Many years ago, past the mists of time I ran a technical support crew (a cosmopolitan and fab’ bunch) and an automated marketing tool of sorts was about to play out some havoc. Something was up with the management. We, team leaders, were called into a meeting. ‘O’ dear something is amiss.
‘White Space’
A director went through the call stats dashboard. You know the thing, an operator on ‘busy wrap up shows up red and those ready to take a call was coded white.
The point the director was making was there was far too much ‘white space’ where operators were doing nothing. Look at all these people doing nothing…too much white space.
That’s what the automated dashboard told him. So, was he right?
No.
Various team leaders pointed out to the director that the operators WERE DOING PLENTY. From teaching themselves more about the (software) products, to answering email enquiries, analysing files and chatting about the business.
Automated Marketing Point 1
Is great. It is to a certain extent but when a tool is displaying a ‘statistic’ and people base their thoughts on that ‘stat’ it is a bad thing.
Automation is fabulous, automated email ‘nurture engines’ work for a business and if done correctly benefit the subscriber.
Combining your ecommerce, CRM and email platform are a joy and vital to a business.
Automated Marketing Point 2
I use an email solution for a client that makes me shake my head at the lack of thought and arrogance of the developers. OK. That’s harsh. It is built by developers who think in a very narrow fashion. It’s not built for the operators.
When I compare this platform to something like Mailchimp or Aweber I despair. Because it’s what was once described as ‘bloatware’ like every product Microsoft created. How much of Word to you use? That’s right, about 10%.
Automated Marketing Point 3
When thought is given to the users everyone wins. The platform gains customers. The business spreads the platform brand through word of mouth. The business using the platform wins as everything is easy. The customers win as they get what they want in a timely fashion.
My Marketing Automation Hero
Currently this is Buzzsprout. This is a hosting service for podcasts. The interface? Simple, logical and does everything I want. I can login and find what I want. If I don’t find it the help system is built for ease of use (and their customer care team is excellent). Buzzsprout automates a RSS feed that populates Apple Podcasts, Amazon, Google, Spotify etc.
I would estimate I use over 80% of its capabilities (I’ll be using more as Jelly Trumpet, my comedy podcast about creativity) grows and we publish more episodes.
Marketing Automation Irritations
The Chatbot
The bl***y chatbots. Yes. I have had good experiences but many of them are built to annoy you. What do you think you are doing? A standard set of answers is fine BUT then you need a trained customer care agent.
Chatbots make people angry. Good customer care teams will listen to an unhappy customer, solve their needs and turn that customer into an evangelist for your business.
SEO Tools
I have used the majority of them including Majestic, Linkdex, Moz and SEMrush. They are all fantastic in their own way.
The problem comes when you rely on their algorithms and detach yourself from your visitors / prospects and customers.
Tools like these don’t tell you everything, they can’t. O’ they are clever and save time but they are created with a purpose and that purpose can mask your intelligence and creative, idea making business.
All my clients receive a dashboard of stats every week or month (that’s a big word for a spreadsheet) and that dashboard collects stats from different services. Why do I do that (spending hours each week)?
I do it because then I am like a prospect. I see things and have ideas that I can turn into action. Tools will try to do this but they can’t be everything to everyone…
Only you, people can make a difference.
Conclusion
Use automation to save time. Use the best tools BUT keep yourself, your business and your audience in the forefront of all you do. People buy from people.
Amen,
About Conversion Detectives
Conversion Detectives is a full service digital marketing agency in Hertfordshire.
We find the best quality traffic for your website and convert more of that traffic into sales or sales leads.
Services
Digital Marketing Strategy | Creative Content Marketing | Email Marketing |
Lead Generation | Content Strategy | Social Media Marketing |
Video Marketing | SEO (Basics) | SEM |
Shopify Marketing
About Post Author
