“If you don’t know where you’re going, don’t be surprised if you end up somewhere else.”

(Mark Twain), American writer, 1835 -1910

There is a wealth of information on these topics on the Internet and some very good literature.

I can recommend the following compact, up-to-date and practice-oriented guide by Tim Cortinovis:

This is Marketing Automation! This is Sales Automation!:
A Compact Guide to Putting Sales on Autopilot for SME

Even though the author focuses on SMEs and start-ups, the book gives a very good insight into the topics and is peppered with tips, software overviews, warnings of pitfalls and also covers the topics of social media, email marketing and sales funnel as elementary components of marketing and sales automation.

 

From my practical experience, here are the 9 biggest mistakes when introducing/using marketing and sales automation:

 

1.  customer journey unknown

If I don’t know the stages of the customer’s journey to purchase, I can’t use my tools in a customer-oriented way.

 

2. the wrong social media channels

Often, too many social media channels are poorly used instead of concentrating on the few channels that are also used by the target groups.

People post randomly and irregularly instead of working with a fixed editorial plan. The topics are not relevant to the target group and there is no interaction.

 

3. wrong email marketing

Lack of personalisation, wrong subject, too long text, no added value or information for the recipient, no call-to-action – these are just a few gross mistakes.
Because e-mails are so easy and inexpensive, they are sent until even the last former or current customer is annoyed, often with too many follow-up e-mails. The bounce rate increases and you end up in the spam filter. The new magic word here is “cadence”, but it is often implemented incorrectly.

How to do it right: https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/email-cadence

The right sequence and number of emails, clever and smart personalisation and, of course, the quality of the addresses increase the success of an email marketing campaign, not the quantity.

Another common mistake in email marketing is focusing on emails as the only channel. Leads can also be gained from other sources.

 

4. Automate everything – saves money and time

Even if the temptation is great, the complete automation of marketing and sales does not always make sense.

If, for example, the target group of doctors has little presence on certain social media platforms, automation makes no sense here. It can even be counterproductive, as doctors react sensitively when they are addressed on their private Facebook account, for example.

And even today, personal customer contact is more successful in the C-level approach than several emails that are perceived as annoying and which, in the worst case, banish the sender to the spam list.

 

5. wrong buyer personas

Buyer personas are a good way to get to know target groups and potential customers better and to address them. But they must not be too vague or too narrowly defined. It also doesn’t help to use personas for target groups that are not relevant to the product at all.

It is helpful to conduct good (online) market research and market analysis before creating the buyer personas. This topic is presented very well and in detail here: https://buyerpersona.com/blog

 

 

6. Trial and error – wrong choice of tools

The same applies here as in my post on CRM. In the area of sales and marketing automation, there is an abundance of tools with different price and performance ranges.

Without a good pre-selection, appropriate training of the marketing and sales team and a good plan, using tools indiscriminately will only cost time and money.

 

7. The wrong agency

When introducing sales and marketing automation solutions, it is often necessary to fall back on agencies.
Here it is very important that the agency fits the company and also brings the appropriate know-how and references.
A targeted selection with a good briefing, a pitch and clear ideas on the part of the client and recommendations from reference customers are helpful here.

An agency that wants to work on social media channels, for example, and has hardly any followers and only outdated posts on its social media sites, does not have a good reputation.
If the agency outsources sub-projects to sub-providers, this does not have to be a disadvantage either.

 

8. Wrong or no KPIs

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) “can be used to measure and/or determine progress or the degree of achievement with respect to important objectives or critical success factors.” (Source: Wikipedia)

If these values are not defined at the beginning and regularly checked in the course of the introduction and further application of marketing and sales automation, you don’t know where you actually want to go. And if you collect too many KPIs, you will quickly lose the overview and “suffocate” in a flood of numbers.
Sales should sell, not be hindered by administrative tasks.

A good overview of KPIs and their application can be found under these links:

https://www.dialoginsight.com/en/blog/analytics/15-kpis-measure-when-doing-marketing-automation/

 

9.  direct roll-out

Even if time is short, it makes more sense to start with a pilot project. A direct roll-out when introducing marketing and sales automation solutions is fraught with high risks and requires a highly professional and experienced project team and management.

 

“Copyright © 2022 Dipl. Betriebswirt (FH) Georg Dörner – All rights reserved.”