When does your business need marketing automation?
Marketing automation covers various facets of how you interact with your customers. Irrelevant of the size of your business or the industry you operate in, some of these problems probably sound familiar:
Disparate data sources
Data is crucial for proper targeting. However, problems typically start with access to the right kind of data: the information you need is either not recorded at all or resides in different databases, often in different parts of the business.
If you want to make data work for you, you need to be able to access it all centrally.
No tools. Or too many.
Many sections of the campaign management process can be done infinitely better with the right tools in place. Storing data, analyzing it, creating segments, orchestrating campaigns
Processes created in silos. For silos.
Campaign management processes often suffer when ownership shifts between teams. As an example, if lead generation processes are not aligned with lead conversion, capacity and follow up issues are the logical consequence, which creates leakage points.
Segmentation and targeting deficiencies
Automating communication will make it faster, but not better by definition – that only happens if clear segmentation and targeting guidelines are in place. Without sufficiently defined customer journeys indicating a series of triggers and scenarios, targeting will be random.
Missing or misaligned KPIs
Performance is driven by KPIs, and campaign management is no exception. In order to have successful campaigns, you need to define what success is. It can be something major like a completed purchase or a micro-conversion like filling in a survey, but whatever it is, if it is not tracked – ideally in real time – your ability to take action will be limited.
Organizational structure not suited to omnichannel campaigns
Marketing automation and more broadly, interaction automation can grow out of specific departments, but works better if either e2e planning or execution responsibilities (or both!) for campaigns reside within a single unit. Without this – or a channel-independent campaign management team setting targets – wide-scale, truly omnichannel adoption will be slow and painful.
IT delivery speeds out of synch with business needs
Internal IT processes typically optimized to support core systems often struggle when it comes to responding to commercial requirements quickly. Small, iterative changes necessary for running efficient campaigns have no place on traditional IT roadmaps – the more can be changed on the front end by commercial teams, the better.
Data is crucial for proper targeting. However, problems typically start with access to the right kind of data: the information you need is either not recorded at all or resides in different databases, often in different parts of the business.
If you want to make data work for you, you need to be able to access it all centrally.
Many sections of the campaign management process can be done infinitely better with the right tools in place. Storing data, analyzing it, creating segments, orchestrating campaigns
Campaign management processes often suffer when ownership shifts between teams. As an example, if lead generation processes are not aligned with lead conversion, capacity and follow up issues are the logical consequence, which creates leakage points.
Automating communication will make it faster, but not better by definition – that only happens if clear segmentation and targeting guidelines are in place. Without sufficiently defined customer journeys indicating a series of triggers and scenarios, targeting will be random.
Performance is driven by KPIs, and campaign management is no exception. In order to have successful campaigns, you need to define what success is. It can be something major like a completed purchase or a micro-conversion like filling in a survey, but whatever it is, if it is not tracked – ideally in real time – your ability to take action will be limited.
Marketing automation and more broadly, interaction automation can grow out of specific departments, but works better if either e2e planning or execution responsibilities (or both!) for campaigns reside within a single unit. Without this – or a channel-independent campaign management team setting targets – wide-scale, truly omnichannel adoption will be slow and painful.
Internal IT processes typically optimized to support core systems often struggle when it comes to responding to commercial requirements quickly. Small, iterative changes necessary for running efficient campaigns have no place on traditional IT roadmaps – the more can be changed on the front end by commercial teams, the better.
What are the tangible benefits?
The power of marketing automation can be harnessed in various ways, but the main objective is always to deliver measurable impact. Cutting edge marketing automation platforms combine a set of capabilities which typically focus on three distinct areas:
Increased revenue
Generate leads in real time and manage conversion across contact channels through a single platform, while using powerful attribution modeling for transparency in measuring commercial impact. Revenue boost can be derived from various levers ranging from improved conversion rates to higher campaign frequency.
Reduced customer churn
Customers churn for a variety of reasons, but a lack of interaction is often one of the root causes. AI powered churn prediction modeling and engagement allows you to to connect with customers at the right time with the right message to keep them on board.
Boost in customer experience
Customer profiling allows you to create elaborate micro-segments based on behavioural, transactional or demographic data and launch targeted campaigns across a broad range of contact channels. Personalized experiences delivered in this way help you stand out and boost customer experience.
How can Pattern help you make the transition?
Successful marketing automation requires more than having the right tool, though that is a good start. Our marketing automation services are tailor made to help you identify the necessary adjustments and support you along the way to deliver maximum commercial impact in a sustainable way.
Campaign management diagnostics
You know you need to improve the way you are managing customer interactions, but not sure where to start? We run diagnostics sessions based on mapping high level CRM and campaign management flows, uncovering pain points in stakeholder interviews and quantifying opportunities with internal data which we then benchmark against regional best practices.
Campaign management diagnostics
Target picture workshops
Target picture workshops
Our target picture workshops are designed to create a common vision for running better campaigns across the business and generate sufficient engagement to tackle the difficult cross-departmental task of changing the way you communicate as an organization. We like to run campaign management diagnostics before jumping into the workshops and proceed to articulate clear goals and objectives in a holistic way – covering processes, segmentation, targeting, KPIs, data management, tools, organization and compliance.
Impact modeling
Impact modeling
Introducing marketing automation can – and, in our experience – should be done step by step with a focus on ROI, but the investment needs to be justified nevertheless. We are happy to work with your team to define ramp up scenarios and build impact cases to support the internal decision making process. Additionally, we have created dozens of decision support presentation decks over the past 10-plus years and can help you develop a storyline designed to get engagement within your organization.
Customer journey development
Customer journey development
A key element of marketing automation is transitioning to contextual communication based on carefully developed customer journeys. We can co-create key customer journeys for top segments together with your team on a train-the-trainer basis, enabling you to become self-sufficient in this regard.
