Friday, May 15, 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 process starts when marking individuals or the department involved in marketing specifies what outcome they would like to have from any process or task that touches on marketing. The software picks up the commands, makes a quick interpretation, and implements them as needed. It is efficient and not prone to error as humans are. In the recent past, such systems have been used to analyze behavior online and its effect on overall results. Cloud hosting enables clients to use the platform as a service.

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.

A good example of tracking is recording when one clicks a link in the email, capturing what search terms visitors use when accessing the website, detecting what forum thread is attracting many visitors and getting to know what social media group is attracting many visitors. The retailing team uses this feedback to develop plans that match the prospects interest.

There are marketing automation platforms whose main aim is to move prospects down a retailing funnel. This turns prospects to hot prospects that are ready for sales proposals. The platforms score clients as they interact with the brand online and slowly create interest in the products until prospects become clients.

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.

There are workflow automation programs whose main work is to ensure that the internal retailing processes are automated. It is common feature to find internal sales processes delay goals that could have been achieved earlier. These processes may be internal collaboration, budgeting, planning, and coming up with the retailing calendar. The programs take charge of all internal marketing functions.

The rules that these programs follow are set by a CRM administrator. On their part, the platforms trigger other process to be implemented by other programs or by the sales team. These may be sending newsletter, emails, and uploading some marketing files. Marketing automation makes retailing faster and is less prone to human error.




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