Before, Marketing Automation was a tool reserved for the giants., the large corporations with a turnover greater than $500 million per year.  Not anymore.   The fastest adopting segment of Marketing Automation are small to medium sized enterprises.  This means companies with a turnover of $1 – $50 million per year.  So, no wonder marketing automation has been developing such a buzz.  Because of its meteoric rise, many organisations may have a vague understanding of how to implement a marketing automation system into their organisation?  That’s where I am going to help.  Many small-medium enterprises need to understand how they can use a marketing automation tool and which features would work best for them.

The majority of marketing automation software out there comes with a wide variety of features.  This is so that they can cover a wide variety of different organisational needs.  However, your particular situation may not call for the top of the line software.  But there are some key features which every marketing automation software should provide, and these are the ones which you have to make sure you get in your software.

A Lead Qualifying Tool

An example of a good lead qualifier tool is one which assigns points to leads via how they interact with your content and marketing campaigns.  A lead qualifying tool will have an in-built system to grade your leads through their interaction with your marketing efforts.  For example, opening a link in one of your emails, may be worth 5 points, while asking for a quote on your website maybe worth 20 or 30 points.  So as you scan down your list of leads each will have been assigned an overall score.  Therefore when it comes to that time to make a phone call you know which leads to call first (the ones with the highest points).  While the ones with the lower point marks you can leave and wait till their score increases.

Email Sequence Development

One of the major key selling points of marketing automation is the automated side.  Well every good marketing automation software must have an easy-to-use but effective automated email tool.  These email tools have become quite common place but that doesn’t mean they are all good.  There’s nothing worse than getting email after email from a subscription which doesn’t even help personalise the information towards you and your needs.  A good email sequence tool will automatically decide how your potential customer will progress through.  For example, if you click on one link over another in an email, it may mean you will be moved to a different email list catered to how you interacted with the previous email.  This can be a very powerful tool and when used correctly to nurture a customer relationship it can pay off.

Customer Support

Integrating marketing automation software into your organisation can be a daunting task.  That’s why any company which offers marketing automation software must have a great customer support system.  This is a key point for small enterprises which may only have a limited number of employee’s.  Some companies have fantastic support systems, while some companies leave you in the dark after your adoption.  Making an investment such as this, you need to make sure you’re going to get the support you need.  Once you have learnt the marketing automation system it can make your life a whole lot easier.  That is why having a wonderful support system is another key point when adopting any marketing automation system.

These are some of the key basic features which you need to demand from your marketing automation provided before making the plunge.  While there will be many other fancy tools and features which they will sell you on, making sure these basics are efficient and easy to use.  Many providers have struggled to get this right and have caused nightmares for their customers.  Getting these basics wrong has caused the adoption of marketing automation more difficult for everyone involved.