B2B Company? Here’s 3 Reasons You Need Marketing Automation Posted on August 27, 2015June 18, 2018 by Jonathan Herrick Are you getting enough attention to keep you sailing strong, or are you fighting against the currents without the right tools? Other businesses won’t know about your company or trust you if they don’t know you exist. You need to prove your value, show your company can be trusted and captivate interest. Companies are able to do this by marketing their products and brand to the companies they want to work with. You can improve your reach by implementing marketing automation. Here’s three reasons why: 1. A Stronger Approach Towards the Key Decision Makers Business to business marketing automation is often overlooked as a marketing tactic only for B2C companies. However, B2B companies are struggling to reach their key decision makers. Forrester Research reported that 2 out of 3 marketers say identifying key decision makers is their top challenge. Automated B2B marketing helps companies to keep content working the pipelines. Think of automated marketing like the sails on your ship. While you could manually row your boat with sales reps working round the clock, you could take a great load off with sails. Your sails, or automated marketing, offers a flow of content that snags the wind and moves the ship without as much time and effort wasted. Businesses who initially board your boat are able to move through your sales funnel smoothly, with little or no interaction from a direct sales team. When your sales team is reserved for the harder jobs and more difficult questions, your company is able to work more efficiently and accommodate more customers. 2. Marketing Automation Improves Marketing Jobs It’s important to understand that automated software makes the process of posting, emailing, tracking and reporting easier, but it does not make the marketer obsolete. The marketing professional is still needed to establish a strong, strategic and well-defined course. But marketing automation makes that job faster. Eliminating the unnecessary busywork leaves more time for brainstorming, creating and crafting content. 3. Craft More Relevant and Diverse Content Don’t get caught into a bad habit of email blasting a list of not interested contacts. You waste valuable time and burn potential leads when content is irrelevant, sloppy, unwanted or spammy. Instead: Require your entire contact list and all future contacts to opt-in to a list for receiving content and send a thank you email as soon as they sign up for content from your company Segment your lists so that different types of leads are receiving appropriate types of content (don’t send new leads the same content as loyal customers, etc.) Revisit your marketing goals and send out highly-targeted content to very select audiences – never send out generic content or blast general messages to your whole list Use resulting analytics to inform your sales team of which leads they should reach out to and what has prompted interest for that specific decision maker Continue to send content to specific contacts with intelligent marketing based on their behavior Establish customer engagement campaigns for your loyal customers to achieve higher retention rates and improve your marketing ROI (keeping loyal leads is more cost effective in the long run then solely chasing new leads) Use your marketing automation to build stronger relationships with your decision makers, individually nurturing those connections over long periods of time without spending a lot of time personally working with each lead Are you starting to see how important marketing automation is to the B2B company? So, raise your sails and stop fighting every wave the hard way. If you need more help, we would be happy to provide you with a compass to get you where you need to go.
7 Out of the Box Ways to Automate Your Small Business Operations Posted on August 26, 2015April 3, 2024 by Don Breckenridge Automation in business has become the latest buzz. If you have an automated phone system, have a shopping cart on your website or have an email that can send vacation messages, you are already participating in the business automation buzz. For years, large businesses have been using technology for marketing efforts in a variety of ways, but it has recently become more affordable for smaller businesses to adopt automation. If you own a small business, here are 7 ways you can further automate your small business operations. Automate Lead Collection and Nurturing Automated sales and marketing software is designed to collect leads from online resources like social media, your website, and incoming emails. It can also nurture those leads to eventually become customers. Small businesses have endless options when it comes to automating their lead collection. Many small business owners don’t have the time to dive deep into lead collection, so using a software that automates lead collection and nurturing is often the best solution. Automated CRM and Sales and Marketing An automatic Customer Relations Manager (CRM) will improve your sales and marketing process. It stays connected with prospects and customers, accounting for every connection. It will even let you know when a prospect has reached the buying point. This is key for small business owners. It is hard to keep track of where leads are in the sales funnel. An automated CRM and marketing tool keeps track of this for you, and sends the right material to potential customers. As long as business owners provide the content, CRM and marketing automation will take care of the rest. Recruiting There are plenty of online services and software available that can help you automate your recruiting process. Once you create a particular employment ad, your listing can be immediately posted on multiple platforms. Systems are available that allow you to sort and store online applications, keeping a database for future openings. Automating your recruiting can result in a wider reach, better applicants and is less expensive. Look for Ways to Outsource There are companies who can help you outsource just about any task. Need content for your blog? Outsource a writer. Need advertising help? Outsource it. Outsourcing may not exactly be automation, but as far as your company, it serves the same purpose. The “automation” of outsourcing saves you time and gives an expert eye into difficult tasks. Automatic Bill Pay Just like with your personal bills, many business bills can be paid automatically. Don’t confuse paying bills electronically with automatic bill pay. While paying bills electronically is certainly a form of paying your bills using “automation”, automatic bill pay takes care of the entire process without any further action needed on your part. Of course, it is important you are prepared financially for these automatic bill payments to be withdrawn from your account. To seamlessly incorporate invoice automation into your business operations, choose invoicing software that streamlines the creation and sending of invoices. Ordering Stock Large companies, especially retailers, have been automating stock orders for years. As an item is sold it is reordered and shipped, so stock remains filled. This is not only for small retailers but for any small company that uses up inventory and supplies like copy paper, ink, paper towels and other office supplies. Most suppliers can easily help you set up a way to automatically order stock. Getting started may be as simple as asking. Organizing Receipts Are you still fumbling with tracking expenses with unwieldy paper receipts? Are you, or is someone else in your company, spending unnecessary time entering data, perhaps multiple times? There are software applications that allow you to scan, sort, and store receipts and track expenses. This is not only beneficial at the office but also when tracking travel expenses on the road. Automation makes tasks in your process easier to manage, not to set and forget. It allows you to spend more time doing what you love and less on the daily minutia. Think about your process and look for areas where automation can improve your business.
Email Campaigns – Simplified! Posted on August 25, 2015June 9, 2020 by Jessica Lunk What’s a Drip Campaign? You meet someone, talk to them over the phone, complete a demonstration and follow up with a great personalized email. Things usually stop there. You don’t hear back and you don’t earn their business. Fix this with email campaigns. Drip campaigns allow you to slowly drop kernels of knowledge while staying in touch with your prospects (in a helpful, non-pushy non-salesy way). Drip campaigns allow us to educate prospects over a period of time with the hopes of converting them to customers when they are finished. Let’s say someone has visited your website and filled out a form to receive your e-book, Low Cost Ways to Get in Shape. They’ve also called you to discuss gym rates and ask if you offer group classes at your gym and opened your email follow-up containing your class schedule. What have you learned? Your client wants to work out affordably, and probably wants the motivation of others to help them reach their goals. To email blast them offering costly one on one personal training sessions is a waste of time. So what can we do to simplify the process and create our first campaign? 1) Segment your list Your email messages are not one size fits all. You need to clearly define your audience by their interests so that you can develop detailed content. Ask smarter questions and allow your prospects to segment themselves. How does someone segment themselves? They might fill out a form and check their interests, they might tell you in person, or they might continually read your blog or articles about a particular topic or service. Tag your link clicks so that you can gauge interest and sort your list very specifically. Keep a personal tone so that it seems that you are speaking uniquely to each person on the other side of that email (even if you happen to be sending out 200). 2) Organize your content Keep it short and sweet. You can provide great content, but if your prospects have to scroll through a 3 page newsletter, forget it! If you include links to additional information in your emails, you put the ball in the reader’s court to click and learn more. Don’t put it all out there on the first email. Break up your emails into easy-to-read, easy-to-follow content. If I’m considering a gym membership I don’t need a 5 page newsletter on going gluten free. Nor do I need to read about fitness physique competitors that have placed in our state. It’s all too much and the timing is off. Start by sending a nutrition tip a week or maybe add a testimonial speaking on great results from group kickboxing class. If your prospects are single, include an email highlighting singles only night at the gym. If they are married with kids, include an email with info on kids care. 3) Use what you have Don’t start from scratch, use what you have! Have a blog? Cut it down and use it for your email. Add a testimonial and let someone else sell your service for you. Find a great article online? Share that with your prospects. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel here. Some people try to create a year-long campaign with over 20 emails. Why? By the time our prospects are reading this in 6 months, this content isn’t relevant. Scale it down. Start with a 2-3 month campaign and see how it goes. Once you have created the first couple of emails, you can add content to the campaign later on. 4) Schedule and sit back Once you have your content created, sit back and let it all happen. You might have decided to email your prospects on day 1, day 14, day 35, day 60 and day 90. You’ve created enough awesome content to keep them engaged for 3 months! Cheers! If they haven’t purchased yet, have a sales person call them to check-in, maybe start a more sales-heavy campaign with discounts or coupons for the services they previously expressed interest in. Ask for feedback, give your VIP’s special offers and early access to new products. Your prospects will appreciate it, and will help you get even better for your next drip campaign. Most prospects aren’t quite ready to buy when you first connect with them. With a good email campaign, when they are ready to buy they will remember the company that did the best job of educating them.
How To Easily Scout Sales Leads For Your Small Business Posted on August 24, 2015June 3, 2016 by Jessica Lunk A constant infusion of qualified leads is the lifeblood of your business. Without the steady stream of leads, you cannot work with prospects, determine their needs and convert them into sales. However, sourcing leads can often be a problem, especially in a small business where every moment is filled with tasks including putting out fires. It is important to have a proper system in place that will continue to scout out leads for your business whether you get distracted by other matters or not. Just the knowledge that your company continues to source sales leads can lower tension. So, how do you solve this problem by putting into place a system that will build your prospect list? One answer to this issue is adopting a program that manages your lead sourcing and follow-up without hands-on attention on a constant basis. Does that mean you can ignore the process? Of course not. You will still need to pay attention to the way the system is used. But it does mean that you can free up some of your attention to details and get back to managing your company, coordinating efforts and looking forward to the future. Hatchbuck has multiple methods of improving your lead sourcing and managing the leads once you collect them. Using Hatchbuck, you will find that your ROI increases, meaning your team can work smarter, instead of harder. Better results increase confidence and establish pride in skills and abilities for your whole team. The best way to understand Hatchbuck is by getting a live demonstration. However, here is a list of the ways Hatchbuck will help you succeed. CRM and Marketing Automation With this tool, you can track and manage your sales and marketing activities in one central location. Hatchbuck will let you know when you need to perform important tasks, and alerts you to hot prospects. Build relationships with prospects and customers in a personalized manner until they are ready to buy your products or services with Hatchbuck’s email nurturing engine. All the Tools in One Place You can build customized online forms with Hatchbuck for converting visitors to your site as well as import your existing contact list to the program, eliminating a lot of your administrative time. After all, time is your most valuable resource. Easily Segment Leads You can add more personalization to your contact list through tagging and segmenting to ensure that your customers only get the valuable information that they are interested in and avoid boring them with too many emails. Track Leads Precisely Getting the right message out at the right time is a big part of the battle. Hatchbuck tracks your visitors’ behavior on your website which will trigger relevant emails to be sent as a result of their behavior. Timely Follow Up Hatchbuck will take the work out of following up with your leads, nurturing them properly with relevant messages through the entire buying process. Convert Prospects into Customers You will have help converting prospects into customers as Hatchbuck scores them for prioritizing. Hatchbuck is the ideal solution to improving your marketing success, increasing your ROI and building your customer base. If you want to grow your business more efficiently, Hatchbuck will help you get the job done.
4 Quick and Easy Tips for a Tidy CRM Posted on August 21, 2015June 20, 2018 by Lindsey Stroud Imagine… A new lead – we will call him Matt Smith – comes through a form on your website and you eagerly pick-up the phone to introduce yourself. “Hi Lindsey – Thanks for the call, but Erin on your team has already reached out and I am scheduled for a time to speak with her next week.” Your hot new lead now identifies themselves as an existing opportunity for someone else within your company. Where did you go wrong? Chances are your CRM is not working in your favor. With a poorly structured database – you can miss out on valuable opportunities, send irrelevant information, or appear lazy to your contacts. In this example, Matt Smith was entered in as a duplicate contact, and had already been in contact with another sales rep. I see this scenario roll out far too often, and I credit that to an unorganized CRM. There are many steps you can take now to ensure your team is set-up for communication success. Tidy Up Your Spreadsheets Prior to importing data into your CRM, it’s important to tidy it up as much as possible. Deleting unnecessary fields is a good starting point; consider which data is critical, and which is disposable or could create potential confusion down the road. If you are moving from one CRM to another, take note of the additional fields that systems include in your export. Often times there will be unnecessary fields that you may have used in a previous system, which would no longer apply. Create a Standard Data-Entry Process Much of bad data unfortunately stems from human-error. You can significantly cut down on the error of inputting bad data by creating a standard process for documenting new data. Within Hatchbuck, we allow for drop-down custom fields – which helps to save time and error. Drop down fields allow the admin to pre-define the options their team has, so the team can stay consistent in their selections, forgoing spelling errors and renaming. Merge Duplicate Contacts The majority of CRM systems will match based off of email address and/or full name. Whichever merging criteria you choose, it’s important to remain mindful of how incoming leads will be entered into your system, so you can avoid entering duplicates. You want your communication with your contacts and internal sales team to be rock solid, and if you have multiple people on your team contacting the same individual – things can get messy very quickly. Keep Your Process Simple Clutter often derives from a complicated process. You can keep a tidy CRM by eliminating unnecessary statuses and custom fields, and keeping tags to a minimum. A good exercise is to consider and plan with your team which pieces of data are crucial to your sales and marketing process. Everything else can be considered fluff, and should be eliminated to reduce confusion down the road. Streamlining your sales funnel and creating a well-structured process for segmenting your contacts can help to cut down on the clutter. A few small changes upfront can help create large impact over-time. Internally, we like to ensure a clean import, consistent data entry, and minimum contact fields to maintain a clean CRM. At Hatchbuck, our goal is to help you create more meaningful conversations, close more deals, and maintain more customers by providing you a well-structured and easy to use CRM.
How to Bring Your CRM and Marketing Automation Together Posted on August 20, 2015March 27, 2020 by Jessica Lunk How well do you coordinate your company’s customer relationship management (CRM) and marketing automation? Are these two related processes managed separately, or do they work together? What are the benefits of bringing these two systems together, and why should I consider doing so? These are all questions you should ask yourself when looking for ways to improve your overall marketing and sales ROI, sales funnels, and ongoing customer relationships. And let’s be honest, as marketers, those are things you’re trying to do on the daily. Bringing your CRM and marketing automation software together results in the best partnership since peanut butter and jelly. Let’s take a deep dive into why this coordination gives you a leg up and how to go about doing so. But first, let’s address the basics. What’s the Difference Between CRM and Marketing? While CRM and marketing are related, they are not the same thing. Marketing is the process by which your company invites prospects to try your products or services and raises awareness of your brand. Marketing can be divided into two main categories: Outbound Marketing – consists of traditional commercials and advertising that broadcasts your brand message to prospects. Inbound marketing is the process of creating content to attract customers to your brand by answering their questions before they are ready to buy. Inbound Marketing – focuses on starting prospects down the sales funnel by offering free information in return for a conversion with a lead magnet. While some of the methods of reaching customers during marketing campaigns are the same ones used for CRM, the focus of marketing and CRM is different. These methods may consist of email marketing, social media marketing, content marketing, PPC ads, or broadcast ads. But what is CRM, you ask? Well, CRM is how you organize your prospects’ information so you can better manage them. Specifically, your CRM software should: Enable your company to structure and plan optimal interaction with prospects and clients. Harbor and organize information on your prospects gathered from your marketing campaigns. Manage the methods and scheduling of client interactions by way of email, social media, texting, phone calls, or meetings. Allow you to determine which clients are the highest priority and how and when to approach them. Prevent prospects from slipping through the cracks and help cement your existing relationships. Now that we’ve outlined some terms and ideas let’s discuss why it’s key for your CRM software and marketing automation software to work together. Why Coordinate CRM and Marketing Automation? While the goals for marketing and CRM are different, the relationships that begin with your marketing program continue with CRM. You can learn a lot about your prospects through their responses to marketing campaigns, which can then be applied to your CRM and help you interact with them going forward. Ultimately, marketing and CRM work in partnership to build the foundation that you need to earn a customer’s trust. Also, when you bring your CRM and marketing automation together: There is less chance you will miss a prospect. Marketing automation gathers and sorts inquiries. Rather than missing an inquiry from a prospect, they can immediately be sent a relevant reply. The reply can be much more targeted than a generic “we’ll get back with you” message. You can immediately grab their attention with your responsiveness, and it can all be done automatically. There is less chance you will lose a prospect. Without automating your CRM, there is a good chance you can lose prospects along the way. They can slip through the cracks or may not be getting an appropriate follow-up. Using marketing automation keeps you in contact with prospects until they decide they are no longer a prospect or until they become a customer. It makes you more effective. Small business entrepreneurs are required to be a jack of all trades. They are the ship’s captain, but they may have to occasionally swab the deck or grab an oar. By automating your CRM, you are able to spend more of your time doing what you like to do and the things you are probably good at. It makes your company more cost-effective. All-in-one marketing software is affordable for even the smallest of companies. These are exactly the companies that need to be efficient and effective with their resources. With affordable pricing available in packages to meet the needs of any size business, marketing automation makes the most of your financial and human resources. Automation tracks your efforts. When properly used, marketing automation tracks your marketing efforts. Of course, you will still want to do A|B testing to hone in on tactics that work best for you, but automation can give you the valuable feedback you need. Automation marketing software allows you to track your marketing and helps you make more informed decisions. It provides a strategic, simpler way to turn prospects into clients. Marketing automation uses a specific strategy to turn inquiries into prospects and prospects into customers. You can even be notified when a prospect is hot and ready to buy. It delivers a consistent and repeatable process to drive more sales month after month. It helps you make the best use of all your online marketing efforts. When you integrate your CRM with marketing automation, you combine your email contacts, website visitors, and social media efforts into one manageable system. There is no need to bounce between platforms or a variety of different software programs. It can immediately help make you more competitive with larger companies. There aren’t many things you can do that will have more impact on how you compete than automating your CRM. It reins in all segments of your prospects and provides a systematic flow of prospects and clients. Your competitors may be considering doing it. One of the best reasons to automate your CRM is that your competitors may be considering it. By automating your CRM now, you will stay ahead of the competition or at least compete more effectively against them. Smart, successful companies are always in search of better ways to do things. When it comes to CRM, automation is a better way. 7 Steps to Supercharge Your CRM with Marketing Automation Here are the steps to take that will lower overhead cost, give you better metrics to track your CRM activities, and ultimately bring your marketing automation and CRM together. 1. Learn the System. Not using all the features of your cellphone isn’t a big deal (and honestly, who does?). But not learning about and using the features of your CRM and marketing automation system can cost you money in lost prospects and customers. Take the time to learn as much about your CRM and marketing automation as possible. And steer clear of CRM and marketing automation systems that are overly complex for your business needs. 2. Enter Data Consistently. No more bad CRM data. Your platforms will function only as well as the quality of the data that you enter. Reduce human error by automating as much data entry as you can. When importing bulk data from spreadsheets, make sure data is formatted correctly and that fields are correctly matched. Use drop-down fields instead of text boxes to reduce data inconsistency. 3. Make It Part of Your Daily Routine. Once you get your customer data entered, it’s important to use this valuable tool daily. Start with simple tasks like setting automation to absorb data from your online lead forms and respond with automated messages. 4. Monitor Your System. Make sure data from forms are being properly absorbed into the system and segmented the way you want it to be. Consistently monitoring your data systems will save you from catastrophic mistakes when it comes to nurturing your leads. 5. Set Up Drip Campaigns. Drip campaigns are automated emails that help with sales efforts by trickling messages to prospects, with the goal of funneling them into becoming customers. Choose a system that comes with a wide choice of attractive and professional-looking templates to help you easily create effective drip and email campaigns. 6. Monitor Reports. Each campaign you set up with marketing automation can be monitored with easy to read reports. It is here where you can fine-tune your campaigns and conduct A/B testing to improve your results. Like human salespeople, efforts should be tracked, monitored, and improved to make the most of your assets. Using data from reports can contribute to improving CRM. 7. Commit to Your CRM. Once you begin to see results from your marketing automation, you will better understand the full value the system brings to your organization and CRM. The longer you use marketing automation to improve CRM, the better you will be at using its full range of abilities. The better you become at using marketing automation, the more valuable the tool will become. These two tools are sophisticated, and they’re even more powerful when they’re used in unison. They allow you to use the advantages of automation while personalizing your interactions with each customer. You’ll spend less time on routine tasks and systematically prioritize customer interactions resulting in a readiness to buy. You get the best of both worlds – more conversions through marketing automation and better customer relationships through CRM. This blog post has been updated on 3/27/20.
7 Surefire Ways to Get Your Small Business More Leads Posted on August 18, 2015November 18, 2022 by Jessica Lunk Being creative in finding new ways to get qualified small business leads can keep you several steps ahead of your competition. Many companies are using social media to find leads to nurture into prospects and sales. How can you make the most of your social media accounts to get in on the action? There are many different techniques that work for both B2B and B2C companies which you can adapt for your own prospecting. Here are some valuable tips to help you get more leads from social media. 1. Establish yourself as an authority in your field. Establishing yourself as an authority in your field will help prospects focus on what you have to say. Good social media prospecting is related to offering valuable content for shoppers to read, watch or listen to before they are ready to buy. You can offer information that you have gained over the years by answering the typical questions that new customers have on your website, blog or in outlying articles on third-party sites. The more you establish yourself as an expert, the more potential customers will trust you. 2. Set up your Facebook page as a lead-generation tool. While getting likes on Facebook is nice, it is not as valuable as getting leads. If you set up your Facebook page as a lead-generating tool, you can drive business from your page without spending oodles of time. You can add tabs to your page and customize them to offer contests, gather contact information and issue calls-to-action that will invite them to visit your site or blog. 3. Use lead generation cards to gather email addresses on Twitter. Partnering lead generations cards with a customized email campaign is a successful way to drive conversions directly to your content and get their email for future contacts. You can create an attractive ad with a link to your online content and use this incentive to get prospects to give you their email address. Once on your list, these prospects are ready to learn more about your company and how you relate to their needs. 4. Use LinkedIn to drive leads from your profile page. LinkedIn is one of the most valuable social media sites for lead generation. You can start by turning your company profile page into a lead generation tool. Use the description area to write your elevator speech and add a link to your landing page. 5. Join LinkedIn groups to network with contacts in your industry. LinkedIn groups, used properly offer a doorway into a vast networking opportunity for lead generation. Find groups that have the right set of members for you to work with and use them to build relationships that will result in lead generation. 6. Pin images on Pinterest that demonstrate how to use your products in new ways. Pinterest has become a useful search engine for many industries. One excellent method of driving leads is by offering suggestions to prospects as to how they can use your product through images and text overlay. You can add a call-to-action in the pin description for lead generation. 7. Create how-to videos for YouTube to promote your products or services. YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google. By creating short videos showing customers how to use your products or services, or answering questions that may confuse customers, you can drive prospects to your website or landing page. Calls-to-action and links can be inserted in the video or listed in the description below. Source: Social Media Examiner
Making Your Website the Ultimate Sales Machine Posted on August 17, 2015February 22, 2023 by Jessica Lunk There are a lot of platforms, media and vehicles you can use today to help increase your sales. Still, the flagship of your online marketing efforts should be your website. Consider the way you shop online for a product or service. You’ll likely conduct some preliminary research and begin to whittle down your choices. Your prospects are likely doing the very same thing…right now. Is your website prepared? Is it ready to grab and nurture these prospects? Let’s take a look at how to turn your website into a sales machine. The Three Stages of Making a Purchase There are three stages to the buying process. They are: Awareness (Just Looking) Consideration (Actual Shopping) Decision (Making the Purchase) Research indicates that most prospects would like to remain anonymous through two-thirds of this process. But engaging them and getting a prospect’s name and email address earlier in the process is one of the first keys of turning your website into a sales machine. Why Getting Engaged Early is Critical When you get engaged early in the process, you have a better chance of surviving “the cut” during the shopping process. You also have the ability to get valuable information to the prospect to help them in any future buying decision. By positioning yourself as an expert, you are in a better place to ultimately get the sale. Three Keys to More Leads from Your Website There are three fundamental ways to get more leads flowing in from your website. Use Lead Forms. If your website is just an online brochure you are missing the boat. Use easy to fill out lead forms often throughout your website. Make it simple for them to give you their information. Give Value. Make sure your website has current, relevant content, but offer something of more value to lure prospects. Remember to think like your customer, not like a business owner. What information can you offer them that would be irresistible? Consumers are willing to trade their name and email for something they want or will find value in. Don’t Sell Prospects, Nurture Them. Why do so many people say “I’m just looking” when shopping? Odds are they don’t want to be “sold” something. Prospects feel they are quite capable of making a buying decision once they gather the information they need. They key is being the one that provides them with that information. By providing information that is relevant to them, you greatly increase the odds of turning them into your customer. How it Works in Real Life Let’s say you have a real estate website and are offering an online guide entitled “Ten of the Most Cost Effective DIY Improvements to Add Value to Your Home”. Mary downloads the guide. While it may be tempting to call her, it is better to capture her data and segment it into your CRM. You know Mary is interested in remodeling, do-it-yourself projects, and potentially, real estate. There are a variety of related guides, tips, tricks and research you can share with her via email that will nurture her, and position yourself as an expert. Based on her involvement with these materials you can determine when she may be ready to move into the coveted “customer” status. Make the Process Automatic With an all-in-one sales and marketing automation system, you can funnel those prospects into customers. Automatically stay in contact with your prospects, making sure you don’t lose contact until they are ready to buy.
9 Reasons to Integrate Your CRM with Marketing Automation Posted on August 13, 2015June 18, 2018 by Jonathan Herrick The marketing seas are filled with tools that can help you with Customer Relationship Management (CRM). These tools store your contacts but can leave a hole in your boat when it comes to helping you market your business effectively. There are some very good reasons to integrate your CRM with marketing automation, especially an all-in-one marketing automation system. Here are nine of them. There is less chance you will miss a prospect. Marketing automation gathers and sorts inquiries. Rather than missing an inquiry from a prospect, they can immediately be sent a relevant reply. The reply can be much more targeted than a generic “we’ll get back with you” message. You can immediately grab their attention with your responsiveness and it can all be done automatically. There is less chance you will lose a prospect. Without automating your CRM, there is a good chance you can lose prospects along the way. They can slip through the cracks or may not be getting appropriate follow-up. Using marketing automation keeps you in contact with prospects until they decide they are no longer a prospect or until they become a customer. It makes you more effective. Small business entrepreneurs are required to be jack of all trades. They are the ship’s captain but they may have to occasionally swab the deck or grab an oar. By automating your CRM, you are able to spend more of your time doing what you like to do and the things you are probably good at. It makes your company more cost effective. All in one marketing software like Hatchbuck is affordable for even the smallest of companies. These are exactly the companies that need to be efficient and effective with their resources. With affordable pricing available in packages to meet the needs of any size business, marketing automation makes the most of your financial and human resources. Automation tracks your efforts. When properly used, marketing automation tracks your marketing efforts. Of course you will still want to do A|B testing to hone in on tactics that work best for you, but automation can give you the valuable feedback you need. Automation marketing software allows you to track your marketing and helps you make more informed decisions. It provides a strategic, simpler way to turn prospects into clients. Marketing automation uses a specific strategy to turn inquiries into prospects, and prospects into customers. You can even be notified when a prospect is hot and ready to buy. It delivers a consistent and repeatable process to drive sales month after month.. It helps you make best use of all your online marketing efforts. When you integrate your CRM with marketing automation, you combine your email contacts, website visitors and social media efforts into one manageable system. There is no need to bounce between platforms or a variety of different software programs. It can immediately help make you more competitive with larger companies. There are few things you can do that will have more impact on how you compete than automating your CRM. It reins in all segments of your prospects and provides a systematic flow of prospects and clients. Your competitors may be considering doing it. One of the best reasons to automate your CRM is that your competitors may be considering it. By automating your CRM now, you will stay ahead of the competition or at least compete more effectively against them. Smart, successful companies are always in search of better ways to do things. When it comes to CRM, automation is a better way. The market may be full of CRM and marketing programs but the key to making the right catch is leveraging the power of sales and marketing automation together. To learn more about integrating your CRM and marketing automation needs talk to one of the experts at Hatchbuck or schedule a live online demo.