Over the years, many areas of business have been evolving to keep up with the new advancements in automation technologies entering the market—including sales and marketing.
Today, more and more companies use marketing automation software to gather customer data, streamline sales and marketing workflows, analyse data, qualify leads, and more. If you don’t have the right automation expertise, however, you may find yourself falling into some traps that can harm your business.
Marketing automation mistakes are quite common, especially for businesses that purchase a ready-made automation solution without having the expertise to execute it and utilise its features to drive productivity.
If you’re planning on investing in marketing automation software, consider these mistakes you could potentially make if you don’t have the proper guidance you need.
Mistake #1: Trying to automate a process you don’t have
You must understand that marketing automation is just a tool. It’s only supposed to automate certain parts of your sales and marketing function.
Using high-value content to advance potential customers along the customer journey is what will help you move the needle for your marketing automation strategy.
To put it simply, your business can’t automate what you don’t have. If you don’t have the leads, they can’t be nurtured.
With the attention span of the average human decreasing, targeted content—and the right content—is what matters the most.
By avoiding sending out bulk emails and focusing on targeted segmentation, your conversion rates grow. This is why you need to keep in mind that automation is simply a tool to enhance your existing processes.
Mistake #2: Automating a bad process
Take a page from Bill Gates who said that automation amplifies the efficiency of an efficient operation and amplifies the inefficiency of an inefficient process.
Not thinking about what you’re automating and why is one of the ways businesses make critical marketing automation mistakes.
Are you automating an impromptu plan that happens on the fly? Or do you have an established system that creates, distributes, and re-uses content?
Prepare for what happens after your leads start growing. Marketing automation helps you manage new leads by providing continuous engagement as well as nurturing casual visitors into long-term paying customers.
The main takeaway here is to remember to ask yourself what you’re automating. If the process adds no value to your business or is ineffective, stay away from automation. Think about the processes that are driving your performance so that you can magnify the positive impact they’re having through automation.
Mistake #3: Using marketing automation to simply enhance email marketing
Failure to use marketing automation to its full potential is the same as purchasing a Rolex that you only wear to the hardware store on weekends. Investing in marketing automation solutions doesn’t automatically guarantee that your strategy is going to succeed.
Most companies generally use marketing automation to send out automated emails rather than using its features to get the most out of it.
Marketing automation includes customer relationship management (CRM), lead management, social media, multi-channel campaigns, and a lot more that can help you create a successful end-to-end marketing strategy.
What you need to remember is that attracting new customers is one thing, but leveraging them into becoming repeat buyers is a much better way to use your marketing budget than reaching out to an uninterested audience.
Mistake #4: Starting off too complex
Marketing automation comes with several features and while it’s important to use these features in the best way possible, it’s also important to understand that you don’t have to use everything at once.
It can be tempting to try out everything as soon as you get your automation solutions, but doing this can equate to a significant setback rather than a big win.
Starting small and with some easily implementable features could help you get much further ahead a year from now than if you were to start in a complex way.
The best path would be to select a specific audience or product that you can build your campaign around. Implement your automation strategies with the campaign and iron out the errors and improvements you need to make.
Think of it as an experiment. A way to test-drive your automation strategy. What you learn from your first campaign will give you a blueprint of how you need to improve your other campaigns.
Avoiding rookie marketing automation mistakes such as this will help you get further ahead in a short amount of time and roll your strategy out much faster across your entire business.
Our final thoughts on avoiding rookie marketing automation mistakes
Keep in mind that the strength and success of your marketing automation strategy will be in its ability to meet the demands of your audience as they advance through their customer journey.
When you have the right strategy that speaks to your core audience, you’ll be able to establish good-quality relationships with customers with the help of marketing automation.
To give your business the best opportunity to create these relationships, you need to partner with an automation expert that can guide you every step of the way. Get in touch with one of our experts today by scheduling a consultation.
Get the help you need to avoid these common pitfalls and implement an automation strategy with an upward trajectory of success.