The marketing team always suffers from a multitude of tasks; for this reason, we are all looking for ways to increase the return on investment for the effort we put in. In this regard, using a marketing automation tool and workflow can represent a significant leap forward in supporting marketing outcomes for many organizations.

Implementing a market automation system requires spending some money and acquiring some knowledge; this raises questions about the success of this investment for any organization and the extent of success of marketing automation in your organization. However, one should not be misled by the myth that high marketing expenses are detrimental to your organization. In fact, excessive costs can be one of the best ways to increase the number of your organization's members and boost its donations.

On the other hand, not all marketing teams within the organization are ready for this type of marketing. This task can be challenging especially if you have not prepared your team in advance to leverage automation's potential; this will lead to spending money and energy without realizing the desired benefits. Meanwhile, your organization is in need of funding, for this reason, marketing automation is not advisable before being ready to maximize its benefits.

Here is an overview of what marketing automation is, along with a checklist you can use to determine whether your organization is ready to engage in this type of marketing, or if you have some marketing gaps that need to be addressed first.

What does marketing automation mean?

The most important thing you should not conceive in your mind is that you can just sit back, load an automated marketing system, and let it run by itself, because this belief is a big illusion. Marketing automation does not mean that the system markets on your behalf, but it amplifies the marketing processes that you previously worked on.

In this context, creating a good framework means having a reliable system for distributing valuable marketing content, capable of attracting and forming a strong and stable cohort of potential customers, who can become members or donors to your organization in the future. If the challenge you face now is to create a number of followers and potential clients who may use your content, you should initially focus on establishing a system for your organization and creating valuable content that is well-received and endorsed by you personally.

When you steadily acquire new clients, and your team working with you is overwhelmed by the influx, it becomes possible to transition to a full marketing automation system, because this is the right timing. At a subsequent stage, activate lead nurturing processes and re-engagement campaigns.

Having a marketing automation system that works well means not neglecting any customer, and the best system is one that automates personalized content you send automatically. When you reach this level, it can be said that marketing automation has created a qualitative leap.

Marketing automation helps expand the excellent marketing you are already doing. In fact, it executes the campaigns you design at a pace and scale that your team cannot handle manually, but it will be important for you and your team to maintain control over everything.

Is your organization ready to work with marketing automation?

Answer these questions to check on this aspect:

1- Are you generating a continuous stream of new qualified clients (donors)?

2- Does your team feel overwhelmed by the large number of potential clients (donors) flowing into your organization’s database?

3- What email messages do you currently send manually? Do you have an email series that can be placed in an automated workflow?

4- Are you engaging with potential clients (donors), members, and contributors across multiple channels?

5- Do you already have manual “triggers” that you use to send important content to potential clients (donors)?

6- Do you have the necessary content to support personalizing and scaling your marketing efforts?

Applying marketing automation:

Content marketing is a continuously growing process, and once you start working on inbound marketing, you will learn over time what messages and templates attract your audience at different stages of their journey. As you optimize your content and donors, you will begin to set a plan and standards that make the process of creating campaigns and content more efficient.

The next step in this process is to automate marketing, which will turn your manual work plan into an automated mechanism. The timing for transitioning to automated marketing will only make sense if you achieve a continuous flow of potential clients alongside list segmentation and lead nurturing campaigns that yield good results.

Source:HubSpot Blog