Marketing automation (MA) combines technology and strategy to form and send personalized and useful content to help convert leads into customers and nurture one-time customers into repeat customers. It does that by using digital tools and data to nudge a potential customer further along their customer journey. We discuss below what that looks like and provide recommendations for actionable steps.
Understanding the customer journey
A customer journey is the process that a customer goes through when interacting with a brand or business, from initial awareness of a product or service to the final purchase and beyond. It might start with a marketing activity, such as an online search, a social media view, or a click on an engaging ad, but it also includes many other touchpoints. Every interaction is another step on the journey and it’s not the predictable, linear path you may think it is.
We strongly encourage you to workshop and define a customer journey map before you begin a digital ad campaign that promotes your products or services. It can be a written document but is most often a visual storyline of every engagement a customer has with your company with the next step clearly identified—the ultimate goal being your brand directly in their mind. Think of this map as a key to understanding your ideal customer, through first interaction to the coveted sale.
Adding the secret sauce of marketing automation
Marketing automation typically comes into play once you have that map in place. At ddm, we put databases, MAPs/ESPs (marketing automation platforms or email service providers), CRMs (customer relationship management), and landing pages together to manage your marketing and sales funnel, which reduces marketing overhead and creates better quality leads and relationships. MA accomplishes that by automating repetitive tasks, streamlining lead generation processes, and delivering higher-quality leads through personalized, data-driven campaigns. The goal is to automate and personalize communications well enough that each potential customer is getting the right message at precisely the right time. With the information gleaned through the process, your sales team can better focus their efforts on closing deals.
Lead generation is the process of finding potential customers and encouraging them to learn more about your company. With actions on their part, e.g., clicking on one of your ads because you display something of interest, you gain information that will inform the next targeted communication. Creating personalized content using data and segmentation allows your potential customers to feel you are a brand that understands their needs.
Tracking and organizing your data, using a tool such as HubSpot or SalesForce Marketing Cloud, to learn and capture the source of a lead and determine what step of the customer journey your lead is on is highly recommended. Also consider developing a methodology to determine the quality of each lead by attaching a lead score value based on behavior. This objective ranking helps align the next step you’ll take with that lead. In general, you want the most clean and organized data possible to help with targeting and automation. Deciding what you want to capture, how you will capture it, and what to do with it next are paramount.
How you sell matters
The purpose of a lead nurturing sequence is to develop and maintain a relationship with customers until they are ready to purchase. Automated lead nurturing involves sending messages based on user behavior or a predetermined schedule. Bear in mind, a well-structured email sequence is crucial to your success because a well-nurtured lead (showing interest) becomes a prospect (has a problem and actively seeking a solution) and then a client (purchase made). It should go without saying, once a lead becomes a client, that isn’t the end of their customer journey, but the beginning of your relationship.
This is where analytics comes into play for continuous sales improvement. Establishing an intentional feedback loop will help you make informed incremental changes to your marketing automation program for even greater success. You can sort through your customer data by using tools like Google Analytics or Microsoft’s Power BI. They are useful tools for helping monitor site traffic, user behavior, and the overall sales funnel. This data will enable you to measure performance and identify areas that need improvement. Key performance indicators (KPIs) such as conversion rates, customer acquisition costs, the lead score value we spoke of earlier, and retention rates will allow you to compare your performance against your predetermined goals.
Overcoming challenges and roadblocks
One of the biggest obstacles to sales enablement with marketing automation is making sure both sales and marketing teams are working toward the same goal. When you set your KPIs, ask the marketing team what content sees the most traction and ask the sales team where they regularly see leads stall on the customer journey, or worse, fall off. Even though marketing teams traditionally look to the future while sales teams tend to focus on the present, both teams can work together if clear channels of communication are present. Cohesive messaging should carry across both marketing and sales with a common goal of nurturing leads through the customer journey. Of course, creating engaging sales content, whether digital or printed, is imperative.
Work smarter not harder
We don’t need a crystal ball to tell us that using marketing automation to enhance sales enablement will be around well into the future. Afterall, the gap between sellers and buyers will always need to be bridged. True success lies in how you build that bridge. The tools you use might change, but the basic human behavior in decision-making stays fairly consistent. At ddm, we’ve been helping our clients sell to their audiences for over 30 years. Our marketing automation team is ready to seamlessly integrate into your workflow at whatever point they’re needed to help your marketing and sales teams provide a better customer journey experience.