Today, we have a special subject to cover: marketing automation (MA). It is one of those sexy buzzwords folks like to throw around, like, ‘NowCast’, ‘Push Tolerance’ and ‘Triggering.’ That’s why we are about 1,000% sure you have the term before.
So what is marketing automation? Is it worth my time? What is it’s purpose? How can I use it for my restaurant?
Well, that’s why we are here to clear up any questions, confusion and/or misconceptions you may have about MA. Let’s dive in!
What is Marketing Automation?
Marketing automation is a tactic that allows companies to nurture prospects (potential customers) using highly personalized, valuable content that helps convert these prospects into leads, and turn those leads into customers.
Marketing automation is an important piece to your marketing puzzle—and by no way a means to an end. You need to constantly reshape and analyze your strategy to discover what’s working and what isn’t, in order for you and this investment to be successful.
Nurturing leads is an ongoing process. From their first interaction with your brand to way beyond the purchase. And marketing automation can help that process by synching your strategy throughout all of your efforts (blog, social media, email, forms, etc.), helping to organize your plan of attack. That being said, remember, your plan of attack is just that—a plan and you need to take action to engage and convert your leads if you want to achieve your desired results.
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Where Can You Apply Marketing Automation?
MA is a great way of guiding potential customers through your website, social channels and email to generate new leads, all while converting existing ones. Applicable uses include:
- Social Media Marketing
- Email Marketing
- Lead Generation
- Lead Nurturing
- Metrics and Analytics
- Management Activities
There are many businesses that know what marketing automation is, yet refuse to get involved. They may think marketing automation is fad or may not completely understand it’s capability or purpose.
And just so we get this out of the way: marketing automation is MORE than just sending emails.
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Marketing automation software can expedite and focus all your marketing efforts. Not to mention it can actually quantify and measure the kind of return or loss your strategies are producing.
So here is the big question: Can marketing automation help my restaurant?
Yes. And it can help in a huge way.
However, it is imperative that you fully integrate and use the available capabilities. Purchasing a marketing automation system (MAS) is quite an investment, but if you are can establish detailed Buyer Personas (another fancy buzzword for Customer Profiles), construct an accurate sales/purchasing funnel and recognize nurture and conversion points, then a MAS will boost your business exponentially. You will be faster, more efficient and more in-tuned with your customer’s Buyer Journey. And that is incredibly valuable because you will be able to see customer pain-points and alleviate those issues to create a better experience and ultimately, an easier sale.
We wanted to give you a quick snapshot into marketing automation and hope that this information was helpful, if you have either never heard of marketing automation or are thinking about purchasing a system. There is SO much more to discuss into making a system successful like SEO, blog writing, email & landing page conversions, Google AdWords integration and more. And also the topic of busting the myths about MAS and setting real expectations.
The moral of the story is: to make the investment have a positive ROI, it takes hard work, dedication and planning.
For many of our readers, that is just another walk in the park.
Need to pass the time between our next post? Then check out Custom Business Solutions for all your restaurant technology needs!
