Think of Marketing Automation as a “Machine”

“Marketing automation is about taking a lot of communication that previously happened on a phone, and building that capability into a digital medium, into the work flow across all stages of the process.”

Bob House, Head of Worldwide Marketing Automation at ezMarketing

Comparing marketing automation and analytics, perhaps one of the most common statements that arise is that marketing automation is magic. Taking a leap of faith and believing that what you’re seeing is true, the following discussion provides a good analogy of what marketing automation does for the larger purposes of marketing.

The first part of the conversation has to do with machines: when we think of computers, we think of the capabilities of a hard drive or a storage unit. Machines get things done, and they use a lot of our time and cost a lot of money to get things done. Marketing automation is about taking a lot of communication that previously happened on a phone, and building that capability into a digital medium, into the work flow across all stages of the process.

Marketing automation is not just about being able to change the wording of an email or a landing page. It is also about thinking through analytics of your entire database of assets, including never-before-seen assets, as well as properties in your database that you’ve never opened yet. This is also about taking all the investment and effort that went into the build and testing of this inventory and using it to figure out the best way to deliver your message and convert traffic into customers.

Compare this to any other business or process that you think about: having your business run off of Google Analytics or Salesforce’s big data repository makes you quickly realize how much time that investment takes to achieve.

“Every marketer out there has to focus on what their customers need, what they love and want, and the processes through which they want to have an experience with those things.”

However, as much as marketing automation focuses on customer relationship management (CRM), this is only one of its many value-added services. Marketers at heart, and every marketer out there, have to focus on what their customers need, what they love and want, and the processes through which they want to have an experience with those things. Marketers have to create the building blocks for building relationships and sharing those building blocks with their customers, not just following leads and revenue. As many marketers know, using marketing automation to create marketing automation is not enough.

“It’s also a challenge with marketers who haven’t gotten into the business like automation. For a long time, automation wasn’t a part of their thinking process. … So, we have to start thinking about it differently.”

– Nicole Tomten, Chief Technology Officer at alphik

When marketers ask why does my marketing automation platform offer more reporting than reporting on my SEO? When they ask why does the dashboard go blank all the time?

As human beings, our relationship with marketing automation really starts at scale. Starting with the smallest clients, scaling into larger clients, then into the C suite and all the way into the VP. As marketers scale, marketing automation becomes a bigger piece of their spending pie. As marketers begin to find ways to increase the efficiency of their campaigns, the leverage they start to get, and the cost savings they start to realize, the value becomes bigger and bigger.

Content Engine Content Marketing

Content Marketing World 2019: Best Use of Blog, Facebook, Twitter

Read here to learn how to achieve an industry-centered strategy that gets the most out of your content marketing spend. In this way, content marketing becomes a case of knowing where the opportunity is and are you going to give it to the public. In the world of digital marketing, where speaking the language of the crowds has become an almost essential skill, getting noticed as a content creator isn’t always easy. With those Community Managers engaged on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Reddit – they can spread the word on Google: and that sounds like a pretty big advantage. As much as we would like to think that a strong buy-now strategy will push us to purchase in the moment, the reality is that it won’t. Instead, you can segment your broader userbase with the right messages and offer a discount only for C2 customers, for example, a discount or a purchase promotion that only reaches the most likely buyers.When you combine lead scoring and personas with data analytics, buying intent should be kept simple. It is only part of a larger buying scheme, which consists of your most valuable content, offers, and marketing campaign data. When you collect the correct data, you can show the audience in the correct manner the content and offers they want to see in the relevant channels, at the right time. Unless you are a creative production company that actually spends their time creating things from scratch, writing and delivering a few thousand words of content for publication every day, you are likely to have a manageable percentage of publishable content on your blog or webpage. Not only is this the evidence in front of you, but also in front of the customers (who generally like to read content that is relevant to them and works for them). Marketers that value their branding and reputation will invest time in producing specific content for specific audiences, places, and occasions. As marketing transformation takes off, these are the types of things you will see getting organized – a stream of content, so to speak. When you have a lot of content and focus on producing compelling content, you will be able to reach the right audience in the right place at the right time, when they are ready to buy. And here’s the thing – the content marketers who are prepared to master the art of testing, and learn how to listen to their audiences, can earn some pretty big advantages in terms of their bottom line. Content Marketing World is an opportunity for you to stay up-to-date and learn new things, and to run towards the opportunities that will keep your website updated with high-quality, relevant content that will keep people coming back.

Content Engine

Jan 23
5 mins read

Content Engine Content Marketing

Digital Advertising Agency Kyobri Releases Data Driven Media Report

Global digital advertising agency, Kyobri, recently published a report that discusses the Content Marketing Service Industry, and helps guide a better understanding on what the future holds. The Data Driven Media Report was developed by Kevin Motts, Director of Competitive Intelligence at Kyobri, working with the analytics team led by Ariel Wilkerson, in collaboration with external editors from Kyobri and Deloitte. “Marketers need to consider this higher investment in content marketing services as one of the different ways to allocate marketing budgets. The data generated by content marketing services also helps a lot in showing the digital consumer when consumers have interest in a product, and when they don’t. By not only providing great content, but also by working with local leaders to the content itself, technology partners can expand into content services, and stand in the way of the bigger giants, such as Google. Once you have worked to understand content marketing and content marketing services, new opportunities will present themselves. This is why Co-grow with Gartner is discussing the technology uses in the content marketing space. Q&A: Motts Provides Tips on Successful Content Marketing Service Delivery Q: What are some of the biggest challenges to running content marketing services business? A: If you can find a content marketing services provider with a very engaged team, it will be easier to manage everything, including monitoring. When you sign up with a content services provider, you need to take the time to take a hard look at them and get to know them. There is another big thing that everyone in marketing knows is essential to building a company that sticks around over the long term, and it’s alignment between the people, strategy, and processes. Right now, the biggest technology I’m using is Google Analytics, which is a tool to measure the performance of a company’s efforts in multiple areas, both inside and outside the company. Although data is used to make decisions about creating content and how you will reach them, social listening and information sharing is also a key part of this: You need to know what’s happening on other channels, especially Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, so that you’re not missing out on important conversations that people are having about the organization. In marketing, it’s a lot about trying to connect to people through the various ways they are consuming information. Both inside and outside the company, technology is your gateway to delivering high quality content in a way that people want to hear. I also see a lot of companies using surveys to get a better understanding of the people working for them.

Content Engine

Jan 23
5 mins read