The continued growth in technology means that your business now has more ways than ever to generate leads. This, of course, should mean more sales, and more profits in your bank account. However, with new technology comes a changing digital marketing landscape that you need to keep up with. One of those ever-expanding areas is in marketing automation, and if you’re not doing it already, don’t worry. It’s not too late!
Here’s a few reasons why you should consider marketing automation, and some of the best tools for small businesses to use.
Why Automate Small Business Marketing?
Marketing automation is all about generating leads and converting them into sales with as little human input as possible. Anybody who has tried to manage their own small business marketing will tell you it’s a full-time job in itself trying to keep up with social media, email marketing and customer enquiries. You’re running a business, so you simply don’t have time for everything.
That’s where marketing automation software comes in. There are some great tools on the market today, but they do have varied uses. One marketing software could be great for your retail business, but not for a B2B operation. Luckily, we know a thing or two about which tools are best suited for different business types. Here’s a snapshot of some popular tools we love to use when helping our clients take control of their marketing automation.
Drip
We see Drip as a highly effective automated marketing solution, particularly for businesses in the e-commerce field. If you’re using Shopify, WordPress or Magento, you’ll also find that Drip integrates easily into your website and is easier to use than some of its more complex competitors. If you want email marketing automation, strong workflows, social media audience integration and the ability to conduct sophisticated campaigns without a huge expense, Drip should definitely be on your radar.
ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign is a comprehensive email marketing, marketing automation and small business customer relationship marketing (CRM) tool. We feel ActiveCampaign is well suited to B2B companies who need to perform basic CRM functionality. It offers a lot of flexibility, however if you don’t have a lot of technical knowledge, you may find it difficult to take advantage of all of ActiveCampaign’s benefits.
Hubspot
Hubspot is one of the more popular tools out there, and for good reason. It packs a punch with everything you can think of at your fingertips. Whether you want forms, campaigns, landing pages, chat, SEO tools or even more complex rules and customer experience pathways for different types of customers, Hubspot lets you do it.
Due to how comprehensive Hubspot is as a marketing and CRM tool, it can be difficult to master. But with the right help, the possibilities are nearly endless.
Get Response
If you’re looking for basic features such as autoresponder emails and newsletters, Get Response represents excellent value. You can access a range of different features for an increased monthly fee, making it the perfect tool when you only want to pay for what you’ll use.
Among the expansive list of features accessible is CRM, landing pages, email marketing, autoresponders, list building tools and even e-commerce functions. Like most tools out there however, you’ll find the simple functions quite easy to implement but the more in-depth you go, the more you might need some assistance.
Let Us Help with Marketing Automation
While there’s certainly some easy to use marketing automation tools out there, you can’t beat expert help. At Fly Paper Planes, it’s our job to get the most out of your digital marketing automation tools. That’s because we know your time is better spent doing what you’re already great at. Contact us here to see how we can help take your business to the next level with affordable, practical marketing automation solutions.
