an emotional level.
According to Venture Harbour, 96% of the visitors who visit your website don’t buy anything. In fact, they are far from making a decision. One goal that was considered unreachable in marketing was scalable-personalization ― the ability to orchestrate data, design, decisions, and distribution so that your actions meet an individual’s requirements.
Through marketing automation, you are able to convey specific messages that address the needs and wants of your customers. This helps capture and nurture leads, which drives more traffic to your website and finally leads to visitors making a purchase. In order to continually encourage and foster engagement throughout the journey down the funnel, you need to come up with relevant content and meaningful interactions, which automation can undeniably assist you with.
The line of operation that marketing automation follows also helps collect and analyze data, such as content performance and user engagement history. You can use this information to maximize conversions and increase your ROI.
Benefits of Marketing Automation
Before we get down to the benefits, let’s look at a scenario that will help you understand how marketing automation works.
You are looking for new gym equipment for your office. The results of a survey done in your office revealed that the current gym equipment is old and doesn’t offer a complete workout program. So, you take your search to Google and type in the search bar “best office gym equipment.” You click the first website that comes in the results and send them a query asking for assistance. After 20 minutes, there’s no reply so you close the page.
Now, let’s look at the same situation but with one twist. After sending your query, you get a reply within just a few minutes. The company thanks you for choosing them and then proceeds to answer your question. They also email you a guide saying that it will help you choose the right equipment.
In both these scenarios, which company left a positive impression?
Obviously, the second one! And that’s how marketing automation weaves its magic.
Following are five benefits of marketing automation to your business that you have been so patiently waiting for:
1. It Helps You Lay Down the Welcome Mat
The above scenario is a prime example of how important first impressions are. In order to build a lasting relationship with your customers, you need to welcome your visitors the moment they arrive at your website. Once a visitor gives you their email address for the newsletter, you can send them a welcome email with what’s new on your website. If the lead now takes action, you can use the data to customize their experience with in-page content.
2. It Makes Your Marketing and Sales Teams More Efficient
Automation will minus the routine tasks from the marketing equation and give more time to your sales and marketing teams to focus on strategic planning that is central to the success of your company.
3. It Helps Give Quick Responses
In order to nurture your leads, you need to be responsive at all times. The more efficiently and quickly you answer their questions, the higher the chances that they will make a purchase. Swift response is one of the weapons of marketing automation. You won’t lose a single customer because even in your absence, they will get a response.
4. Helps You Implement Marketing Campaigns in a Timely Manner
If you run a small business, you probably don’t have the manpower to develop, analyze and launch multiple campaigns. They key to steady and increasing revenue is consistent marketing efforts. This is where automation helps you by doing everything for you. All you have to do is arrange your workflow and the software will deliver the content to your audience.
5. Helps You Retain Loyal Customers
Existing customers are easier to target than new customers. That’s because you have their information to a point that helps you recapture their attention. Automation tools such as CRM help you grow your list of loyal customers by using their data and delivering them a product or service with higher quality.
So, there you have it ― the success of your business on your fingertips… or more accurately in a software program. Think of marketing automation as a robot that does your tasks for you more accurately with the promise of better results. The purpose of marketing automation is to increase revenue and what business doesn’t need that? It’s time that you grabbed the marketing leadership position by leaving your mark on your visitors.
Coconspirator can help you with your marketing needs. We specialize in brand and performance marketing to help entrepreneurs and well-established companies boost their business. For more information about the types of marketing services we offer businesses, call us at + 01 727 565 2535
