Marketing Automation – The “work smarter not harder” answer for marketing
Let’s Stop the Glorification of Busy | LinkedIn.
I have a degree in Industrial Engineering. I was first introduced to this field of study in an “Introduction to Engineering” seminar during my first weeks in the Rutgers College of Engineering program. In addition to learning that Electrical Engineers built weapons and Civil Engineers built targets, I learned that Industrial Engineers looked for ways to maximize efficiency. The legacy of the IE dated back to Time-Study Man with a stopwatch and a clipboard. The future was in computers, automation and robotics. Their job was to figure out how to “Maximize Outputs while Minimizing Inputs.” AT first blush, I took this to be a license to cheat, but I later realized that this was really the business side of engineering.
With the rise of Marketing Automation, I have been able to apply the “Maximize Output, Minimize Inputs” mantra to marketing. By properly implementing a Marketing Automation solution and all the outstanding new tools we have our disposal, we can generate many more qualified leads for our sales teams to act on than we ever could with a “Stack It High and Let It Fly” mentality of the past. Because of Marketing Automation, this can be done with a much smaller team than needed in the past.
The engineer in me has a need to measure and test every part of any system I implement. Marketing Automation and Analytics allow us to apply this engineering approach to the process of taking a website visitor from their first click on the site to when Sales closes them. It’s not a bunch of disconnected silos or tasks, but a process to which every department and employee can contribute. It must be measured, refined and refreshed regularly in order to keep attracting those visitors, who become prospects, who become leads, and who eventually become satisfied customers.
Remember that this process of measurement and refinement needs to be extended beyond the marketing process. We need regular feedback from sales to let us know which leads are closing and which ones are not. Without that, we may just be do a great job of generating the wrong leads.
If those visitors don’t close, we are just hamsters on a wheel.