It’s a word you’ve probably heard at conferences and seen on blogs, but just what is Marketing Automation and why should your business care about it?
Simply put, Marketing Automation is the process of nurturing prospects into customers; through highly targeted content and emails.
We all consume content every day (you’re doing it right now!) and the content we read can play a big part in our buying decisions both online and offline: therefore it’s vital that when we produce content we’re aiming it at the correct audiences and their position in the Buyer Journey.
There are three steps to the Buyer Journey: Awareness, Consideration & Decision.
The types of content these users are interested in differs from stage to stage: this is where Marketing Automation can help you, by guiding the users through each stage and eventually converting them into customers.
For example, a user in the Awareness Stage has spotted that there is an issue and is researching the problem: a research guide or whitepaper would work excellently as a piece of content here. On the other hand, a user in the Decision Stage knows the issue and is in the process of finding a vendor to solve it; therefore Client Testimonials and Product Demos are the best piece of content for this audience.
How Does Marketing Automation Work?
Using Marketing Automation you can set up a Workflow starting from the first user interaction. This could be downloading a research whitepaper, signing up for more editorial content or simply contacting you for advice.
Following this, the user will begin to receive targeted emails and content over a set day period, based on further interaction with your site, the areas of your site they are interested in and most importantly their stage of the Buyer Journey. These emails could contain content from expert guides, to webinar invites or trial downloads.
Here’s the benefit of using Marketing Automations – your workflow is automated rather than being manual. This means you don’t need to set reminders to email your leads, instead you can create your workflow and simply let it run.
How Can Marketing Automation Benefit My Business?
There are many ways in which Marketing Automation can benefit your business, here’s 7:
- By increasing your leads and customers
- It allows you to establish contact with potential clients immediately.
- It builds your business up as the industry authority
- It allows you to maintain consistent communication with potential clients, so they won’t forget about you.
- You can identify pain points of your potential customers and then come up with ways to fix them.
- You can upsell and cross sell your products, based on customer data
- Finally, it’s automated, meaning that you can schedule communication months in advance
Marketing Automation is a brilliant tool for business, but it isn’t right for everyone and it isn’t a quick fix, but that’s where we come in. To drive Marketing Automation to its full potential, it needs to be planned and scheduled correctly. It works hand in hand with other marketing methods such as SEO & PPC: when combined your business can benefit three fold. For example, you optimise your Marketing Automation content so that it has SEO benefit, you can bid on keywords relating to your content through PPC and then even automate any Social Advertising. When there’s continuity between your marketing channels, you’re more likely to see success and an increased ROI.
If you think that Marketing Automation or any of our Services could benefit you or your business then please talk to Sam.
