TIPS TO SUCCEED WITH MARKETING AUTOMATION

 As your business grows, the need for a solid lead management system grows. Without such a system, your ability to engage with leads within the buying cycle will continue to decline – as will the ability to manually target individual customer interests. Using a marketing automation system removes the pain points and ensures that you approach the customer with the right message and at the right time.

The success factor of such a system depends to a large extent on the device, because it is the first and only possibility to do this well. If this kind of technology is unfamiliar territory for you, you don't necessarily have to worry. I have put together a list of tips to ensure that your marketing automation adventure starts without any problems:

1. Clean up your CRM

Make sure your CRM with invoicing or customer relationship database is cleaned up before you start. This is important because your new software will be integrated with this system and the emails will be used for inbound marketing. If you have duplicates in your current list, the new list will be a mess when you import the current one.

Ensure all leads and contacts are converted properly and duplicates are removed. In addition, make sure that the contacts are associated with the corresponding account and that the account names are completely correct. Combine, delete, convert – whatever it takes to keep your list up to date.

2. Validate/verify email addresses

Please check the email addresses in your list through a verification program before uploading. That way you can rule out erroneous or outdated email addresses before you start. This ensures a lower bounce rate within your first email campaign, which is useful for future campaigns. If your bounce rate is higher than ten percent, you run the risk of poor delivery. Correct email addresses can start bouncing as a result, and the reputation of your IP address comes under attack, potentially leading to being blacklisted.

3. Reflect on your lead management process

Despite the detailed benefits of marketing automation technology, many companies do not take full advantage of the technology. That means they don't reap the benefits. To correct this, you need to analyze and implement a lead management process. Use a whiteboard to spar with your colleagues to shape your own unique procedure.

Imagine the following situation:

– Identify your leads: Create your buyer persona and associated questions.

– Create a rating system: What makes someone a top customer?

– Map out support campaigns for each personality.

– Recognize when marketing leads to a lead-to-customer conversion. For example, when they reach a certain class or score.

4. Team Skills

To grow a team into marketing specialists, you need to find the right type of person: someone who understands the technical terms, but speaks the marketing language. When assembling your team, I recommend that you look for people with the following skills or competences (or if you manage a smaller company: an employee who can manage your automation system):

– Sales: understands customers; understands the buying cycle; helps in classifying leads.

– Analytics: deep understanding of analytical process; understands and translates results; evaluates applications and makes recommendations.

– Marketing: knows and understands the audience; manages the campaigns and messages.

– Manager: brings the above together; in case of larger companies, this person leads the team of specialists (ie works with design team to create website, landing pages, inbound emails for example).

5. What is your content strategy?

What are you going to send to your leads? You can't build a successful campaign without developing relevant content for every step of the buying cycle. With quality content, you show your customers that you are professional, knowledgeable, that they can trust you and, preferably, that it is worth making a purchase.

My advice? Start with what you know. Start small and expand your content offering as you gain confidence and better understanding of what works and what doesn't work with your target audience.

6. Set goals

Marketing generates more sales and must therefore be treated with care. Before you buy or implement a marketing automation system, you must clearly map out what you hope to achieve. Build a list of your key marketing goals from a revenue point of view, and use marketing automation accordingly. Once you're up and running, keep an eye on your goals through data analytics to make sure you're on the right track.

7. All of the above!

When considering purchasing an automation system, keep all of the above in mind. A marketing automation program is only as good as the people, the processes and the content behind it. So make sure that all of this is aligned in detail before installing, so that you don't pay for a service that you don't use optimally.