Marketing Automation Benefits That Turn Prospects Into Buyers

Are marketing automation benefits geared to the buyer or seller?

If you know about marketing automation you've heard about it's benefits. It helps marketing teams identify prospects and market and engage with leads across multiple channels. It automates repetitive tasks and scales with limited additional costs.  And most importantly, it creates more opportunities for sales.

But what about prospects? We've all been one. What's in it for us?

The Power Of Marketing Automation

We've all been there. What happens when something pushes us over the edge. You're doing your job and suddenly you've had enough, you realize there's got to be a better way. Maybe it's a productivity challenge or a nagging problem that won't go away. But, a pain, triggers the need to do something different.

As the prospect, when a company provides a solution to this challenge, you are thrilled! And that's the power of effective marketing automation.

When I was searching for a solution to my business challenge, it was marketing automation that provided the insights to deliver timely, personalized and relevant follow ups. The insights and education that helped me understand my options and formulate a decision. And, the detailed information I needed that led to an ultimate purchase.

Marketing Automation Benefits

Blast emails. Generic messages. Irrelevant information. Don't work.

Prospects want information specific to their needs. Marketing automation benefits your audience by providing the details they seek. Plus, as you gain insights from prospects you can progressively deliver more relevant, specific and valuable information.

And for your marketing and sales team, connecting during those trigger events, with a solution that solves the pain, is the prescription to increasing sales.

But some prospects may not confront a sudden pain. Even so, there are numerous other marketing automation benefits that make it a technology worth considering for both you and your customers.

Marketing Automation Identifies Interactions

With prospects formulating purchasing decisions well before they identify themselves, wouldn't it be helpful to know who visits your website and the pages they explore?

With marketing automation, you can. Although Google Analytics provides general information, the details are limited however, marketing automation provides additional insights. You can see and track which companies are visiting your website, how often, where they came from, what content they’ve viewed, and much more. If they’re a known contact, you’ll even see them by name.

Knowledge Is Power

By understanding a prospects interactions you can communicate in ways that benefit both you and the prospect.

With these insights, marketing automation benefits your prospects by delivering information that assists their specific buying journey.

By utilizing landing pages, contact forms and progressive profiling you can gradually learn more about your prospects, building a relationship that otherwise would have been impossible to form. And, as you build a richer dataset you increase trust and strengthen the opportunity for increased engagement.

Build Campaigns Based On Prospects Needs

With an increasing database of insights, you can build campaigns that target your prospects needs.

When my business pain manifested into downloading a white paper and conducting additional research on the topic, my needs became clear. And voila, I received targeted information that helped answer my questions and narrow my purchasing options.

Whether it's a trigger event, like mine, or a lead nurturing program that educates and engages prospects as they move through their buying journey, marketing automation benefits customers, and sales and marketing. The automation allows you to deliver personalized messages with relevant content that's behavioral based. It's both useful for the prospect and powerful for the marketer.

Use Marketing Automation To Gauge Interactions

Although marketing automation benefits your prospects, user engagement will vary. And for those that do engage, not every interaction is created equal. So tracking and scoring interactions is crucial.

Marketing automation allows you to develop a point system for interactions that are indicative of a prospects level of interest. For example, it's nice to have your email opened but it's even better when a potential customer downloads a white paper or watches a video. And when interactions occur in a certain order - a video followed by a white paper and then pricing - it may indicate a strong interest in your product.

A marketing automation system allows you to automatically uncover these opportunities. And by tallying and grouping these scores, you can better target programs that are relevant to their needs.

Identify Sales Ready Leads

Online from your website or in-person at a trade show or event, only a small percentage of prospects that show an interest in your capabilities are ready to buy today. And those 5 - 15% are easy to figure out. But the numbers say that another 60% - 70% will buy within two years.

Unfortunately, when your sales team follows up only to find there isn't immediate interest, the lead likely won't receive further attention. However, with an effective trigger and lead nurturing program, you'll target prospects with the information and education that often leads to further interest. And, by tracking their interactions and keeping score, you'll only provide sales with the most likely to buy opportunities.

Marketing Automation Benefits

Who doesn't want to know more about their target audience? And what consumer prefers unwanted communications vs. relevant, targeted personalized information? When executed properly, marketing automation benefits both the using company and end consumer. It builds relationships that allows you to turn more prospects into buyers.