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How I Automated 50% of My Business Tasks and Scaled Without Hiring More Employees

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By Kartik Ahuja Edited by Chelsea Brown

Discover how automation helped us streamline processes, improve efficiency by 50% and scale without hiring extra employees.

Key Takeaways

Running a marketing agency is no walk in the park. It requires repetitive, time-consuming tasks. With the client list growing, the manual workload increases to a point where you need at least one — if not more — employees to tackle the pressure.

I realized this to the bone as repetitive tasks and manual work piled up. The first blow was that it became harder for our employees to execute tasks on time. Also, it frequently caused burnout or fatigue that interfered with the quality of our work.

To address this, the first and immediate solution that came to my mind was hiring multiple employees. But that wasn’t feasible, as recruiting more employees would require additional management and increase overhead costs.

So, after re-evaluating some workable options, I finally found a better way to streamline my operations — automation. Despite the scepticism, I decided to give it a shot and started automating my business processes. The result? I was able to offload 50% of my business tasks.

Here’s my whole journey, from switching to automation to achieving sustainable growth without hiring extra employees.

Determining the time-consuming tasks

Before diving into my automation strategies, let me highlight the tasks that slowed me down and became the biggest bottlenecks in my workflow:

1. Manual lead generation

Initially, I spent half my business days just nurturing qualified leads. I had to target companies that needed optimization for customer acquisition and funnel management, which took a great deal of time.

Even after sifting through countless websites, social media profiles and directories, I hardly found businesses that needed scalable marketing systems and growth strategies.

And the result? I gradually started to miss opportunities.

2. Customer support overload

As I inspected further, I found out that the customer support representatives of my company had to respond to every inquiry, manage complaints and provide solutions — all manually.

As you can imagine, with the growing number of customer support requests, it became harder to keep up, resulting in slower response times. The worst part was that the repetitive queries consumed too much time, leaving little scope for them to handle serious customer issues.

3. Financial tracking and reporting

Processing invoices, reconciling accounts and generating financial reports were more than a time drain for my team. Manually tracking finances led to miscalculations and inaccurate reports. The inefficient management made future income predictions and budget planning a great obstacle, as it all resulted in errors and lost revenue.

4. Client onboarding and communication

The next big challenge I faced was managing client onboarding and communication. Each client required personalized attention, contract processing and documentation.

So, it consumed a large portion of our workweek to keep track of every interaction, address queries and ensure a smooth onboarding experience. The lack of a structured system impacted our client satisfaction and retention.

5. Meeting scheduling and follow-ups

Efficient communication and timely follow-ups are essential for my team, especially when executing the Attention, Interest, Desire and Action (AIDA) framework. However, the manual processes, including scheduling meetings, turned into a major roadblock.

Plus, we had to coordinate meeting times across different time zones and make endless back-and-forth emails, which impacted the precision of that framework. At its worst, we were at risk of potential client drop-offs.

Opting for specific solutions

That said, after noting down the issues, I realized that most of the time-consuming tasks could be worked around using automation. And here’s how I did it:

1. LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Apollo.io for automated lead generation

I integrated LinkedIn Sales Navigator and Apollo.io to eliminate my manual lead generation drain. These advanced tools are designed for highly targeted searches based on specific criteria such as industry, service or company size.

Apollo.io’s email finder and verification features were a lifesaver, significantly reducing the time I spent on manual research.

More than that, we could reach our target audience in minimal time. We narrowed down our search with LinkedIn Sales Navigator and as a result, our company also witnessed up to a 17% higher win rate on average.

2. AI-powered chatbots for customer support

First, I tried addressing customer overload issues by implementing an AI-powered chatbot on my website CRM. It was programmed to handle customer queries and provide basic troubleshooting.

After testing multiple chatbot designs, I decided to review one and connect it with our CRM. It was effectively linked with HubSpot to access customer data, track conversations and update customer records.

This ensured personalized help and reduced our workload by up to 40%. The efficiency allowed my team to provide 24/7 customer service with improved response time.

3. QuickBooks Online for financial tracking and reporting

For financial monitoring and reporting, I found QuickBooks Online, which integrates with our payment gateways and bank accounts.

This advanced software effectively automated our invoice generation, payment processing and financial reporting. Also, I integrated a dedicated reporting and business intelligence tool, Fathom, with QuickBooks and ensured seamless financial reporting.

As a result, I witnessed an increased accuracy of my reporting by nearly 95% and was able to reduce the reporting time by 75%.

4. HubSpot for client onboarding and communication

I used HubSpot’s robust suite of automation tools to manage our clients’ onboarding and communication processes. The powerful workflow automation builders of Hubspot helped to automate contract signing through an integrated e-signature tool.

It automated our document collection via file request workflows, and the sequence tool allowed us to send personalized and targeted emails to clients. We could easily monitor client interactions and progress through onboarding stages and identify issues.

Overall, we turned a complicated process into a time-saving, smooth system and ensured a streamlined client engagement by 50%. We could also track our marketing success and adjust the plan accordingly. However, the key benefit was reducing our onboarding time by 20%.

5. HubSpot and Calendly for meeting scheduling and follow-ups

To improve follow-ups and deploy the AIDA framework, I implemented HubSpot. With HubSpot, my team effectively manages follow-up emails, reminders and tasks based on specific actions and timelines. We were able to improve our direct mail automation and retargeting consistency by 90%.

I used Calendly — one of the popular scheduling tools — to automate our scheduling. It was integrated with my team’s work schedule, and we could set the meeting times accordingly.

This helped my team big time as some of the repetitive tasks like adding new leads, sending alerts and syncing data were completed in no time.

After all that automation, I successfully streamlined manual tasks and boosted efficiency by a whopping 50%. The result was clear: My team became more productive, client satisfaction improved, and the overall quality of our work increased — without any additional employment. Automating the processes not only saved my valuable time but also helped my team reduce errors, improve accuracy and focus on what’s most important.

Pro tips

Though automation processes can be game-changers, you need to tackle them wisely. Here is my take on it:

Dos:

  • Instead of trying too many tools at once, it’s better to automate one process at a time and measure its impact.
  • Training team members on how to use the new automation tools and processes helps ensure the best outcomes.
  • It’s compulsory to regularly review automation process results and find new ways to improve efficiency.

Don’ts:

  • Keep the automation process as simple as possible to increase the team’s expertise and customer satisfaction.
  • No matter the tools used, they must be safe and comply with data privacy regulations.

By Kartik Ahuja 

Entrepreneur Leadership Network® Contributor. Tech Entrepreneur & Growth Marketing Expert

Kartik is a 3x Founder, CEO & CFO specializing in startup growth, scalable marketing, and financial strategy. He helps businesses acquire customers, optimize funnels, and maximize profitability using data-driven systems. Featured in BBC, Bloomberg, DailyMail, Vice, Amex, GoDaddy, and more.

Edited by Chelsea Brown

Sourced from Entrepreneur

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How to Boost Your Business With Direct Mail Automation and Retargeting — a Detailed Beginner’s Guide

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By Joy Gendusa

What is direct mail automation, and how can it benefit your business? Here’s an in-depth guide.

Automation has made many aspects of our lives easier, both professionally and personally. If you’ve ever used dictation to send a text or have separate “home” and “away” settings on your smart doorbell, you’ve likely benefited from automation.

When most people think of automation, they think digital. But automation has evolved to help us in the offline world, where its effects can be felt all the more keenly.

Case in point: Research shows that direct mail messaging has a deeper, more significant impact on our emotions than digital alone, resulting in stronger recall a full week later. Participants in the same study also demonstrated more neurological activity when interacting with direct mail versus online-based ads.

Translation? Humans are hard-wired to respond to tangible — as opposed to digital — stimulation. Leveraging it at key points in your marketing and sales funnel could be the key to unlocking untapped revenue.

Not only do I use direct mail automation in my own business, but I’ve also mailed 23.2 million automated mail pieces on behalf of clients nationwide, so I know what it takes to create and run a successful campaign. Here are some basics to get you started on the right foot…

What is direct mail automation, and what can I do with it?

Direct mail automation is a technology that automatically prints and mails postcards, letters or other offline material based on a pre-programmed trigger. It also goes by the names “triggered mail” or “programmatic direct mail.”

Triggers can be programmed from your website, CRM (customer relationship management system), or a third-party source like Zapier, and these triggers can be based on behaviour, data or timing — or any combination thereof. Contact details aren’t even required in some cases; the automation handles that for you while protecting everyone’s privacy.

Some examples of direct mail automation:

Ecommerce retailers can target browsers that abandon their shopping carts. The next day, those shoppers receive a postcard from you with a 15% off promotion to nudge them back online to finish their purchase. You can also target all website visitors regardless of whether your website has a shopping cart or not, though I suggest targeting people who spend at least 30 seconds on your site. This is usually called “direct mail retargeting” and works just like digital retargeting, but offline.

A moving and storage company could target homeowners whose homes were just placed under contract. Even inaction could trigger a mailer. Let’s say that as soon as a customer hits the 3-month mark of inactivity, they get a postcard in the mail to remind them to give you a call or make a purchase.

There are so many ways you can take advantage of this technology to bring in more leads and keep your current customers engaged. I recommend you analyse your customer base and existing funnel and ask yourself a few things. Are there any noticeable commonalities among my customers that I can take advantage of? Is there any point in my funnel where a large number of people drop out? These places are likely prime opportunities to add direct mail automation.

How does direct mail automation work?

I don’t want to get too technical because, if you ask me, it isn’t how direct mail automation works that’s important — it’s more about what it can do for your business.

That said, most people still want to get a little peek under the hood to see how the magic happens.

Automated direct mail is possible thanks to something called an API, which stands for Application Programming Interface. In plain English, an API is basically how one software program talks to another software program, a bit like a translator.

With direct mail automation, you’re telling a software program what to do. For example: When someone spends more than 30 seconds on my website, send this postcard. If someone calls me once and we don’t speak again for a week, send this other postcard.

From there, the software connected to your website (if you want to target visitors) or your CRM (if you want to target one-time callers) needs to be able to speak directly to the software that will trigger your mailing. This is where the API comes in — it makes it possible for your website to tell a printing press what to mail and who to mail it to. It’s just following your directions!

Automation allows you to do the work of setting up the marketing one time, and then you can let it run on auto for as long as you like.

If only 20 people visit your website a month, then you only have to pay for 20 postcards. If you’re concerned about sending out too many cards a month and overextending your budget, you can also set up limits. So, if you can only afford to mail 500 cards a month, then once the system registers you’ve hit your 500th card, it will stop mailing.

Probably the most important benefit of triggered mail is that every mailer is hyper-targeted to the prospect you want to convert. In many cases, the recipients are warm leads who have already shown some kind of interest in your products or services — now you can strike while the iron is hot without lifting a finger.

How do I choose an automated mail provider?

Not all mail automation providers are the same, so you need to do your research and ask a lot of questions before handing over your credit card.

The first thing to look for is print quality. Some direct mail automation providers only specialize in the software/API, meaning they don’t actually print anything. Instead, they farm out printing and mailing to a network of providers (often prioritizing lower costs over quality). This can result in a lack of quality control.

Ideally, you’d want to work with an automation provider that doesn’t outsource the real work to third parties, because if something goes wrong, you’ll need direct support to handle the issue.

Another thing to be wary of is cost, of course. Some direct mail automation providers will charge “tech fees” on top of the usual costs associated with printing and mailing — this is where they have a chance to generate their own profits, rather than just skimming a little off the top of every mailer. If you’re working directly with a print and mail house, you’ll likely find zero tech fees.

You also want to consider your options for the design of your mailer. Every direct mail automation provider will allow you to upload your own design, but there are benefits to using a template instead, especially if it’s professionally designed and results-based.

At my business, PostcardMania, we’ve delivered more than 250,000 direct mail campaigns and mailed more than 2 billion postcards over 25 years in business. That experience has allowed us to fine-tune a design formula that prioritizes real returns. The result is a gallery of industry-specific templates based on designs that have been road-tested to generate calls, clicks and revenue — like this real estate investor who made $70,000 after mailing a little more than 100 automated postcards over the course of a year. Often, a proven design translates to a greater likelihood of bringing in more revenue.

I’ve often witnessed small business owners throw their money away on low-quality mailers that didn’t live up to their expectations. So, if you invest a little more in an experienced mail provider that is an expert in automation, you’re much more likely to see results.

What are the steps to start my first direct mail automation campaign?

Once you’ve shopped around and found the direct mail automation provider you want to work with, you’ll want to set up an account and get started by connecting your account to your website or CRM. Each platform has its own steps and processes you’ll need to complete to make this happen, so I won’t be able to walk you through it step-by-step from here. Hopefully, you’ve chosen a provider that makes it easy to set up your first order and can provide support if needed.

I suggest testing your connections in a controlled environment all the way through to mailer delivery before turning them loose on your live website or CRM. That way, you’ll be able to test the automation for design, messaging, timing, print quality and more by just paying per mailer. The more mail your automation triggers per week or month, the more your price per piece should go down.

Once you’re happy with your automation, set a weekly budget and check back often to track the incoming results.

It shouldn’t be a headache. With this technology in place, you’ll impress customers, get ahead of your competition and foster a growing and thriving business that is attentive to every customer’s needs.

By Joy Gendusa

Entrepreneur Leadership Network Contributor. Founder/CEO of PostcardMania. Joy Gendusa founded PostcardMania in 1998 with just a phone & a computer (no funding or investments), and today we generate $97M annually with 365 staff. I’m passionate about helping small businesses succeed at marketing and grow — because when small business does well, we all win.

Sourced from Entrepreneur

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5 Ways Creativity Will Drive Marketing Success In 2023

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By Bernard May

As marketers and brands around the world start 2023, one subject I find myself discussing more and more frequently is creativity. Internally, creativity is critical for keeping agencies competitive. Externally, creativity is key for driving results for our clients and partners.

But just saying “think creatively” is a vague request and, therefore, a lost cause. Creativity means different things across the spectrum of marketing channels and expertise.

Looking forward to next year, I want to take some time to outline not only why creativity is key but also where creativity comes into play for improving performance and maybe even helping to future-proof the marketing industry.

Automation Fuels Creativity

While some fear automation as a threat to their particular area of marketing expertise, I personally see automation innovations as gifts that allow us to refocus our creative mindsets.

The time that may have been taken up by manually tracking data points for optimizing the performance of a landing page, for example, can now be reinvested into creating more landing pages for testing. New ad platform innovations like Google’s Performance Max may free up time for Google marketers to create more differentiated ad messaging for more rapid testing and optimization.

As another example, not too long ago, we had to crack open a laptop and dedicate hours upon hours to edit video content. Now edits, flashy transitions and color correcting can be automated on our phones if we desire.

I urge fellow marketers to take advantage of and embrace automation for reasons like these. Time is our most precious commodity, and automation offers us all more time to get creative with our content.

Strategy Requires Creativity

Often overlooked is the need to flex creative thinking to develop effective marketing strategies. Developing creative strategies is an underappreciated but deeply important skill for effective marketing campaigns.

At its core, strategy is problem-solving—mapping out a solution of tactics, tools and processes for going from where you are to where you want to be. Now, this may require thinking about data in creative new ways, exploring the connection of marketing channels from different angles and even re-exploring the pieces of the marketing funnel for different clients.

Remember, a creative mindset is not confined to copy, messaging and design. Without a strategy, there is no vision for how the pieces of the marketing puzzle will fit together. Without creativity, your marketing strategy is likely to fall flat.

Context Takes Creativity

If you take one thing away from this exploration of creativity, let this unpacking of context be the winner.

Context, in my opinion, generates 80% to 90% of the power attached to any piece of marketing content. Ad channels, website content, emails, social platforms, etc.—each require a different understanding when adapting content to the specific medium.

This is a very jargon-filled way of saying “what works in one place may not work in another.” For example, it requires creativity to take the essence of a product page on a website and pivot it to work for a Google ad. Even repurposing the minimal text of a Google ad for Facebook demands an understanding of the context so you can make the appropriate changes.

Just because someone is an amazing blog writer does not mean they can just bang out copy for a Google ad, Facebook ad or email drip campaign—and vice versa. It takes rapid creative thinking and an understanding of the content’s real-world context to be effective. Take the time to ensure you have the right creative minds in the right seats.

Loyalty Needs Creativity

In 2023, customer loyalty, and in turn better customer lifetime value, will become even more important. With a possible recession on the horizon, brands need to hold on to as much repeat business as possible.

So, where does the creative mindset come into play? Well, what drives loyalty is different across the board. It may take a combination of data, messaging and channel creativity to find an effective strategy for outreach, follow-up and loyalty-based promotions that are personalized for your various customer cohorts.

This might even mean polling your customer base to better understand their needs and desires so that you can proceed with creative and innovative loyalty programs.

Customers Want Creativity

All in all, customers have a thirst for creativity—something that breaks through the noise and makes them pay attention. There is a reason that people always talk about the commercials they see during the Super Bowl—it’s the “Super Bowl” of creative ideas.

The good news (and bad news) is that there are no rules surrounding creative concepts. “Got Milk?” and “Think Different” were beyond basic but broke through decades ago and are still remembered today.

There is a reason that consumers across demographics have pivoted to a platform like TikTok: We are attracted to new ideas. This platform has fostered a completely new avenue where creators are promoting products in ways that massive brands could never have seen coming.

The point is that customers and clients will always be in the market for new creative ideas and concepts. Businesses and brands will forever need creative strategies to progress. Marketers cannot ignore the power of creativity.

Creativity Is Non-negotiable

We have to invest in creative minds and ideas to keep our customer bases secure. You, your business or your agency partner may not (understandably) have every single creative angle covered. Anyone who claims to be an expert in every creative sphere is either lying to you or themselves.

So consider the various touchpoints of creativity, from the aesthetic to the strategic, and be sure to have your bases covered as you welcome 2023.

Feature Image Credit: Getty

By Bernard May

Follow me on Twitter or LinkedIn. Check out my website.

Bernard May is the CEO of National Positions, a 5-time Inc. 500 company, award-winning marketing agency and Google Premier Partner. Read Bernard May’s full executive profile here.

Sourced from Forbes

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Three Steps To Using Automation To Keep Personalized Digital Marketing Alive

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By Anna Luo

Covid-19 has not only drastically changed the way we communicate with each other, but the economic impact of the pandemic has forced many brand marketing teams into a corner — charged with increasing revenue contribution while facing budget cuts. In fact, according to a recent Gartner Inc. survey, 76% of marketing leaders expected budget cuts as a result of Covid-19. These teams are being asked to improve business outcomes with fewer resources.

Bringing Life To Personalization

Brands executing a digital-first or direct-to-consumer strategy must move beyond a one-size-fits-all approach to digital marketing and create messages that are relevant to a consumer’s moment and context. To move the needle in sales, it is important to message more granularly. For example, creating messaging for individual consumers’ interests in specific products (like models or colors) and locations (like open locations vs. curbside pickup).

It is equally important to design specific content relevant to individual consumers regardless of where they may be — like Facebook, Instagram, streaming media or email. This means brands are in need of creating many variations of the content to fit new advertising formats and deliver personalized experiences that appeal to consumers. According to a report by IAB, “50% of digital device consumers will make a purchase and become brand loyal if they receive personalized brand content.”

Right now, many brands are leaning on production teams or agencies to manually design and build creative variations, which can be costly due to the hours it takes to do so by hand. While this method of creative production used to be a brand’s only option, it also meant that the creative outputs were not built in a way that could be easily modified and customized with language and product changes for local brand teams. Automation, however, paves a way for brands to quickly and efficiently spin up new creative variations that add an extra layer of personalization to marketing campaigns.

It Isn’t Just About Spending Less; It’s About Doing More

Automation isn’t just about spending less on production costs. It’s about creating endless possibilities with ad and content variations. It’s a powerful tool that lets us achieve tasks that weren’t humanly possible 20, 10 or even five years ago.

For example, at my company, Jivox, advancements in automation have allowed us to scale personalization for our clients while dramatically reducing production costs. This is done by automating creative versioning across all digital marketing channels (paid and owned) and enabling real-time dynamic assembly, re-sizing and delivery of creative assets. We optimize the best performing creative and the highest performing audience segments to increase the return on investment.

When it comes to personalized digital marketing and advertising, automation through dynamic creative optimization (DCO) technology allows brands to create millions of creative options — versus the hundreds possible through manual creation — that better speak to their audiences on an individual level. This means individuals will receive hyperpersonalized recommendations on products based on context, such as time of the day, weather, location, interests, real-time behavior and many more factors that make them the unique person they are. This increases brands’ chances of converting, selling and creating brand loyalty with those individuals.

How To Get Started With Automation For Personalized Digital Marketing

For marketers stepping into the world of automation for the first time, to those who are comfortable using creative management platforms to automate versions, and possibly using one or two data triggers to personalize creative, there are a few things to consider before taking a leap of faith:

1. Do a self-assessment.

No matter where a brand starts its creative journey, the goal should be to consistently achieve omnichannel personalization using automation. To figure out your maturity level, start with an assessment like the following:

• Are you A/B testing creative without using much data? Are you optimizing a few variations of the ads in the rotation?

• Are you personalizing the creative based on genders, age groups, geographical regions? Do you also mostly use behavior data from your website for retargeting?

• Are you using the creative management platform (CMP) for creative versioning, and data management platform (DMP) for prospecting? Do you run your campaign using more than one channel?

2. Home in on three key ingredients: data, channel and optimization.

There are three key ingredients to effective DCO: in-depth data, a broad array of channels and artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled optimization. True personalization should rely on more than just basic demographic information like age and gender. Establishing in-depth data points, like first-party data and data from your customer relationship management (CRM) software, or contextual data, is key.

When it comes to distributing those personalized messages, it’s also important to create a consistent experience across a broad array of channels — like display, social, video, website, email and more — versus taking a siloed approach to reaching potential buyers. Once you have the right data and channels in place, the last key ingredient is AI-enabled optimization that allows you to evolve your campaigns based on in-the-moment performance, not just when the campaign is over.

3. Choose a partner that’s focused on the future.

The demise of third-party cookies has been a hot topic for what seems like years now. As this change evolves, it’s critical for marketers to choose an automation partner focused on what happens after third-party cookies are phased out. One way to determine if a potential partner has these future changes top of mind is to ask how they’re currently using first-party data to replace third-party cookies, such as data from first-party-based identity.

We can’t expect things to return to the way they used to be, but automation creates a beacon of hope for brands, allowing them to increase output while decreasing the budget needed to get them there to adapt to this new age of business. The way I see it, automation is the key to keeping personalized digital marketing alive.

Feature Image Credit: GETTY

By Anna Luo

Anna Luo is VP of Customer Innovation & Marketing at Jivox, telling global brands’ stories with data, metrics, and business impact. Read Anna Luo’s full executive profile here.

Sourced from Forbes

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How to Balance Marketing Automation and Personalization

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Brands have embraced automation to help them carry out a spectrum of everyday tasks. According to a recent survey published by Social Media Today, 75 percent of marketing teams use some form of an automation tool. However, with growing popularity, there are growing concerns. The same survey reports that 61 percent of marketers are concerned about the lack of personalization due to automation. Likewise, a global study by PWC found that as technology advances, most consumers want brands to use technology as a tool for increasing personalized support. Put simply, customers want more human interaction, not less.

That’s why it’s vital that today’s businesses find the right balance between automation and personalization. Companies that go overboard on automation can come across as detached and generic. On the other hand, those that get too personal with customers can come off as intrusive and creepy. Brands need to get it right to maintain a trusting relationship with their customers.

Here are ways marketers can successfully balance automation and personalization.

Offer Timely, Valuable Content

Email campaigns are an effective, low-cost way to leverage automation and personalization, but marketers need to be careful not to clog consumer inboxes. Instead, they should focus on offering relevant and valuable content that doesn’t involve using intrusive data.

Most consumers are familiar with receiving personalized content based on an action, such as an online purchase, that features a related product or service. Using transactional data to send automated, personalized emails can be less intrusive since it’s a natural, and at this point expected, component of the relationship.

Marketers can also use geographical data, such as a customer’s zip code or address, to deliver personalized content, like creating a segmented list of customers and offering them discounts to nearby events. Although consumers dislike when brands bombard them with irrelevant, generic messaging, they also don’t like overly personal messages that infringe on their privacy.

Respect Consumer Privacy

Research shows that 81 percent of consumers want brands to get to know them and understand when to approach them, but not at the expense of their privacy. There is a fine line between highly relevant content and tactics that take marketing personalization too far.

For example, sending mass emails to consumers with the same promotions or offers isn’t an effective strategy. Consumer interests vary significantly. Marketers should pay attention to their target audience and consider whether the interaction will make them feel special or unsettled. Customer data can be used effectively, but content that’s too personalized can disturb customers, thus putting them off the brand.

Enhance the Customer Experience

It’s crucial that marketers use technology to improve the consumer experience, rather than eliminate the human touch. For instance, British grocery chain Sainsbury’s delivered an exceptional customer experience with its “This Time It’s Ultra Personalized!” campaign. The store used smartphone location data to provide personalized offers to customers through their mobile devices as they walked around the store. Not only did the campaign promote in-store offers, but it helped the company gain insights about how people navigated the aisles. As a result, Sainsbury’s was able to make better merchandising decisions and improve its in-store customer experience. Marketers must remember that relationships are crucial in business and that automation tools provide additional support.

Combine Automation and Human Touch

There are many ways marketers can mix automation and personalization, such as inserting tags to add customers’s names in emails to make them feel like the message addresses them individually. Going a step further, marketers can encourage team members to interact with potential customers by making calls, sending emails or requesting a connection on social media.

For example, if a visitor downloads content from the brand’s website, it’s a good idea to have someone on the team reach out personally, immediately. According to an oft-cited Lead Response Management Study, waiting more than 10 minutes to follow up decreased the odds of securing a lead by as much as 400 percent.

If automation and personalization are going to be effective, it’s important to find a way to balance the two. Overdoing automation can make brand messages seem robotic and irrelevant. Likewise, getting too personal can overwhelm consumers. A successful relationship between consumers and brands ultimately relies on the right blend.

Feature Image Credit: Maskot | Getty Images 

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Co-Founder and CEO of Gain

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11 Trends That Will Shape Marketing In 2019

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Sourced from Forbes

Building brand awareness and successfully interacting with consumers is a crucial part of doing business today. Customers enjoy and expect a personalized experience, and delivering just that will set you apart from your competition.

Voice search and live videos were just two of the methods marketers explored to improve consumer interactions and brand awareness in 2018. As innovations in technology and ideas come forward, 2019 is also sure to see its share of trends having an impact on marketing. Below, 11 Forbes Agency Council members shared their predictions for the year ahead.

Members of Forbes Agency Council offer insights on what marketing trends to expect in 2019.Photos courtesy of the individual members.

1. A Bigger Role For AI In Personalization And Automation

We are all watching the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) in marketing and how it affects our clients’ relationships with consumers. As a company that focuses on bringing out emotional connections through physical environments, we’ll see AI play an even bigger role for brands as they look to personalize and automate more digital and traditional communications. – Jessica Reznick, We’re Magnetic

2. Smart Speaker Advertising Opportunities

Smart speakers and voice assistant devices are more affordable than ever before, making them a huge potential marketing tool in the upcoming year. As the relationship between big tech and the consumer grows deeper, marketers can more effectively reach their target audiences with personalized messaging and content. Expect to see more ad opportunities surrounding smart speakers in 2019. – Timothy Nichols, ExactDrive, Inc.

3. Growth In Content Marketing

Content marketing will always have a strong impact because of the exposure and backlinks you can receive for your brand. Writing interesting content and marketing it to influencers is a win-win. You are helping people with solution-oriented content, and the influencers help your exposure and outreach so it’s widely seen by the right audience and shared with their peers. – Peter Boyd, PaperStreet Web Design

4. A Turn To The Human Side Of Marketing

We are fortunate to live in an age of advancing technology, but we run a risk of oversaturating our market with off-the-shelf tools that gather faceless data and create ineffective content. Marketing has a remarkable power to inspire audiences. Instead of an influx of new tech to adopt, I predict we’ll embrace a deeper understanding of human behavior that will foster more meaningful relationships. – Hamid Ghanadan, LINUS

5. Integrated Online, Social And Mobile Marketing

2019 will be all about the integration of online, social and mobile marketing. Many businesses have dabbled in one or all of these marketing strategies, but true success in the year ahead will be marked by a fully integrated marketing program that incorporates all three. This will eliminate redundancies, increase efficiency and fully leverage content across these three major players. – Laura Cole, Vivial

6. The Growth Of Micro-Influencers

As influencer-tracking technologies continue to improve, brands are becoming better equipped at fielding and managing large networks of high-engagement, low-following micro influencers for their campaigns. This largely untapped market will soon allow for more brands to avoid the significant costs of mid- to high-level influencers and invest in more down-to-earth and relatable influencer marketing. – Jordan Edelson, Appetizer Mobile LLC

7. Audiences Made Part Of Brand Stories

The ability to engage with audiences (that is, making audiences part of the brand story) will have a huge impact. The less friction there is to engagement, the more connected people feel. Brands that are more willing to interact with customers publicly will have a strong impact—and brands that can show how this engagement influences their products and services will make an even bigger impact. – Bernard May, National Positions

8. Thought Leadership

Audiences seek expertise, critical insight and ways to be better at all points of interest. Experiential and interactive engagement with a brand is the future of consumer-brand connectivity. From live video, to recorded advice, to content with real-time responses, to contests and beyond, it’s about offering information and encouraging feedback from stakeholders in a way that establishes trust. – Scott Kellner, GPJ Experience Marketing

9. Transparency As Key To Winning Customers

Technology is giving us so many new tools and platforms that sometimes we forget that communication always happens between human beings. Brands are groups of people who try to communicate with other persons: their customers. In 2019, I expect transparency to be the key to winning the hearts of consumers, who will reward those brands that share their values in an authentic and transparent way. – Daniela Pavan, The Ad Store New York

10. Quality Trumping Quantity In Marketing

Content marketing has been preached to death by most marketers. Content marketing is important, but oftentimes companies are capitalizing on this strategy with over-optimized and bland content that is largely regurgitated from other companies doing the same thing. In 2019, I believe we will get more discerning and choose low-volume, high-quality content instead of high-volume, low-quality. – Brandon Stapper, Nonstop Signs

11. Customers Empowered As Brand Ambassadors

By utilizing tools like YotPo and BazaarVoice, we can now chalk up a percentage of a marketing campaign to leveraging our customers as brand ambassadors by asking them to share info on a product to their own networks. This helps bypass “influencer marketing” to an extent and lets us empower our customers to do the talking. – Loren Baker, Foundation Digital

Forbes Agency Council is an invitation-only, fee-based organization for executives in successful public relations, media strategy, creative and advertising agencies. Find out if you qualify at forbesagencycouncil.com/qualify. Questions about an article? [email protected]

Sourced from Forbes

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