by Lauren Brubaker, Demand Generation Manager, NetProspex
Congratulations! You finally settled on a killer marketing automation platform (MAP) and can’t wait to put it to work. But before you start delivering highly targeted content to buyers — measuring campaign effectiveness and receiving that much-needed pat on the back from the boss — there are several things you must do (and not do) to ensure a winning strategy. Let’s check out a few of the top dos and don’ts.
by Lauren Brubaker, Demand Generation Manager, NetProspex
Congratulations! You finally settled on a killer marketing automation platform (MAP) and can’t wait to put it to work. But before you start delivering highly targeted content to buyers — measuring campaign effectiveness and receiving that much-needed pat on the back from the boss — there are several things you must do (and not do) to ensure a winning strategy. Let’s check out a few of the top dos and don’ts.
Don’t Rely On Your System To Do All The Work
While your automation platform will take several items off your to-do list, you’re not completely off the hook. You still have to prepare engaging, timely and relevant content; so take the time to organize the information according to buyer persona and phase in their buying journey.
Create work streams that push and pull prospects through the buying journey based on their email and web behavior, and develop content that reflects a clear understanding of your targets’ habits so they are inclined to follow through with a purchase. Maybe it’s a landing page about pricing, a free trial, or a “how to solve my business problem today” eBook — whatever makes the most sense for your business should be on your top content creation to-do list. Most importantly, you’ll want to talk to your buyers to learn what matters most to them and build your content off of that insight.
Do Cleanse Your Database Regularly
We all see how many folks in our personal networks change positions or companies from our LinkedIn stream. How many of your target buyers send you a notification when they do so? Better yet, how many times have you put in less than accurate information into a web form just to get the content you want without a pesky sales call? Inaccurate or duplicate data can render your investment useless.
By relying on incorrect or outdated data, your marketing efforts will fail to reach their potential — and could even prove detrimental. You need to have a repeatable and scalable process to take back control of your data, cleansing your database regularly to ensure a smooth-running system. Remember, your marketing automation platform is only as good as the data you feed it
Don’t Leave Sales Out Of The Equation
You’re not the only one who can benefit from marketing automation. Sales reps can use the platform to gather helpful lead intelligence, so don’t be scared to bring them into the process. While they may be resistant at first, they will undoubtedly appreciate the visibility automation provides. Before leads start flowing, make sure you have a common understanding of what makes up a qualified lead and how that is converted from lead to revenue in the Salesforce automation or CRM tool that your company uses. Come to an agreement with the sales team on service level agreements for how leads will be followed up and tracked to show return on investment. Provide a mechanism, either in person or through your tools, for the sales team to provide their feedback on the quality and/or quantity of leads being passed over.
You should also look for common patterns in what is converting (and what is not) to refine your targeting and segmentation strategy — and lead scoring model —to let more of the good in and to remove the bad. Change is never easy, so whenever possible, take the time to create some cheat sheets on how leads flow and what fields are utilized to share key information with the sales team. Make it a priority to walk the sales floor when your marketing automation first rolls out to answer any questions and offer insight into how to make the system easier to use and how to identify workflow refinements.
Do Use Marketing Automation To Improve Targeting And Segmentation
Take advantage of all the juicy behavioral data gathered by your platform to better segment buyers and create more targeted campaigns. Chances are that it’s one of the main reasons you invested in the technology in the first place. Start by building standard queries for each of your target buyer personas, then further segment by industry if you have some great vertical content to share. Go deeper as time goes by and you’ll learn more about the folks in your database so that you can then segment by behavior. Treat frequent web visitors differently than those who only pop up once in a while, and create a query for those folks who are truly engaged to build a communication flow just for them. You can also use progressive profiling and data enrichment.
Don’t Set Yourself Up For Failure
While it’s important to set measurable goals, don’t make them unrealistic. Remember: It takes time before you can see actual results. Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Lauren Brubaker is Demand Generation Manager for NetProspex. Lauren is a high-performance marketing professional with extensive experience in using marketing automation platforms, developing behavior-based campaigns, persona-based marketing, and Sirius Decision waterfall methodology. She has a successful track record of creating demand generation campaigns and implementing email marketing best practices.
