Kamis, 14 Mei 2015

The Basics Of Marketing Automation Systems

By Tammie Caldwell


When talking of marketing automation, one normally refers to software platforms and technologies that are geared towards assisting the marketing teams and the organizations at large increase their effectiveness in promoting their products in various online platforms. Products may be promoted by email, through websites and social media platforms. The platforms take over repetitive online functions from being operated by human beings. They require a command that triggers action when the required task is achieved online hence the importance of the Marketing Automation systems.

The marketing department and other marketing employees just specify the criteria the kind of outcome that they want for certain processes and tasks. The software interprets them, stores them, and executes the task as instructed. This reduces human error and increases efficiency. Nowadays Marketing automations includes analytical tools to anise some factors in that touch on the expected result. Most of these platforms are hosted on cloud and thus there no need for the client to install any software.

There are three distinct categories of the common Marketing Automation platforms. The commonest one does the work of collecting how the company is interacting with its online visitors. This function is called marketing Intelligence. Codes are set to track the behavior of visitors that interact with the products. They could have interacted with your firm on email, on social media or other online channel. The software goes further to measure the probability of buying the product.

Examples of tracking includes recording the link that was clicked in an email, search terms that visitors used to access a website, a forum thread that was followed or a social media group that has so many followers. Buyer behavior can be tracked by use of such links for a product x. This feedback helps the retailing team develop programs that are in line with the interests of the prospects.

Developments have also brought platforms with the sole aim of moving prospects down the sales funnel. Normal visitors are guides slowly until they are hot customers in waiting. The software scores the prospects in the normal interaction with the online presence of the brand and help nurture their interest until they are ready to buy.

Depending on the client that your company is targeting, you are going to use one of these sales cycles. You may use B2B (Business-to-Business), B2C (Business-to-Customer) or if targeting the government, B2G (Business-to-Government). The platforms are a perfect example how a structured business process can be intermingled with email marketing to chase the right, qualified prospects.

Some platforms are meant to ensure automation of internal retailing processes. These are referred to as workflow automation platforms. In most cases, the sales cycles are delay by the internal component that takes some time to be accomplished. Such processes include planning, budgeting, internal collaboration, development of retailing calendar among others. They check on anything that involves internal marketing process.

Your CRM administrator feeds the software with the rules and directions. The software then activate other actions needed to be done by the sales team when needed. For example, it may remind them to send emails, design marketing material, or call a client. With marketing automation you are more efficient with very few errors.




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