Mediastreet
Tag

Email Campaigns

Browsing
In News

4 Ways to Automate and Streamline Your Marketing With Advanced Tech

No Comments

By Frank Landman

When marketing becomes too much to handle, most businesses assume that they need to hire an employee or outsource to a contractor. But don’t be so quick to grow your payroll. It’s possible that you could automate many of these tasks with streamlined digital solutions.

4 Powerful Ways to Automate Your Marketing

By its very nature, marketing is an activity of scale. In order to successfully build up your business and grow your brand, you have to get in front of as many people as possible. But if you’re trying to handle all of your marketing efforts manually, you’re probably exhausted. There’s simply too much for any one person (or department) to handle alone. And this is where automation comes into play.

Automation – which is basically the strategic combination of software, applications, and artificial intelligence to streamline time-consuming processes and produce results at scale – is a powerful tool that is not deployed nearly enough by small businesses and growing brands. But if you can pick the right spots to automate your marketing, it could change everything.

Whether you’re nursing a small start-up or you have a booming business that’s bursting at the seams, the following solutions could provide exactly what you need at this precise moment in your company’s life:

1. Automate Email Campaigns

Did you know that more than 68 percent of businesses spend seven days or more on the production of just a single email? (It takes 14 percent of businesses a month or longer to push out an email!)

Or did you know that most companies are in the process of producing between one and five emails at a time?

We’ll let you do the math…but that’s a lot of time spent building and sending emails. And yet nobody is denying the value of email. So the question becomes, how do you automate your email campaigns so that you can enjoy the benefits without unnecessarily wasting hundreds or thousands of man-hours each year?

One answer is to leverage an email marketing platform that allows you to use automations and triggers to streamline these touchpoints. Any major email marketing platform is going to have similar features, but we’ll use a tool called ActiveCampaign to illustrate how effective this can be.

Within the ActiveCampaign platform, you can create individual campaigns that are automatically managed using “triggers.” A trigger is any event that your business can track – like subscribes, unsubscribes, form submissions, email opens, web pages visited, links clicked, purchases made, or specific dates (like a birthday or customer anniversary).

Once one of these triggers is “tripped,” you can create an automated email sequence that’s sent out to that user. This sequence can include anywhere from one message to a dozen or more (sent out at predetermined times and intervals).

Once you draft the email copy and create the campaign, it all happens automatically…at scale. Whether you have 10 people on your email list or 100,000, everything happens flawlessly. It can literally save you thousands of hours every year.

2. Automate Content Promotion

Content promotion is another time-consuming element of marketing that we hear a lot of people complain about. And while it is time-consuming, it can be automated without much effort. You simply have to develop a plan and create the right processes on the front end.

Here’s one dead-simple process you can replicate:

  • Step 1: Sign up for a social media management tool like Buffer or Hootsuite, which allows you to manage all of your accounts (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc.) from one place.
  • Step 2: Create an account for a tool called Zapier. This is an automation service that makes it easy to connect apps and create powerful automated workflows. It works great for marketing and content promotion.
  • Step 3: Create an automation process (called a “Zap”) that connects your blog’s RSS feed to your Buffer or Hootsuite account. Optimize it so that your blog post is shared to each of your social networks every time the RSS feed refreshes with a new blog post.

That’s just one example of how you can automate content promotion using Zapier. There are literally dozens of other ways to spread your content without lifting a finger. If you haven’t explored these opportunities yet, you’re doing yourself a disservice.

3. Automate Customer Feedback

Customer feedback is the lifeblood of successful companies. Unfortunately, most businesses don’t collect enough data to produce meaningful insights and takeaways. And of the companies that do, just a small percentage are able to make sense of the data they collect. Automating customer feedback and analysis could be a vital decision for your business moving forward.

There are plenty of ways to automate your feedback loops, but we’ll touch on just a couple. The first approach is to use an advanced SMS text survey software like Delighted to procure instant customer feedback in a convenient and streamlined process. Here’s how it works:

  • You craft a simple survey within the Delighted platform and initiate a campaign.
  • Each customer receives the survey in an SMS format.
  • Customers reply with a numerical score to each question.
  • The Delighted platform responds with a free-form follow-up question.
  • Customers can provide a more detailed explanation in their own words.
  • Data is organized for easy analysis.

If you have a Zapier account, you can trigger surveys to be sent out after specific actions are completed in a customer’s lifecycle.

You may also find it helpful to automate feedback related to customer churn. (This is especially important for subscription businesses that rely on customer retention to sustain revenue.) There are tools that can be leveraged to send out exit surveys any time a customer cancels a subscription and/or fails to upgrade from a free trial. These surveys won’t do anything to keep the customer, but they can give you a good idea of why people are leaving.

A third option is to automate your feedback analysis by using a “customer sentiment” tool. Services like MonkeyLearn can “read” your feedback and effortlessly organize all responses into general theme-based buckets. This lets you identify and group common pain points, which makes it easier to track customer sentiment and address pressing issues as quickly as possible.

4. Automate Lead Generation

You might assume that automation stops at lead generation, but you’d be wrong. While there are certain aspects of lead generation that can’t be handled by an algorithm, this list is growing smaller by the year. Thanks to advanced technology and artificial intelligence, lead generation automation is more practical than it’s ever been.

Chatbots are among the fastest-growing technologies in this niche of advanced tech. They can be used to automate and enhance the overall customer experience by increasing engagement and initiating high-value touchpoints that would otherwise go ignored.

One of the more impressive use cases for chatbots involves the use of Facebook’s native Messenger platform. Because regardless of how much experience you have or what type of skills you possess, you can create interactive chatbots with no coding required.

Facebook chatbots are basically automated customer service agents/sales reps that empower your business to engage with Facebook prospects at scale. And while you’re probably not going to close deals on Facebook Messenger, these bots are excellent “setters.” They can indoctrinate prospects into the funnel and provide a steady flow of pre-qualified leads to your actual sales team.

Here are some examples of powerful ways you can leverage Facebook Messenger chatbots to assist with lead generation:

  • Blast out content and share it with your most loyal followers
  • Conduct quick webinar signups and get people to show up to live events
  • Automate your drip campaigns and nurture leads
  • Send out appointment and event reminders so that people never miss an engagement
  • Provide powerful customer service (including answering FAQs and giving out directions)

As mentioned, you can build your own bots for free (and it’s relatively easy for anyone to learn). Rather than having to code, you simply create logical workflows that operate on an if/then basis. These bots can take some time to build (depending on how intricate you want to go), but will ultimately save time when deployed on a large-scale basis.

Reduce Bloat With Automation

Automation can’t solve everything, but it can provide relief in areas where you need it most. Advanced technology, like the solutions outlined in this article, prevents bloat and allows you to scale without having to continually add more people to the payroll. It’s an efficient way to manage resources and grow in a timely and sustainable manner that respects both the brand and the bottom line.

You don’t have to implement each of these solutions today, but it would be wise to take action as soon as possible. Pick one area where you stand to improve the most and put that strategy to work.

Then, once you have that piece in place, move on to another one. It’s through this diplomatic yet proactive approach that you’ll find results.

By Frank Landman

Frank is a freelance journalist who has worked in various editorial capacities for over 10 years. He covers trends in technology as they relate to business.

Sourced from readwrite

Read More
By
In Uncategorized

Is that message really from Amazon? Tech giant cracks down on fraudulent email campaigns

No Comments

By

Amazon this week filed lawsuits in three states, aiming to squash what it describes as fraudulent affiliate marketing schemes driven by email campaigns purporting to come from the Seattle e-commerce giant.

The suits allege that companies in Georgia, Michigan and Texas wrongly used Amazon’s branding in spam campaigns designed to send traffic to fake Amazon-branded surveys run by online marketers. Those marketers then made money off advertising impressions, according to the suits.

It’s part of a broader effort by the company to crack down on fraud. In May, the company filed suit against companies in Washington state and India, alleging that they tricked new users of Echo speakers and other Alexa devices into paying for purported technical support. Other actions by the company have targeted everything from get-rich-quick scams to fake customer reviews to sales of knock-off products.

The latest suits were filed against Michigan-based companies Sendwell and Lakeshore Development Group; Georgia-based PhatLogic; Texas-based Omala Internet Solutions; and Germany-based SpreadyourAds.

“Amazon has no tolerance for schemes fraudulently using our brand, and we are appalled at these bad actors’ attempts to deceive our customers,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement. “We are advocating for customers by holding these bad actors accountable to the fullest extent of the law.”

Amazon says it has shut down the campaigns and has secured an agreement from the Michigan defendants to stop using the company’s brand.

The company filed a similar lawsuit last year against an Illinois-based affiliate marketing company, First Impression Interactive, and won prohibitions against use of the Amazon brand by that company.

Separately, Amazon says it has stopped a series of fake Amazon-branded email campaigns from companies and people in Colorado and California, with the people involved agreeing to stop using the company’s trademarks or brands

The affiliate marketing schemes are different than recent phishing scams that caught police attention last month, using purported Amazon branding to trick recipients into divulging personal information.

Amazon says customers should report unsolicited emails and texts here, and the company has more information about decoding suspicious emails, phone calls, and webpages here. The company has previously filed similar lawsuits to prevent scammers from fooling Amazon customers.

Feature Image: Amazon alleges that several companies fraudulently used its brand in affiliate marketing schemes to get consumers to fill out fake surveys. These images were included in lawsuits filed by the company.

By

Taylor Soper is GeekWire’s managing editor, responsible for coordinating the newsroom, planning coverage, and editing stories. A native of Portland, Ore., and graduate of the University of Washington, he was previously a GeekWire staff reporter, covering beats including startups and sports technology. Follow him @taylor_soper and email [email protected].

Sourced from GeekWire

Read More
By
In News

5 Outstanding Ways To Use Personalization In Your Email Campaigns

No Comments

By Steven Bowen

Email marketing is being utilized for targeting large audiences for a long time. It has been a fruitful way to create new customers and extend the brand reach. The organizations use email marketing tactics to promote their brands and services and persuade customers through it. The design and elements of an email is paramount to achieve the goals of successful email marketing campaigns. The content you put in emails can make or break the success of your campaign.

In addition to content, personalization has become a key ingredient in creating top-of-the-class emails these days. This is also known as one-to-one marketing or marketing to individuals tactic for email marketing. Thankfully, you can personalize emails according to the target audience and send specific messages that suit their interests. By doing this, you can build better emails that would have a greater positive impact on your marketing campaign. Following are five effective uses of personalization that boost your email marketing efforts.

 

  1. Customize images

One of the awesome ways to increase click-through rates is by customizing images for the customers. You can personalize the images according to different customer profiles and data. For instance, you can customize the content according to different locations for customers if you have location data. By personalizing images, you can build emails more effective and result-centric.

  1. Personalize content

When creating your email message, you need to be careful with the words you use and the overall tone of the message. The message you create for email should be compelling. You can personalize the subject lines of your emails to ensure better click-through rates. The better the content you write the greater response you will receive. By personalizing the content, you can make the content more attractive.

  1. Custom product recommendations

Your target audience might be interested in products recommended in the emails. However, product recommendations should be based on personal preferences or be relevant to their past purchases. You can incorporate the recent browsing or purchasing history of your customer in email marketing in collaboration with the email service provider.

  1. Customize cart abandonment messages

No business wants to have increasing cart abandonment rate. However, the marketers can strive to reduce the cart abandonment rate by creating personalized cart abandonment emails. By creating and sending these emails may increase the conversion rate and  allow the marketers to re-capture the customers that left earlier. These tailored emails work as an effective reminder for the customers.

  1. Provide personalized offers

By personalizing the offers and deals on your products or services, you can improve the click-through rate of your emails. It increases conversion rate. The customers like offers & deals and when they want to buy a product, it might be useful to show the right offers and deals based on every individual customer. It will make them to buy products from you. There are endless possibilities for personalizing the offers.

Best practices for email personalization

There are lots of benefits of personalization that can be reaped by following the best practices. Following are some of the best practices for personalizing email marketing.

Collect relevant details

In order to personalize the emails in the right way, you must first understand more about your customers. Obtain the relevant information about your customers and understand their preferences. Know who your customer are and how you can serve them effectively. You can conduct survey and ask questions from people to understand them. However, you must not overwhelm audience with tons of questions, simply ask specific questions.

Segment the audience

You can divide your audience into different subgroups based on the location, demographics, customer type, etc. Like if you have a clothing retail shop, you can segment your audience based on gender and add images of people wearing clothes into the email.

Add more elements

When it comes to personalization, marketers often think it of including the recipient’s name. While it is a good aspect and a great start, it is only one element of personalization. So, you need to tailor it further by adding custom content into the email as per the preferences and tastes of your recipients.

Understand the behavior

By looking at the behavior of your recipients, you can understand what factors to include and not include to create effective emails. When you send emails, some customers may not show interest, others show interest and some find your emails engaging. Ascertain the behavior of recipients and then send emails accordingly.

Mind the quantity

You must be careful when dividing your audience into different segments as too many of them can be difficult to manage. Make a broad segmentation and also decide what type of emails you will be sending to specific audience. You won’t like to overwhelm your recipients with too many emails which you could send if there are unmanageable number of segments. On different stages of email marketing, you can try to ascertain what emails and segments your recipients best respond to and then send emails accordingly.

Don’t create negativity

Often recipients get promotional emails immediately after viewing products with subject lines like “We saw you are looking…”, it creates a negativity in recipients’ mind who feel it like their privacy is invaded. There must be some time between product viewing and the receiving the email with a positive subject line.

Wrapping up!

Though email marketing is an effective way for creating new customers and reaching a large audience. Now, personalization make emails more attractive and compelling by letting marketers add a personal touch for every recipient. By creating custom content, adding custom images and do other customization, marketers can make emails more persuasive and improve their click-through rates. With the power of personalization, marketers can design emails that are tailored to the needs and requirements of every individual recipient that provide them a great experience and delight. The marketers can include offers and deals tailored to the requirements of individual customers through personalization.

By Steven Bowen

Steven Bowen is associated with No-Refresh, which is a prominent company providing custom designer tools. The company offers different off-the-self web-to-print designer software for several products. Steven has a good flair for writing and he loves to compose informational and quality articles and blogs for his audience. He writes well-reached and quality content on this area of interests.

Sourced from Promotion World

Read More
By