AVOID These 8 Mistakes in Automation
Want to enjoy about return of investment in marketing automation tools?
Marketing Automation allows you to increase your sales by 14,5% and reduce your marketing cost by 12,2%. Furthermore, 80% of marketing automation users notice a rise in number of leads and 77% of users noted a conversion boost.
In this episode, you'll be able to learn :
- What mistakes you should simply avoid if you want to enjoy about return of investment in marketing automation tools?
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00:00 Intro
00:51 What is marketing automation?
02:53 1. Mistake: Wrong reason for implementation of Marketing Automation Technology
04:33 2. Mistake: Wrong choice of a tool
06:18 3. Mistake: Lack of strategy
08:08 4. Mistake: Misunderstanding of the impregnation process
09:36 5. Mistake: Too much at once
11:13 6. Mistake: Lack of optimization
13:02 7. Mistake: Wrong concept of personalization
14:03 8. Mistake: Overestimating of automation functionalities
14:20 Outro
According to latest research conducted by Invesp, Marketing Automation allows you to increase your sale by 14,5% (fourteen point five percent) and to reduce your Marketing costs by 12,2% (twelve point two percent) Furthermore, 80% (eighty percent) of Marketing Automation users notice rise in number of leads and 77% (seventy seven percent) of users noted a conversion boost.
In this episode, you’ll find out what mistakes you should simply avoid if you want to enjoy and brag to your boss about your return on investment in a Marketing Automation tool.
What is Marketing Automation? One of the definitions is: Marketing automation is a solution that allows you to communicate based on gathered data. This solution can be used at every stage of the marketing funnel - from building awareness of a brand and product by building relationships and educating potential customers, to customers making decisions on buying a product or service.
In this episode, we are going to focus on traps. Literally, around every corner there is a risk of making a mistake. If the process were easy, there would be no need, and this episode wouldn’t be necessary as I would happily tell you about how you don’t have to worry about anything during implementation of Marketing Automation.
So, what mistakes should you try to avoid on your Marketing Automation journey?
There are many more than you may presume, but the most common mistakes are:
(wrong reasons for implementation of Marketing Automation technology)
Some of them you will face right at the beginning, right around the corner after making a decision or getting permission for implementation of Marketing Automation.
Let’s break down your automation decision. First up, was it a justified business need?
The Marketing Automation market has reached a level where basically every marketer has heard this term. Most of them have made at least one attempt in implementing some kind of tool. Unfortunately, most often this was something highly inefficient and it couldn’t be considered business success.
Why? More than once I’ve heard such reasons: “we are implementing Marketing Automation, because everyone has one, it means it's something you just have to do if you’re going to work in marketing”
OR
“Our competition uses Marketing Automation and they noted an improved performance during the quarter. Of course it has to be because of marketing automation - implementation, here we go!”
Behind making a decision about implementing Marketing Automation, there should always be a specific need and some concrete effects or goals you want to achieve.
With an attitude like “whatever, let’s just implement it” can be more harmful than helpful.
(choice of a tool unmatched with your current needs)
You might think that your choice of a tool determines your success, but it’s not always the case. Another way to look at it: Do you think that your choice of transportation will determine if your holidays will be enjoyable? It doesn’t matter if you decide to travel by train, plane, car, or bus, it is not the drive down that matters, but the final effect.
To keep using this analogy, before you decide on flying by plane and picking a first class seat, you’ll want to check how the tool will match your needs and business expectations, how much they cost and what is their development perspective. After all, it makes no sense to bike to an island.
Most importantly, test it! How can you know if a particular tool works for you and your business if you don’t test it? Schedule a demo with a sales person, or create an account on the platform and just discover it. Check out if certain functionalities work properly and if you can gather the exact information or implement the exact scenarios that you need.
You’re finished choosing the right path - a tool that will help you achieve your set goals... and what now? Are you ready for the next possible mistake?
(lack of strategy)
Strategy. This one word raises anxiety in many marketers or founders. You’re probably going to say: “Mike, come on, strategy is an initial step. You should have started off with it!”
And here, I agree with you but at the same time I don’t. If you have an appropriate level of knowledge to develop a strategy right after deciding on implementation, or even before, to justify your decision to your board, then it’s great.
However, according to a study done by Liana technologies, the main factor preventing the implementation of Marketing Automation for companies is a lack of know-how. That’s why only after you choose the tool, you should develop the strategy with a system provider expert or with a third party qualified agency.
Remember it’s not always about preparing a long, expert document. Strategy is your plan for moving from point A to point B, that is: to realize where we are at the moment, and to specify a point we’re aiming to reach. You need to also remember that strategy for Marketing Automation campaigns should be consistent with strategy for Marketing campaigns, which of course has to be consistent with the general strategy of the company or organization you work for.
(Misunderstanding of implementation process)
Since we're at developing strategy, you can’t forget to plan your implementation process. I hope you know that implementation is a process. You know, don’t you? If not, you’ve almost made the mistake I’m about to talk about next.
Marketing Automation systems are often presented as magic solutions for your Marketing problems which will guarantee a business success. Rather than a magic wand, marketing automation is a technology that has to be properly implemented just like any tech. The implementation is a process that should start with adequate planning - defining a goal and its scope.
For example, if you want to increase the value of a cart, you can use product recommendations; if you want to improve the conversion rate, you can switch on abandoned cart automation; if you want to increase customer satisfaction, then you have to start measuring it with a NPS method and then with onboarding and educational actions boost customer experience of your customers.
(desire to implement a lot of tools at the same time)
Moving on to the next most common mistake, let me ask you: have you ever tried eating a whole elephant at once? You might laugh, but Desmond Tutu once said: “there is only one way to eat an elephant - a single bite at a time”. Consider Marketing Automation implementation as this metaphorical elephant.
Marketing Automation gives a lot of opportunities, which can come as a blessing or a curse. Write down your main goals into separate scenarios. The scenarios which are the least problematic to realize, which means: the ones that not only need the least development or other resources but also can bring measurably the biggest profits, should be refined and implemented first.
If, right after a technical integration of a Marketing Automation system, you will try to automate too many different processes and use many different communication channels, the risk of failure is very high.
Let’s assume that you nailed it: you didn’t fall into any of the pitfalls, the system is implemented, scenarios work and automations achieve set goals, SUCCESS!
(lack of optimization)
Implementation of automation paths doesn’t guarantee that magically you will gain thousands of new Customers and you will get a return on investment that exceeds the cost of implementation of a tool.
After creating automation paths, don’t forget to test them and check if all the content items are optimally configured and if you can possibly have more use of them: A/B content tests, experimenting with different timings, or dividing particular scenarios into those with slightly different content that matches more with user segments.
The work doesn’t end with the activation of specific automation paths - even more important is the path analysis, development, and even optimization. If you only set it and forget it, chances are that it will only harm you.
Why? I am sure that more than once, after visiting an online store, you were attacked with countless pop-ups or sequences of emails sent in short intervals right after leaving the website. Automations can overlap and without optimization of the whole puzzle, you will not create an amazing customer experience. If you experienced such a situation yourself, then you know how wrong implementation of Marketing Automation looks.
(wrong idea of personalization)
That leads us to the next mistake you may make: a wrong idea of personalization and automation. To start off, let’s make one thing clear: “Hi (name)!” is not personalization. According to Pure 360 (three houndred sixty), 92% (ninety two percent) of Customers won’t get in touch with a company whose only use of personalization is addressing customers by their name.
You shouldn’t consider automation as technology doing repetitive tasks so more of them can be done at the same time.
Efficient and smart approach to personalization and automation of Marketing campaigns often means more attention to content and format of the messages, and kind of interaction between user and application, or website.
(overestimating automation functionalities)
The last mistake, a trap you can fall into, is thinking that automation can do everything for you. Automation tools (even the most powerful ones) can’t do anything without a qualified person behind the wheel.
And that’s all the mistakes that you can make. Let me know in the comments if you happened to fall into any of those traps. Or maybe you run into different obstacles while trying to implement Marketing Automation? I will gladly hear about them and maybe I will suggest some solutions. You’re welcome to discuss in the comments!
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