What are they and why do you need them
Marketing Automation tools, also called Engagement Marketing, are more than just lead nurturing tools. They enable you to define, execute, automate and measure your marketing programs. That’s the simple answer. But what are they really, why do you need one and how do you choose the right one for your company?
Marketing automation tools are systems that help nurture leads and turn them from suspects to prospects. These tools enable you to generate, track and manage leads. They make it possible for you to provide relevant information to each of your prospects, basically enabling you to perform one-to-one marketing easily and efficiently. You can optimize lead flow, drive ROI and move your leads through your pipeline quickly. What’s that you say? “This is too good to be true!” Maybe, but here are some of the main benefits:
· Optimize marketing spend - through analysis of campaigns and programs you can start to see monetary impact
· Target and reach the right prospects - provide them information that is relevant to them, spend the right money on the right leads, e.g. don’t spend the money to send a white paper on lead gen to a developer
· Optimize lead flow – nurture and qualify leads through lead scoring and better lead management
· Develop relationships that build loyalty and increase ROI – through drip marketing and one-to-one marketing you can essentially engage your prospects on their terms, thereby increasing response rates and further qualifying them
· Access and leverage data to measure and report information which allows you to quickly assess impact and change programs as needed
· Once you have identified successful marketing approaches, programs and campaigns, you can scale up your efforts—applying them to a wider range of prospects, or begin to segment different
· Align marketing and sales – simplify lead management and lead scoring, and deliver the best leads to the salespeople, therefore shortening the sales cycle
