In this episode of our Centric Biz and Tech Talks, we talk to Michael McNeal about Marketing Automation.
How do you define marketing? Maybe you think it’s a continuous cycle of campaigns to customers, with metrics tracking hits, responses, and – hopefully – sales or revenue. Maybe, if you’re especially savvy, you successfully target a campaign at high-quality leads. But often time, it’s no more than a guess.
Well, welcome to the 21st century of marketing! In this episode of Centric Biz and Tech Talks, we talk with Michael McNeal, our National Marketing Operations Lead, about the journey into modern marketing and marketing automation.
We talk about how marketing automation drives continuous campaigns, with communication focused on the life cycle of a customer.
For example, let’s say you’re doing marketing for Acme Motors, and you’ve just sold a car to Jane Consumer. You don’t need to tell her all about your new models right now: she just bought a car, and she’s not likely in a position to buy another one right away. What’s more, she’s probably pretty excited about the vehicle she recently bought from you– telling her about next year’s model with its snazzy new features is only likely to create a sense of disappointment.
Instead of blasting her with news about the latest models, you can use marketing automation to send her a different message– such as how exciting it is to be part of the secret society of cool people who bought an Acme Motors car!
As time passes, you can use marketing automation to share maintenance specials with her, and then gradually bring in news about newer models. So, when Jane Consumer starts thinking about her next new car, your communications are perfectly in sync with her needs.
As the podcast continues, we also talk about how machine learning and artificial intelligence play a role here, along with the technology that’s out there for it. Critically, we dive into what it takes to make marketing automation successful for an organization.
Join us to see what the future holds in store!
John Kackley is a senior manager and program manager at Centric Chicago.
