Automated campaign messaging will improve marketing efficiency and effectiveness, says Ellen Valentine, product evangelist at Silverpop
Social networks and developments, such as smartphones and tablets, have changed the way individuals communicate with each other, and brands are constantly trying to adapt and integrate their sales material with this environment. Ironically, in order to communicate on an individual basis with an on-the-go audience, marketers must automate their messaging. Such a strategy requires the use of core principles that are essential in order to fully activate automation and drive revenue through online marketing communications.
1. Email etiquette
First and foremost, always obtain permission from your customers. This distinguishes marketing automation messaging from spam and will drive open and click-through rates. It will also filter out those who aren’t interested in your business, creating a highly relevant recipient list. The same should be implemented for the opt-out process – customers want choice and should not be forced into a scheme they do not want to participate in.
Once this list has been built, monitor recipient behaviour through online tracking tools and progressive profiling. Activity pre and post sign-up provides insight into customer interests while progressive profiling allows these interests to be constantly updated. This data can then be used to create personalised messaging based on online habits, creating a significantly larger amount of engagement than generic, non-targeted messaging.
2. Data collection
Collecting relevant data on prospects is paramount to running an effective email programme. Without an understanding of potential customers, how can you expect to engage with and sell to them? Opting in should be as painless as possible. Ask for some initial details, then collect the rest later through timely data requests and careful form-building.
Progressive forms pay dividends as they allow for slow and steady data collection without the customer feeling they are giving up too much personal information. Remember, every time data is requested, the content required by the customer should be delivered immediately. Content encourages users to provide details because they get something in return. This is key to creating a trustworthy relationship.
3. Data management
Having an effective data management and integration strategy is fundamental to the success of digital marketing as it allows you to collate and utilise the data collected in the most efficient and profitable manner.
As a starting point, make sure all automation runs out of one centralised marketing database. This will allow communication with customers across all platforms without having to jump between databases. Through tactics such as web tracking, existing entries can be appended to create a sturdy list that is adaptable if priorities change.
4. Campaign automation
Automated campaigns deliver processes that move contacts through repetitive marketing steps without the need for queuing, sending or other batch or manual marketing efforts. This is unrivalled as a device that saves labour and drives engagement.
First, define your audience. Use data to segment your leads, allowing automated campaigns to be created that target individuals based on relevance.
Consider using triggered messaging that will send automated emails based on specific actions taken by the recipient. This will allow the streamlining of lead-to-sale conversion by placing recipients into different automated campaigns depending on their potential to buy.
5. Reporting and analytics
Reporting and analytics provide the foundation for improvement in all areas of marketing automation, as well as proving the worth of automated marketing. It provides the insight you need to optimise and improve marketing tactics, budgets and ROI, as well as predict future revenue streams.
The initial contact points for customers and messaging recipients should be measured to allow the most effective capture points to be identified and acted upon. This will allow resources to be used efficiently as they will be directed toward the activity that generates the most return.
It’s also important to identify trends among your recipients. Is there a specific email campaign that isn’t delivering or vice versa? Are customers of a certain demographic showing positive buying behaviour? All this information can be analysed in order to make marketing efforts more profitable.
However, just looking at trends can’t give the necessary detailed analysis, so take the time to look at specific details of each campaign. How successful was an individual event mailer or offer? This allows information to be gathered on email structure, content success and what appeals to specific audiences.
When reviewed in their entirety, email, data management and integration, data collection, campaign automation, reporting and analytics offer a comprehensive suite of functionality that can dramatically improve the efficiency and effectiveness in the marketing department – and contribute to sales and marketing alignment.
Never before has this array of functionality been available to help marketers achieve and exceed their business objectives, but today’s marketing automation technology puts all these tools directly at your fingertips.
