It’s often been said that marketing managers are project managers in disguise. As they juggle multiple tasks and sometimes overlapping projects, the use of automation allows them to be on top of their game and ahead of their competitors.
Some of the key marketing processes that have been proven to provide better results through automation include:
- Lead generation
- Routine messages
- Drip campaigns
- Content research and promotion
- Social media marketing
- Analytics
This article discusses how automating key marketing processes leads to better project management. It also provides actionable tips on how to make the most of automation for each process.
- Quality lead generation
Despite advances in technology, a constant problem still plagues project managers: quality lead generation. Consumers today are inundated with so many offers from different companies across the marketplace.
The vast amount of messages they face daily has become too overwhelming, making many prospective customers wary and even indifferent to SMS and email blasts as well as constant commercial social media feeds. So how can marketing automation platforms assist in engaging consumers through lead generation programs?
Lead generation software deviates from other sources of lead generations such as networking, word-of-mouth or referrals. Its ability to strategically manage data facilitates opportunities for your sales and marketing team to spend more time connecting with prospects who are ready to buy. It also helps empower your sales team as it eliminates the guesswork of where prospects are in their sales journey.
This ensures every individual targeted for lead generation is well-profiled and addressed with a personal touch that’s tailored to their needs.
- Highly engaging drip campaigns
Despite the rise of social media, emails are still the best way to capture, engage and builda relationship with your target audience. Marketing automation enables businesses to leverage the power of emails through automated drip marketing. This contributes to an increased brand presence, higher engagement and better marketing workflow.
Automating drip emails can lead to better conversions as each email is facilitated by specific behavioral triggers, ensuring prospects are engaged with relevant content and context at the right time.
There are various types of drip campaigns your business can employ to generate higher lead engagement and better conversions including the ones below.
- Welcome emails – Depending on the quality of your communication, they can set the tone of future emails and help establish a personal relationship between your brand and your prospects.
- Educational and awareness emails – Increase opportunities for your brand to share relevant, highly personalized information with prospects and engage them along the sales funnel.
- Cart abandonment – Messages based on behavioral triggers entice prospects to change their mind and re-commence activity.
- Transactional emails – Pivotal tools in any email marketing strategy intended to increase ROI.
- Promotional emails – Timed right, these personalized messages can be the catalyst to drive a sale.
- Social media power
With so many social platforms available for both B2C and B2B companies, employing a social media strategy that can be effectively rolled across multiple platforms can be a daunting task. Its long-term benefits may be hindered by inconsistent content creation, and the amount of time it takes to create a strategic social approach.
Automation enables your project to have a bigger impact through pertinent social channels,doing it in less time and in a much more consistent manner.
Businesses challenged by both time constraints and insufficient manpower should consider the benefits of automating their social media. There are automation tools that aid in social engagement to keep content consistent and activated in a timely manner. This establishes your business with a steady presence in the desired social channels that complement your marketing strategy.
Conclusion
These three key marketing processes are just some examples of how automation can lead to better project management. Regardless of industry, marketing automation is one of the most helpful tools in assisting project managers to drive their project forward.
The incorporation of marketing automation to project management streamlines the decision-making process, improving project planning capacities while minimizing potential risks and failures.
AUTHOR BIO
TomiSaikkonen is the Vice President of Liana Technologies, Middle East. Just like youTomi is fascinated by the possibilities of digital marketing and technology. He actively seeks out ways to help businesses and organizations across industries to improve their digital marketing ROI.