Best B2B Marketing Automation Techniques – Ready to Take the Plunge?
Streamlining marketing activities will free up time for customers. And, as your business grows, getting more face time is imperative to your business growth. From buyer personas to leads and landing pages, here are a few ways to automate your marketing to help you grow and scale.
Marketing Automation Techniques That Work…
There’s a famous quote from the movie, Glengarry Glen Ross, “Put that coffee down!! Coffee’s for closers only.” And, while the movie dates back to 1992, the quote still holds true today. Time is of the essence.
While some business and sales professionals answer calls when they’re back in the office or at the end of the day, you have a 100x greater chance of leads answering a call within the first five minutes of them calling. But, who’s got the time – especially if you’re on with another lead?
To alleviate this, consider these marketing automation tips:
Automate your email responses – strategically
Automate email responses with timed offers and include compliments. A timed offer might expire in 48-hours. The sense of urgency is a psychological effect called fear of missing out (FOMO). Stoking perception with a timed offer can compel audiences to act fast. Consider using a clock image, stating that the offer ends at midnight or showing a digital countdown).
You’ll also want to thank current and potential B2B customers for their time. State that you recognize their time is valuable. Keep messages short and sweet. The gratitude prospects and current customers experience can increase your sales by 100%.
Automate all those repetitive tasks
Aside from email responses, there are other items to automate. You can update your CRM system and automate your follow-up messages with prospective leads.
Another task that can be automated is nurturing your new prospects. And, while it’s not part of your automation, integrating your software with social media and across mobile will also reduce any hiccups in your B2B customer journeys.
Adjust emails around the potential account size
If you were selling a single product that was only a few dollars or a few hundred dollars, you might get by with 3-5 automated emails. However, with B2B clients, a six-figure deal is much more complex.
Because you need to nurture leads, anticipate a much longer sales cycle and use segmenting and lead scoring techniques. These will help determine the best time to send a follow-up message and when to bring in your sales team.
Get personal with compelling, targeted content
Random content lacks personalization and let’s face it. It’s superficial. And, that’s part of the mistakes of sending cold emails. And, what are the mistakes exactly?
- Including crappy or bland subject lines (it needs to be click-baity)
- Emails that are cold and robotic (make them personal instead)
- Emails longer than War and Peace (try short sentences, attention-grabbing subject lines, bold wording)
- Your product or service’s value that’s buried in fluff wording (make it precise)
- Pitching too hard and scaring prospects away (soft pitch is better than hard sales tactics)
- Not including a call-to-action CTA (they need to know what’s next?)
- Not following up and avoiding an in-person meeting (If you’re standoffish, they’ll be standoffish, too)
- Not standing by your prices (don’t back down with tough customers, substantiate your value)
- Offering only one option (make it flexible, stagger your pricing plans with different packages)
- You don’t know enough about the prospect (ask about their challenges, know their specific pain points)
- Failing to define what you have to offer (state your value proposition, why you’re better than competitors)
Hence, creating buyer personas and compelling content can increase your conversion rates. But, what’s the best approach? Map out your ideal buyers (age, gender, salary, race) and then identify 2-3 areas where they may need help.
These might include:
- A pain point like the money they’re losing by not having your product or service
- A comparison of how your product or service can improve their brand when compared to a competitor
- A short message to initiate a 5-minute call to answer a problem the business might have
Score your leads and keep sales teams in the loop
Not scoring leads is frankly, a waste of time and the longer the sales cycle, the more you need to know about a prospect’s interests. Your automation software should track engagement on your site and help you understand the behaviors of your leads. This opens the door to different touchpoints that can help you reach leads at pivotal times (regardless of the media they use).
Effective lead scoring can give you insights into leads. When lead scores are used, it’s easier to track your leads and know their various activities and behaviors.
You might learn that:
- Bob Smith Accounting opened 5 emails
- Rx Tax Solutions subscribed to you through social media
- Tag Smith Accounting visited your price and packages page 6 times
Imagine Your Potential
If you’re ready to get in front of the decision-makers, you’ll find that B2B marketing automation provides you with several ways to reduce mundane tasks and target your leads. From email messages to how you pitch to prospects, personalized messages help you reach wider audiences and you won’t sound robotic. Focus on pain points and challenges your prospects have so you can reel them in with your value proposition (and convert leads to closed deals).
If you’re unsure about effective content strategies and ways to maximize your marketing automation, don’t be a fish out of water. Get your FREE inbound marketing assessment. B2BSales provides 15-minutes of valuable insight that can help you improve your marketing and have prospects coming to you based on strategic inbound marketing. And, who doesn’t want to increase their ROI? Set up your FREE assessment today.
