Automation in Marketing

Marketing automation has become a necessity in this digital era. It is a term used to describe various software platforms and tools used in effectively organizing and managing the marketing tasks on multiple online channels, including the automation of repetitive tasks. The marketing automation platforms are either web-based or hosted solutions that help in the automation of repetitive tasks such as certain web actions, email marketing, social media activities, etc.

TYPES OF MARKETING AUTOMATION

Marketing automation is classified into 3 categories:

1. Marketing Intelligence
This is very important for behavior-based marketing as it involves tracking codes to monitor the activities of customers online. This helps in identifying and analyzing the patterns of consumers online that can help in recommending items of further interest to them.

2. Business Development
The business development strategy helps in moving potential customers from the top of the sales funnel to the bottom of the sales funnel, based on a few behavioral measures. Business development mostly relies on marketing strategies such as Search Engine Optimization (SEO), emails, social media, etc.

3. Workflow Automation
This is targeted more towards big enterprises that require more complex marketing strategies, as compared to small enterprises. Workflow automation includes all the processes that run in large enterprises, such as marketing calendars. However, now, even small to mid-sized businesses have access to workflow automation technology.

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF MARKETING AUTOMATION?

Due to the recent global pandemic, COVID-19, most businesses, if not all, have started to rely heavily on ecommerce. This means that the marketing agencies have been swamped with a lot of work and they have countless deadlines to meet. In such a situation, marketing automation would be of great help to these marketers. In the past, there were numerous tasks related to posting and publishing, that have now been automated, helping in reducing the workload of marketers. Marketing automation is all about simplifying the business processes.

A few of the benefits of marketing automation have been discussed below:

1. Marketers save a lot of time.
With marketing automation, marketers can save a lot of time as they do not have to do repetitive tasks, such as sending marketing campaign emails, again. Once the campaign starts, marketers can sit and monitor the campaign instead of worrying about sending emails.

2. Better productivity of marketers.
By saving up on time, marketers can utilize that time in concentrating on other marketing strategies that may be beneficial for their clients, and on improving customer relationships. This could also mean that the quality of work produced becomes better. With Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning, marketers can focus their attention on customized marketing strategies.

3. No room for human error.
As the monotonous tasks have been taken care of by the automation process, there is no room for human error in these tasks. It is generally seen that in repetitive tasks, workers tend to make a lot of mistakes.

4. Reduced costs.
Marketing agencies usually hire separate workers for various tasks. Tasks that can now be automated, do not need any workers. This is beneficial for the marketing agency. Who wouldn’t want to save some bucks!

5. Understand the consumers better.
All the data collected from the consumers, via emails, social media, apps, etc., are analyzed and processed through the marketing automation processes. Then, relevant and personalized messages are sent to these countless consumers, improving the efficiency of your marketing strategies. Once you have all the data in front of you, it is very easy for marketers to manipulate their strategies accordingly. Marketing strategies rely heavily on the consumers; hence, it is very important to know your consumers well.

6. Clients report a higher Return on Investment (ROI).
With better marketing strategies geared towards the target audience, clients report a much higher ROI than before. This defiantly satisfies the client and it increases the chances of their loyalty towards your marketing agency. This, in turn, means more business for you!

IS THE ART OF A MARKETER DEAD WITH THIS AUTOMATION?

Not! Marketing automation has simplified the marketing strategies for marketers. It helps in giving a better insight into the likes, dislikes, thoughts, and online behavior of consumers. This allows marketers to mold their marketing strategies, according to the real-time response of the consumers, to yield better results from them. This, if nothing else, has made the life of a marketer much simplified.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Marketing automation can be seen as a big achievement in the marketing industry. It allows businesses to flourish and consumers to get what they like. However, with such great insights into the consumers, there is more responsibility on the shoulders of marketers to deliver what the consumers and businesses want, by fine-tuning their marketing strategies accordingly.