If you’re in the marketing biz, then you’ve probably had it hammered into your head that “batch-and-blast” is dead. And if you’ve heard that one, then you’ve probably heard all about our buyers’ changing preferences, too.
So let’s cut to the chase: to be successful, marketers need to begin catering to their customers by creating unique web and sales experiences. This doesn’t mean adding your buyers’ first names to an email salutation and calling it a day. We’re talking about rich, personalized experiences that make your customers feel as though they’re getting the one-to-one attention from your company that they deserve (and expect from you!).
Businesses that are currently personalizing web experiences are seeing an increase in sales of 19% on average. (Econsultancy)
For many marketers with hundreds or thousands of contacts in their databases, this is an overwhelming thought. How is it possible to create a personalized sales experience for each buyer when there are so many of them — and with varying needs, too?
Well you can rest easy, folks. This is where a tool like marketing automation can really prove its value. With the ability to not only collect a ton of buyer data through forms and landing pages, but also to execute on that data in a meaningful way, marketing automation can improve conversion rates and turn a generic sales experience into an engaging one.
How Can Marketing Automation Help?
Take a look at the list below to see a few ways that marketing automation can help you personalize the marketing and sales processes for your buyers. You can find even more information on each of the items below in our newly released white paper, Personalization with Automation: The Complete Guide.
Personalized messages. Mass emails aren’t going to cut it with today’s buyers. They’re looking for messages that contain content unique to their interests and needs. Marketing automation delivers on this through segmentation and targeted email content.
Dynamic content. Don’t give your buyers the same experience across your website. Use dynamic content to display personalized content based on who is visiting your site. Think about the shopping experiences that you have on sites like Amazon — you can bring this B2C functionality to B2B through dynamic content.
Lead nurturing. Today’s buyers expect to encounter a sales experience that’s highly interactive and caters to their specific pain points. Lead nurturing is pivotal to meeting this expectation. Not only can marketers deliver personalized sales messages to buyers at the right time, but they can also target these messages based on stage of the sales cycle.
76% of buyers prefer different content at each stage of their research. (State of Demand Generation 2013)
Better sales intelligence. Real-time sales alerts and email link tracking allow reps to improve their close rates by arming them with the information they need to reach out to individual prospects with a personalized sales message.
Want to know more about how marketing automation can help you provide your buyers with the personalized experiences they’re looking for? Take a look at our new white paper, Personalization with Automation: The Complete Guide, to see how marketers and salespeople alike can take personalization to the next level.
The white paper covers:
- how to augment your existing database with information collected through landing pages and forms
- how progressive profiling can improve your conversion rates
- ways that you can personalize emails — beyond a first and last name in the salutation
- how to cater lead nurturing content to your buyers’ stages in the sales cycle
- how to personalize your website based on a viewer’s industry, product interest, and more
- ways that sales reps can personalize their sales pitches to their individual buyers
- how to use link tracking in emails to make sure reps are reaching out to potential buyers at the right time
Ready to get started? Download the full white paper by clicking on the banner below!
