What is Marketing Automation?
Marketing Automation allows companies to systematically shift redundant client communication tasks over to applications that can achieve the same ends with reduced manual inputs. By designing workflows which respond to prospect hand-raising actions and triggers, marketing automation can streamline processes and give back time that would have been otherwise dedicated to a myriad of executional tasks. As a result, marketers can get far more done in less time. As a secondary benefit, the inherent standardization of workflows and processes results in more consistent outputs, thereby enabling better performance tracking. A well implemented marketing automation program can allow marketers to focus on what efforts really are making a difference to their bottom line. Conversely, initiatives that are not generating dividends can be more easily identified and eliminated. But, let’s move on from generalities and identify the specific ways that marketing automation can help us leverage our marketing inputs.
Saves valuable time, money and resources
Without a doubt, the greatest advantage of Marketing Automation is the ability for the technology to free up time for both marketing and sales departments. Tasks that have taken hours to finish could now take mere minutes to complete. With the time that is saved, marketers have the freedom to invest their efforts on new ideas, and growth tactics.
Optimizes sales efforts by serving up only the most qualified leads
Okay… this point is also about saving time, money and resources, but hear me out. Marketing Automation is key to ensuring your sales efforts are spent well. By scoring leads according to their demographic fit, as well as their engagement levels, we can strategically pass forward lists of leads that warrant personal attention based on their readiness to buy. More qualified leads, means more productive 1:1 conversations, and ultimately, more opportunities. So, bottom line is, marketing automation is key in ramping up your sales volume.
Offers detailed reporting and analytics
If you love data as much as I do, this one’s for you. One of the greatest challenges in the marketing world is to establish a correlation between marketing initiatives and the bottom line as expressed by gross sales revenues. With marketing automation, this is now possible. By looking at revenue attribution reports, we can see which campaigns a prospect touched before an opportunity was created, and credit those assets with the resulting sales wins. Not only does this help prove that marketing played a critical role in the sale, but it allows for insights into which campaigns propelled prospects through the sales pipeline.
These, and other advantages, are why marketing automation has become in indispensable part of the marketing mix in the few years since the technology first emerged. So now the next question… which marketing automation platform is best for you? If you need some help on assessing the pros and cons of the different platforms, feel free to reach out. We are happy to give provide guidance and help you determine which of the numerous marketing automation platforms in that sector would be the best fit for your organization.
