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Today’s businesses have come to realize that the marketing and sales tactics of the past, namely in-person tactics, won’t be as effective in today’s post-pandemic landscape. Prospects are increasingly interacting with businesses like they do with brands in their consumer lives: digitally. They are consuming information and content on the internet, browsing websites and doing their own research.
The way buyers consume content impacts buying journeys, which are no longer a linear path towards conversion or purchase. A prospect might take a winding route that flows back and forth between education and engagement. The traditional “hand-off” from marketing to sales is no longer a one-time event but rather a fluid process where a single customer can volley back and forth between marketing and sales multiple times.
To be truly effective in today’s landscape of non-linear, digital-first customer journeys, marketing and sales teams must adopt a new approach. Siloed sales and marketing teams are a thing of the past, and today’s businesses need a strategy that follows suit. This means going beyond traditional, disparate marketing and sales tactics and building a unified strategy comprised of both sales and marketing automation.
Sales Automation vs. Marketing Automation
Marketing automation tools like email marketing, campaign automation, and social marketing help businesses attract more leads, close more sales, and effectively engage customers. Sales automation platforms help automate manual tasks like emails to make it easier for the sales team to focus on important revenue-driving tasks like building relationships and nurturing leads.
To understand sales automation and its role in a marketing strategy, you should first take a step back and think about the potential customer and the most appropriate type of communication for them based on where they are in their buying journey. This means examining their behavior and actions and then communicating with them using the most appropriate form of content. For example, prospects at the top of the funnel might need a high-level educational piece, whereas prospects at the bottom of the funnel (closer to purchasing) could benefit from a case study, customer testimonial, or other piece of content that persuades them to purchase from you instead of a competitor. where they are.
What Does This Actually Look Like?
Here’s an example.
Say you’re in the market to purchase a new car and decide to browse a local dealer’s website. Your visit triggers a marketing event mapped to new web traffic that creates a small pop-up suggesting a piece of content titled, “How to Narrow Down the Kind of Car You Want.” As a consumer in the education phase of the buying journey, this is an appropriate piece of content to receive.
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