Tag Archive for: Marketing Automation

Lead Liaison

Small Business Marketing Automation and Why You Should Get Involved

/0 Comments/in , /by

Small Business Marketing AutomationDoing small business marketing isn’t easy, and for businesses on a budget it might never seem like the right time to invest in marketing automation tools. The truth is, a user-friendly and fully managed automated marketing platform can make a huge difference in the way small businesses operate from top to bottom.

Small Business Marketing and Marketing Automation

There are so many reasons to integrate your marketing efforts. Many small business owners feel like this type of integration is mostly reserved for medium-sized to large businesses because they don’t truly understand the time management/time saving techniques that are a part of a good marketing automation dashboard.

Time management is absolutely critical for small businesses. Business owners who can’t spend a lot of money on resources may find that using their marketing automation dashboard in the right way will give them the same kind of insight a part-time marketing expert would. Marketing automation tools empower small businesses to use their marketing in the most effective way.

Direct management of leads, cost data across all marketing platforms, and key insight that can result in more accurate marketing plans are all small business marketing goals that can be realized with a good marketing automation dashboard. Rather than calling in a marketing expert to do the work and report, small business CEOs can send tasks to their sales teams and beef up marketing efforts based on the reporting data they’re seeing from marketing automation.

Cost Savings

Small business marketing requires an investment. The right marketing automation tools actually cut down on that investment for small business owners because they have all their data tools in one place. Marketing efforts and ROI data come seamlessly without the need to hire a specialist for analysis and reporting. Many marketing automation dashboards also include email marketing tools that may cost extra if you use a service outside the dashboard.

Getting the intelligence data that shows how potential customers are using your marketing materials can result in more sales over time. Marketing automation can change the way a business executes marketing efforts, resulting in more sales – particularly for business owners interested in small business marketing who don’t’ have an advertising background. With the right marketing automation tools, small business marketing can be a snap for cost and time-conscious CEOs.

Lead Liaison’s suite of marketing automation tools can help your business rise to new heights with your small business marketing. For more information, contact us today!

Lead Liaison

Why Marketing Automation is an Advantage

/0 Comments/in /by

Why Marketing Automation is Actually an AdvantageThere has been considerable debate whether or not marketing automation is actually a disadvantage, since it automates such a crucial part of the customer experience. Many old-school marketers question the ability to really connect with customers using an automated computer software program. What these uninformed marketers don’t realize is that it takes a real person to make marketing automation successful. Here’s why marketing automation is an advantage.

Marketing Automation Success Requires Real People

Investing in marketing automation does not mean that you are putting the success of your future sales in the hands of a machine. It takes a skilled marketer with extensive business experience to run the software program effectively. They need to understand the typical consumer and know how to convince them to believe in your brand.

Marketing Automation is Run by Marketing Specialists

A real person (or a team of marketing professionals) will be necessary to establish the behavioral and demographic criteria that will be used for ranking and qualifying leads that are captured by the software. Businesses will also need to invest in a talented creative writer that is able to produce compelling lead nurturing content. A computer program cannot generate content worthy enough for your leads.

The Final Sale still relies on Your Sales Team

The final sales conversion is also done by a real person. Once a lead has shown significant potential, the sales staff will be notified by text or email, so they can contact the lead and complete the transaction. This is an incredible advantage of marketing automation, since your sales team will only be pursuing pre-qualified leads and customers will still have the advantage of dealing with a live person when they are ready to make their purchase.

Other Advantages of Marketing Automation

The automated aspect of marketing automation has its own merits. It does streamline the lead profiling process and make it significantly easier to gather new leads. In my opinion, it has the perfect combination of personalization and automation.

Marketing automation is actually an advantage that can strengthen customer relations because it is controlled by real people. Although an automated program simplifies the lead gathering and visitor tracking portion, it still takes real people to make it successful. You can find further of evidence of the actually advantages behind marketing automation by reading this great article I found on Marketing Automation.

Get a 10-minute demo on how social post automation can boost your campaign effectiveness.

Get your marketing automation demo here

10-Minute Demo

 

 

Lead Liaison

Using Marketing Automation for Transparent Campaigns

/0 Comments/in , , , /by

Using Marketing Automation for Transparent CampaignsMarketing automation can positively affect a company’s bottom line by creating much-needed links between investment and ROI. For CEOs, it’s more important than ever to get confirmation that marketing efforts are paying off for the company. Without the proper web tracking methodology and assets in place that calculate return on investment, marketers and their CEOs are left without a clue as to whether or not marketing budgets are really worth it. Make sure to use marketing automation for transparent campaigns.

MarketingWeek magazine recently took on the issue of how much CEOs truly trust their marketers – a dubious question that undoubtedly causes stress for both CEOs and marketing teams. You can read the article (and the very relevant and insightful comments) at  http://www.marketingweek.co.uk.

To summarize, the article suggests that 70% of CEOs surveyed earlier this summer in a project by Fournaise Marketing Group expressed a complete lack of trust in their marketing team’s ability to generate a positive ROI through their efforts. This begs the question – do these surveyed CEOs have a point, and is their dissatisfaction indicative of industry-wide views of marketers?

How Marketing Automation Makes the Difference

Accountability is the determining factor in whether a relationship between company executives and marketers is transparent enough to survive. Without some sort of measure of accountability, CEOs have no idea what their marketing teams are doing and whether the money spent results in any kind of return over the long term.

Tracking metrics is what defines that level of accountability. With solid numbers in place, even CEOs who micro-manage advertising campaigns won’t be able to deny the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of their ideas. With marketing automation, a solid set of tools that track advertising campaigns across platforms provides metrics that can’t be ignored. When CEOs and marketing teams have access to these metrics and use them to make marketing decisions, transparency is a sure thing.

Developing the Right Relationships

One of the more interesting comments on the MarketingWeek article states that if CEOs want to see the true impact marketing has on their bottom line, they should turn their marketing efforts off for a while and see what happens. We can all likely imagine that scenario and predict the outcome.

Varying factors contribute to the trust CEOs have for their marketing departments, but transparency will always be one of those key factors. Using marketing automation tools like Lead Liaison to provide transparency in cross-platform marketing efforts can make more difference than you think. Not only does the right marketing automation company save money – it can repair a spotty relationship between departments.

Visit Lead Liaison today to find out how transparent your marketing efforts can be!

Lead Liaison

6 Myths about Marketing Automation

/0 Comments/in /by

6 Myths About Marketing AutomationAs companies learn more about marketing automation, the B2B community is abuzz about whether marketing automation is useful, effective, etc. We’re here to dispel a few myths that are out there with 6 myths about marketing automation.

1)  Marketing Automation  Doesn’t Provide Results

Check out these statistics (sources):

  • Prospects nurtured through MA generate 451% increase in qualified leads (The Annuitas Group)
  • Companies automating lead gen see 10% more revenue within 6-9 months (Gartner Research)
  • Relevant emails delivered through MA drive 18x more revenue than email blasts (Jupiter Research)
  • MA provides 70% shorter sales cycles; 54% improvement in sales quota achievement (Bulldog Solutions)
  • 150% increase in contact-to-lead conversion rate (SHIPSERV)
  • 47% higher average order value (Aberdeen Group)

2) Marketing Automation Is Simply A Drip Marketing Campaign

MA offers ever-increasing ways to deploy and/or leverage digital marketing assets. While email campaigns remain a vital component to marketing automation systems, marketers can also automate social engagement, deliver surveys, create and deploy landing pages, and maximize SEM efforts.

3) Marketing Automation Is Difficult To Implement

While implementation of some platforms may be complicated, several systems exist that are user-friendly and intuitive. Most MA vendors provide training and some platforms have robust help files. In some cases, companies elect to focus on using one or two features at the start then phase in additional components once staff has become comfortable with the system.

4) Marketing Automation Is Impersonal

Many MA platforms allow users to create personalized messaging through database segmentation. The efficiency that results from automating delivery does not reduce the capacity to create a campaign where leads are engaged personally. Business intelligence can be used to tailor event-triggered responses (like an email click-through) that deliver messages that address specific lead concerns.

5) Marketing Automation Is Expensive

More statistics:

  • Creative production costs are 15% lower using marketing automation (Gartner Research)
  • Event-triggered response through MA can save 80% on direct mail budget (Gartner Research)
  • Decrease in cost-per-lead from $195 to $130 (Marketo)
  • Companies that excel at lead nurturing through MA generate 50% more leads at 33% lower cost-per-lead (Marketo, Forrester Research, CSO Insights

6) Marketing Automation Lacks Creativity

As one expert puts it “actually, the opposite is true”. Because repetitive tasks, such as scheduling message delivery or data entry, can be streamlined, marketers can focus on creative practices like landing page design, social post creation, and other creative tasks. In fact, with database segmentation capabilities within MA, there is as much a need for creative design than ever before!

Lead Liaison

How to convert more B2B leads into customers? Marketing Automation!

/0 Comments/in , , /by

How to convert more B2B leads into customers? Marketing Automation!As the post title implies, our answer to the eternal sales question “how do we convert more leads into customers?” is to deploy marketing automation. Is that the only answer? No. But with the amount of data available today, marketing automation will do more to improve your B2B lead conversion rates than social media, PPC, or stale drip campaigns.

It’s quickly becoming apparent that marketing automation can play a significant role in improving your lead conversion ratio. From first touch (initial point of contact) to pass through (migration to CRM), lead conversion for companies in most industries is improving thanks to MA. The first step towards higher B2B close rates is to manage your leads effectively before they are sent to your sales team.

To begin, you should know your customers well. Who are they? What do they like? What do they do? Why do they buy? Much of this information is now available digitally, the key is to leverage the information you collect into effective lead management.

Lead Generation

An often overlooked concept about lead generation is that it should be approached holistically not unilaterally. When you need to convert more B2B leads into customers look to strengthen lead generation efforts. Lead gen starts with first touch, escalates through lead tracking, and winds up with capture. If you’re not focusing on developing good content for your touch points, tracking your website visitors using business intelligence integration, and capturing contact information through digital assets, you’re not effectively generating leads – and you can’t convert leads you don’t have. Make sure your lead gen scope is broader than list buys and PPC campaigns.

Lead Nurturing

Many think lead nurturing equals email drip campaigns. Though partly true, lead nurturing is so much more. Lead conversion through the nurturing process requires that you develop the relationship through escalating engagements. Simply sending the occasional “hi-how-are-you?” note won’t be sufficient to move your leads through the marketing pipeline. Build a campaign that offers more at advanced buying cycle stages: a webinar invite, a product demo. Remember, nurture means “to grow”.

Lead Scoring

There’s nothing worse for a sales agent than to receive a lead that turns out to be a graduate student completing his thesis. MA platforms provide lead scoring and grading capabilities that should allow you to sharpen the sales team’s focus towards the most suitable, marketing-qualified leads. Establish specific criteria that can be scored or graded. Most leading systems grade explicit lead attributes (industry, company size) and score implicit behaviors (webpage visit, webinar registration). Once a scoring matrix has been created, determine a scoring threshold that automatically migrates the lead to your CRM.

Lead Distribution

Lead distribution must be optimized to channel leads appropriately to your sales force. Which sales agents are available to respond quickly? Which agents have high close rates? Which agents know the lead’s industry best? Automated systems distribute leads using parameters that can maximize your sales team’s efficiency. Some MA platforms allow you to assign lead ownership according to predefined criteria, such as geography or seniority. Leads distributed effectively will shorten your average sales cycle and improve sales close rates.

Keep in mind that marketing automation is a tool that will improve sales conversions and help convert more B2B leads into customers. Though MA platforms have improved sales outcomes, much of the success that comes from lead management is dependent on the content you provide. If you don’t have strong creative minds to develop messaging in-house, consider outsourcing.

Lead Liaison

Marketing Automation Offers Real-time Visitor Tracking

/0 Comments/in , , /by

Marketing Automation Offers Real-time Visitor TrackingModern businesses need marketing automation to record and monitor who is on their website and how they are behaving. It is estimated that 70% of people begin their purchasing process online and visitor tracking is essential for capturing these leads. Websites that are not equipped with real-time visitor tracking capabilities can miss out on up to 95% of these potential consumers.

Real-time Visitor Tracking

High-quality marketing automation software will also be able to monitor their behavior while they are still active. Potential customers are online searching for answers and it will improve the chance of conversion if marketers and sales professionals can provide them with an immediate and helpful response.

Creates an Accurate Profile in Real-time

Marketing automation generates a detailed profile of every lead’s interests and needs. It follows leads along their buying journey and uses pop-up registries to obtain useful demographic information. Website visitor tracking can tell you who is on your site, their location, purchasing history, employment background, and which pages they are reading.

All of these details can be matched to characteristics of current clients to determine their likelihood of conversion. Marketing automation is the fastest way to develop a lead profile in real-time, so the sales team can quickly decide whether that visitor is worth pursuing.

Keep Better Track of Favorites

Marketing automation uses lead scoring to determine which leads have the highest potential. Leads are ranked based on similarities to existing clients and then prioritized. Once these potential customers are identified, they can be marked as “Favorites.”

The majority of reputable marketing automation companies, like Lead Liaison, will send instant updates via text messaging or email when a “Favorite” goes online. This will offer sales the ability to immediately connect with qualified leads in real-time.

Provides the Opportunity for Live Conversions

Many websites that use marketing automation and visitor tracking have installed a helpful chat feature where they can conduct live conversations with leads as they are actively researching their options. When the person is online browsing your site, a little box will appear in the corner asking if they need any assistance. This offers the ability for open dialogue and live conversions.

Marketing automation offers online businesses real-time visitor tracking. It allows you to quickly generate a profile on each lead, determine their potential, connect with favorites while they are online, and it provides the opportunity for live conversions. This level of concern and service is what modern consumers expect.

Lead Liaison

When Marketing Automation Won’t Work

/0 Comments/in , , /by

When Marketing Automation Won't WorkLead generation. Lead nurturing. Sales pipeline management. These are all benefits of implementing a marketing automation system for lead management purposes. But the grass is not always greener if your company is not prepared to fully leverage the strength of a marketing automation platform. Though marketing automation has proven over the past five years to be an effective tool at shortening buying cycles, providing more qualified leads, and improving sales conversions, investing in marketing automation does not always provide the returns managers expect. It’s important to understand when marketing automation won’t work. There are a few reasons for this:

Don’t Have a Long-Term View

In the “every-minute-counts” world that digital connectivity provides, it is important to remember that marketing is a long-term endeavor. That said, companies that are looking for an immediate fix of poor marketing results through a marketing automation platform may be disappointed. Marketing automation is intended to reduce marketing costs and increase results – over the mid to long-term. Successful implementation takes patience, despite the statistics that show shortened buying cycles.

Don’t Have a Marketing Strategy

Integrating a marketing automation platform will not be effective if your company has not invested time into marketing strategy development. While an marketing automation system may provide decent lead generation capabilities with little planning, the broader functionality that makes an marketing automation system effective requires  thoughtful analysis of what messages you want to deliver to prospects over time, when and how leads will be distributed to your salespeople, and what metrics will be used to evaluate performance. Without careful strategic planning a marketing automation platform will often provide limited effectiveness.

Don’t Have an Evaluation Process

Most marketing automation platforms provide analytics for evaluation purposes. The key to an effective marketing automation integration is having the ability to analyze results and make modifications to your marketing strategy. Not every message will resonate with your leads, and developing effective lead generation and nurturing tactics requires adjustments. Your marketing model should not be cast in stone. Therefore, companies without an adequate campaign evaluation process may find that marketing automation is not beneficial.

Don’t have a Qualified Database

Marketers that start out by injecting unqualified leads into a marketing automation system will likely struggle to see a healthy ROI. Although one of the primary functions of an marketing automation system is lead generation and nurturing into sales-ready prospects, the initial integration phase will present poor results if your database is filled with one-off contacts and stale lists.

Marketing automation has been shown* to

  • Increase qualified leads by 451%
  • Generate 50% more sales-ready leads
  • Nurture leads at 33% lower cost
  • Increase conversion rates by 50%

While marketing automation has been shown to drive revenue faster and manage leads more effectively, this tool is not suited for every company at every stage of the business life cycle. The most effective use of the Lead Management automation platform has been shown by companies with revenues over $5 million. If you’re interested in exploring an marketing automation system for your company, be sure to first determine if your company is prepared to take full advantage of this powerful tool.

Reference: http://www.slideshare.net/McRaeandCompany/four-b2b-marketing-issues-marketing-automation-can-solve-14232631

Lead Liaison

6 Ways to Retain B to B Customers Using Marketing Automation

/0 Comments/in , , /by

Retain B to B customers using marketing automationThere are many ways to retain B to B customers using marketing automation – let us tell you 6 key ways to do so. With Marketo raising $85 million and Silverpop raising $25 million recently, the marketing world is abuzz about the awesome potential of B to B marketing automation for lead generation and management practices. More prospects are being targeted and nurtured using a marketing automation (MA) platform than ever before, but did you know that MA can be just as effective at retaining your existing customers? It’s important to remember that customers should be managed as leads at all times; B to B buyers can migrate to competitors at any time. Here are a few ways you can maximize customer retention through marketing automation:

“Typically, much of our effort is focused on filling top of the funnel, but seldom do we make time to plug any leaks we may have in the sides.  If we’re serious about maximizing customer lifetime value, however, we’ve got to find room in our strategy to prioritize retention as well as acquisition.” – Andy Worobel, Eloqua

1) As a purchase follow-up tool. Customers want to feel like they are cared about after a sale. Using a marketing automation platform like our Lead Management Automation™ solution, your sales team can schedule email messages to routinely “check in” with customers to inquire about satisfaction, provide tips and tricks, uncover issues that must be addressed, or provide product updates. A follow up process is a great way to retain B to B customers using marketing automation.

2) As an up-sell/cross-sell tool. Sales agents know that it is often easier to sell add-ons to existing customers than it is to solicit new business. A marketing automation platform can be an effective mechanism at driving ancillary sales. Through a sustained campaign of sharing special offers and other purchase opportunities delivered by an MA system, your sales team can be more effective at revenue generation.

3) As a time-sensitive reminder tool. An MA platform allows your sales team to deliver reminders about deadline-driven offers without the need to personally contact each customer. Special offer reminders delivered occasionally throughout the offer period can be a great way to stimulate interest and generate revenue.

4) As a customer engagement tool. Even with a protracted sales cycle where your sales team spends months building a relationship with their prospects, there are likely still hidden needs or wants that a customer might have. A marketing automation platform provides cost-effective yet powerful way to engage in an ongoing dialogue with customers without your sales agents spending valuable time performing outreach activities. Creating dialogue and interactive discussion with customers is a great way to retain B to B customers using marketing automation.

5) As a “Happy Birthday” tool. Users can automatically deliver holiday or special occasion greetings to customers following a purchase. Once a sale is complete, your sales agent can immediately schedule brief messages to be delivered throughout the year. This tactic will drive top-of-mind-awareness (TOMA) by maintaining a consistent contact process and recognizing your customers.

6) As a customer appreciation tool. Customers often want to sense that your company appreciates their business. While a sincere expression of gratitude is important at the time a sale closes, occasional expressions of gratitude months or even years after a sale can be effective at maintaining TOMA.

Lead Liaison

Telappliant Improves Lead Distribution Capabilities Through Lead Liaison’s Marketing Automation Platform

/0 Comments/in /by

Telappliant Selects Lead Liaison for Lead Distribution and Marketing AutomationAllen, TX (PRWEB) June 1, 2013 – Telappliant, one of the United Kingdom’s first Internet telephony providers, has improved its lead distribution process by selecting Lead Liaison as its marketing automation vendor. Telappliant was a founding member of the Internet Telephony Service Provider Association and was one of the first VoIP providers in the UK. Among its customers are BBC, Vibrant Media, and WorldPay.

As a leader in VoIP deployment in the UK SME market, Telappliant has been delivering telephony solutions for over a decade and has built an impressive database of sales leads. Prior to selecting the Lead Management Automation (LMA) platform primarily for its superior lead distribution capabilities, Telappliant’s marketing team manually distributed leads to its sales team.

According to marketing manager Tommy Powell,

“The process was time-consuming in terms of human resources. Often we would spend at least one hour per day distributing leads generated through online forms and landing pages, more when we were running major marketing campaigns. Leads were checked and distributed several times per day and pushed through Salesforce.com. (This was) inefficient, as there were often delays between leads arriving and being distributed.”

Powell also noted that Telappliant’s previous lead management process provided “no way to automatically redistribute a lead if it was not…properly worked by a particular salesperson.” Through an integration between Lead Liaison’s LMA platform and Salesforce.com’s CRM each lead is now distributed through an automated lead distribution process which includes a series of filters that ensure the lead is sent to the salesperson most likely to convert it based upon available capacity and strongest recent track record of closing similar leads. Leads are automatically redistributed if not worked in a timely manner. Round robin distribution, the “Hopper” and lead distribution analytics further complement Lead Liaison lead distribution capabilities.

Since adopting the Lead Management Automation platform for its lead distribution capabilities, Telappliant has seen a “marked improvement” in percentage of leads closed and a reduction in the average lead cycle. These improvements have led to increased revenue generation and a more efficient sales team.

Powell is excited about leveraging more of the software’s functionality. “We intend to gradually roll out additional functionality, starting with lead scoring/grading and lead nurturing. I expect this to work just as well as (the) lead distribution (function) has for us.”

Powell was quick to note that one of the primary criteria for selecting Lead Liaison as its marketing automation vendor was the “incredible level of customer service and support that we have received from the team at Lead Liaison. I can honestly say that the level, speed, and quality of service has been second to none.”

For more information about Lead Liaison’s marketing automation products or its support services contact Lead Liaison at 888 895 3237 or sales(at)leadliaison(dot)com.

****

Lead Liaison is an application development company that designs, develops, and sells cloud-based marketing and sales automation software. The company markets to small and medium-sized businesses worldwide, and focuses on creating the broadest and most user-friendly revenue generation software platform. Applications cover all phases of lead management automation including sales prospecting, lead generation, and marketing automation functions that directly influence revenue generation. Its innovative and robust lead management platform combines unparalleled sales prospecting, lead capture, real-time lead tracking, lead qualification, lead distribution, database segmentation, lead nurturing and ROI reporting. The Software as a Service (SaaS) model delivers an effective user experience and integrated cloud computing capabilities.

For More Information:

Alex Brown
VP, Corporate Communications
abrown(at)leadliaison(dot)com
888.895.3237 (888 89 LEADS)

Lead Liaison

How Marketing Automation Makes B2B Marketing More Efficient

/0 Comments/in /by

Marketing Automation Makes B2B Marketing More EfficientThe world of business has become increasingly competitive due to the vast reach of the internet. Companies can now easily conduct business online from anywhere in the world. They can work with any vendorthey choose and receive almost the identical products or services as they would locally. No company is too small to be exempt from global competition.

B2B providers need an advantage to stand out from every other supplier if they expect to convert online traffic into sales. Marketing automation is that advantage. It is an automated system that efficiently streamlines the entire marketing process, so companies can create stronger relationships with B2B buyers faster.

Automated & Efficient Lead Generation

Marketing automation makes B2B marketing more efficient by tracking every contact on a business’ website and automatically recording all of their online activity. It starts at the very beginning of the B2B purchaser’s buying process when they are still researching their options. It evaluates the pages they are clicking on and the information they are gathering to determine what they need to know and what they are interested in buying.This is valuable information that can be used to direct a lead towards additional information about a specific product or service.

Determines Leads with the Greatest Potential

Marketing automation is used to screen and segment leads based on their demographic characteristics and online behavior. It compares each lead against a typical B2B buyer and ranks their activity based on relevancy. For example, if a lead is a senior buyer with a lengthy history with their company, there would have a greater ranking than a new junior buyer. Once the potential of each lead is assessed they are grouped into similar segments based on their profile. Lead segment groups will make it easier to create more personalized lead nurturing campaigns.

Encourages B2B Leads to Share Information

Marketing automation uses online registries as barriers to encourage leads to share vital information. A quick pop up questionnaire appears prior to revealing pertinent content, so it can extract details about a lead to determine theirbackground and purchasing authority. Anytime a lead wants to download relevant and informative content, they are first required to share a bit about themselves. If the B2B lead needs that article or tutorial to help with their decision, they will willingly supply the necessary contact information to obtain it.

Marketing Automation Focus on Quality Content

Today’s B2B buyers are smart. They have higher expectations and want businesses that are willing to offer support and guidance prior to the sale. Marketers will have greater insight into what a lead needs because marketing automation profiles every lead. Various articles and tutorials can be created for each different lead segment and then sent automatically using auto-responders. Offering a lead informative content prior to a sale will help build trust and loyalty in a company.

Most computerized marketing approaches fail to connect with B2B buyers, because the entire system is automated. Marketing automation makes B2B marketing more efficient without eliminating the human element by automating the lead generation, scoring, segmenting, and nurturing process while always maintaining focus on the customer’s needs and interests.