This post is by another of our partners, Lindsey Pickles, Director at Bright Dials, an independent marketing automation agency based in sunny Brighton. In the post, Lindsey provides her views on why in today’s world, marketing automation isn’t enough for successful e-commerce.
So, what are you waiting for, let’s dive in!
In today’s fast-paced, hyper-connected world, businesses need to respond quickly and efficiently and one way of doing this is through marketing automation.
It’s a cost-effective way to streamline your marketing processes and drive measurable results.
But, it’s also just the tip of the iceberg.
Yes, it can help you to reduce manual tasks, to monitor performance and track ROI, but it should not be the endpoint for your eCommerce strategy.
The best way to achieve ultimate success with your business is to combine marketing automation with data.
Marketing Automation is Not Enough
Marketing automation is incredibly powerful, but it’s only as good as the people implementing and optimizing it.
It’s not a skill set that everyone has either, and some marketing automation systems such as Salesforce Marketing Cloud can be complex.
At the same time, if you try and use it to solve every problem and meet every need, you can often end up with an unmanageable system that generates more work than it solves.
This can lead to a host of problems including increased frustration from staff, lower customer satisfaction, wasted time and money, and more.
As such, having some analytical ability and the right data, alongside marketing automation, is essential for the modern marketer.
You’ll need to be able to analyse and learn from the data you have, and it’s vital to keep testing and learning in order to drive results.
Data Strategies are Essential
Data is the foundation of any business as, without it, you’re flying blind.
Accessing the right data and interpreting it to gain valuable insights can help you create a more personalized and relevant online experience for your visitors, meaning a more cohesive and efficient marketing strategy.
Marketing automation software allows you to import your customer data so it can be used across multiple channels. This means that you can deliver consistent and relevant messaging across all of your channels, like emails, website copy, social media and more.
You’ll spend less time on administrative tasks and more time generating leads and closing sales.
You can then track everything. From which campaign is bringing in the most sales, to which blog posts are resonating with your audience.
How Can Data Science Supercharge your Sales?
At Bright Dials we’re working on some exciting stuff, including how to fuse top-notch data science practice into the marketing automation work we already do.
By analysing data sets from a client’s eCommerce, analytics, campaigns and site traffic, we are able to develop bespoke data strategies.
This is a significant departure from marketing automation alone.
For example, let’s say you analyse your data and see that 12.5% of your customers are not near your stores.
If you’re only using marketing automation, you might combine this segment into campaigns to drive footfall and aren’t relevant to the user.
With data science, however, you’ll have the ability to locate this segment and drive specific offers relating to web transactions instead. You’re able to dig into the data to see what’s actually happening so that you can make more informed decisions.
Creating an Omnichannel Strategy
Combining data from your CRM, website, email, product inventory, and point of sale will allow you to unify your retail channels.
By evaluating your data and creating solid customer data segments, you can really target your marketing effectively.
The key to this approach is to test and learn; try out new segments with different campaign creatives, understand their product preferences and develop different approaches to drive your goals.
Conclusion
Marketing automation is a powerful tool, but it can be optimized further.
By combining marketing automation with data strategies and data science, you can create a more personalized and efficient omnichannel experience.
Be sure to select the right tools for your business and choose the right level of automation that will help, not hinder your efforts.
If you’re an eCommerce business looking for ways to increase your sales, book in a no-obligation call here www.brightdials.com/discovery or connect with Lindsey Pickles on LinkedIn.