Increased use of the Internet as well as smartphones is also increasingly changing consumer behavior. With increasing digitization of channels and touchpoints, customers today are informed better than ever and thus harder to acquire. To register, evaluate and understand consumer behavior digitally too, persons in charge of marketing must today form targeted segments and create an accordingly coordinated strategy for potential customer touchpoints, in order to address customers on the right channel at the right time with the right offer, while nonetheless refraining from inundating them with e-mails or push-messages.
Marketing automation solutions help keep track of actions in the channels and develop the right multi-step strategy for customers. But which factors must be considered when introducing such a solution?
The different solutions of marketing automation tools support planning, implementation and analysis of processes, and represent significant added value for CRM as well as marketing departments and organizations. They help achieve, on multiple online channels, more effective and personalized communication, execution of multi-tiered campaigns, and more efficient automation of repetitive and standardized campaign processes. This reduces fault occurrence and saves expensive resources.
Marketing automation tools can generally be assigned four main tasks:
In the first step, it is useful to determine the internal degree of maturity. Which processes are manual, which are already partially automated, which processes are still completely missing? In which direction does the company want to evolve? Here, too, it is useful to evolve slowly and step-by-step; the way to an entirely self-learning and automated system can be long, whether technically, professionally or organizationally.
During provider evaluation, the following aspects must always be kept in mind: Definition of professional and technical requirements for the solution, and feasibility of the channels to be linked (e.g. channels such as call center or mobile push). Compiling a project team (e.g. consisting of IT, CRM) can help merge requirements, create common synergies and select a satisfactory solution for all.
The time frame of the project should also be considered (regarding by when the decision should be made, and by when the solution be ready to use). A maximum budget including internal and external implementation expenditure and license fees should be planned; provision of data management and definition of data strategy should also be planned in advance. Use cases created in advance should be shown live, in addition to several references, during the provider's presentation.
Implementation of data management as part of the campaign solution should be defined in advance; this includes selection of the necessary customer master data, transaction or contract data, as well as dynamic and behavioral data from the order or ERP system. If there are many data sources, creation of a centrally integrated 360-degree view should be considered. The following diagram shows the functional reference architecture of a CRM / customer intelligence landscape:
The following checklist is meant to help select and introduce the right marketing automation solution, taking into account the most important factors:
The solution is still newly in use, the procedures are uncommon, other and perhaps new persons now participate in the marketing processes, some of which have become shorter, whereas others take (even) longer. After some period of adjustment, introduction of marketing automation should be checked as to whether certain things have improved:
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Domain Lead Customer Engagement & MarTech
Interactions with customers in the field of energy supply are rare – a single contact a year is not uncommon. Best possible contact management is correspondingly important. This project focuses on the communication channel comprising the inbound call center.
In our series titled "The next generation of CRM – May the MarTech be with you", we have already explained the marketing technology trend's actual sustainability, the dos and don'ts to be observed during introduction, and the means of identifying one's own MarTech maturity level.
In this article, we will next take a look at the MarTech architecture – our map on the mission through the MarTech universe. Because precisely this aspect is becoming increasingly technical, complex and confusing. In our digital world, customers have numerous options at their disposal – and their demands in terms of customer experience are rising. But digitization is also bringing changes for marketers. Though the traces which customers leave behind along digital contact channels such as an online shop, app or website allow very versatile use – they also increase the complexity of marketing.
It's a done deal: The digital product passport (DPP) is coming. It's quite an elaborate affair, but also a huge opportunity for marketing and sales! As part of a planned Ecodesign Directive, the EU will, from 2027, oblige companies in almost all sectors which manufacture, commission or sell goods and products in the EU to introduce the DPP. Experts predict that five trillion DPPs will be issued annually across the EU in the future. This figure gives an idea of the implications of the EU's decision. Which legally mandatory information the DPP must contain is still being clarified. But one thing is already clear: The DPP will massively change the economy – and in doing so, it offers a completely new touchpoint to the customer.
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