Roughly 30% of employees report that automation software saves money for their business.
That’s right, by using marketing automation to streamline your processes you’re able to save not only time but also money. But what is marketing automation and how do you really put it to work for you?
Dealing with even more software can be overwhelming in the beginning, but once you get used to it and truly implement the automation it can make a big difference in how your company’s time and money are spent.
In this post, we’ll go over what it actually is, and how to use it to your advantage.
Keep reading to learn more.
What Is Marketing Automation?
Using marketing automation platforms is becoming a necessity these days to accomplish all of your marketing tasks.
These use marketing automation software to automate a lot of the tasks and processes that would otherwise be managed by you or your marketing team. This makes marketing much more efficient and effective and gives you time to work on other things while these processes still continue in the background.
The biggest use is in email marketing sequences and it’s great for nurturing leads without your marketing team needing to be personally involved at every step. Usually, the automated processes are triggered by some behavior of the customer.
1. Segmentation
Getting the right information in front of someone at the right time in their customer experience can make all the difference. One of the ways that marketing automation can help here is by automatically segmenting your customers and leads.
Automation services can sort and segment everyone who interacts with your website or social media by a variety of variables. This can be by demographic, engagement level, or past buying behavior.
When you know what group a lead falls into it allows you to offer a more personalized experience for them, which people love and can help convince them to convert.
Doing this manually is a ton of work and takes a lot of time that you could be busy doing other important work, but automation makes it easy.
2. Email List
As mentioned, one of the most common uses of marketing automation tools is in email marketing.
When you encourage people to opt-in to your email list, usually by offering exclusive content, it is important that this isn’t the only contact you have with them. It takes multiple interactions to build trust and fully connect with a lead. By sending an automated series of emails to your leads you can help to nurture the relationship and keep your company fresh in their minds.
The series of emails they receive should be relevant to them, and this is where the automated segmentation really comes into play. Different people care about different things, and so based on their user data and behaviors the automation system should send the appropriate email sequence.
Automating this process is important so that everything happens on time and so no one slips through the cracks and isn’t contacted.
3. Send Reminders for Abandoned Shopping Carts
Another way to use automated marketing with your email marketing is by sending reminders to people with abandoned shopping carts. People who have put items into their shopping carts are obviously close to making a purchase. By reaching out to them if they abandon their cart you are often able to get them to convert and make the purchase.
Set up your email marketing automation so that when this happens there is automatically an email sent to them reminding them of the contents of their cart. The sooner this email goes out, the better.
This is also an opportunity to mention other products or services they may be interested in based on what is already in their cart. This can help to get them back on your website to continue their shopping.
4. Social Media Automation
While social media is a powerful marketing tool, it can also be time-consuming. Between creating and posting content, tracking the engagement of your followers, and keeping track of what’s going on in the industry there’s a lot to do. Automation can help with all of these.
One of the biggest uses of automation for social media is in planning and scheduling your posts. Automation allows you to create the content and then schedule it far in advance. This helps you to be sure that you won’t miss making any posts which can be detrimental to your engagement levels and to how visible your profile is on the platform.
Marketing automation can also help you to assess the leads that come from your social media. It can help you look at a lead and see what kinds of content, posts, and actions they’ve interacted with, which then helps you to know what kind of marketing they’ll best respond to.
You are also able to set it up to track certain keywords, hashtags, or accounts to provide insight into what is popular in your industry and what is and isn’t working in your own campaigns.
5. Monitor Comments
When you use marketing automation tools that can integrate with a content management system (CSM) it can help you to monitor the comments that visitors leave on your website.
It can collect data on positive vs negative comments that can help you to improve your products, services, and overall customer experience. You are also able to create a list of words that are banned. If one of these words does appear you’ll receive a notification and can address it.
This is important for keeping spam, hate speech, and slander off of your website.
Start Using Marketing Automation to Your Advantage
Marketing automation can help your company save time and money while also boosting sales. Use it to your advantage and it will do a lot of the work for you, allowing you to focus on other important things.
If you’re looking for expert help with digital marketing, contact us today!
