If you say “email automation,” most people will immediately think of marketing emails and lead nurturing. Although email automation is primarily designed for interacting with customers, it is also useful for coordinating with internal staff.
The likelihood of closing a deal in business-to-business lead generation is proportional to the speed with which a company responds to a lead. That’s why it’s crucial for sales teams to be updated immediately whenever they receive a new lead.
This means that the sales team needs as much information as possible about the lead, such as how they have previously interacted with marketing materials, in order to have an engaging and productive conversation.
Delays can occur if the lead notification process is handled manually, for example if a member of the marketing team has to send an email with the lead information. If this happens, there is a lower chance that the lead will become a paying customer.
This is made easier with the aid of automated email systems.
In its simplest form, marketing automation software notifies the appropriate people via email whenever a new lead is received. There’s a possibility that the management team in charge of sales and marketing will all receive the same email at the same time.
It’s efficient, as it lets everyone on the team know instantly who’s in charge, but missteps are still possible. Team members still need to communicate with one another via email or over the phone to share the marketing history of this lead, including the content they’ve downloaded, the pages they’ve visited on your website, and so on.
All of this can be handled by automated email systems for a more streamlined and effective workflow.
First, the system will be configured in such a way that new leads are automatically routed to the person responsible for following up with them based on criteria such as the region in which they originated.
To continue, a history of the prospect’s actions can be sent to them in the form of an automated email. The designated team member can gauge the lead’s interest and learn more about the lead’s challenges and passions in this way.
To conclude, once a lead has been assigned to a specific team member, that person can opt to receive additional automated emails that will aid in keeping track of valuable online lead actions. They could, for instance, opt to receive daily emails detailing the online activities of their allotted leads. They could also opt to be notified via email whenever a prospective customer visits the site.
One can see the progression from this to other ways in which email automation aids internal teams and procedures.
- Lead management process has been streamlined.
- Tighter coordination between marketing and sales.
- An increased velocity of leads responding.
- Success in making sales increases more quickly.
Internally, emails can be used for a variety of purposes, including nurturing programmes for employees, contractors, and suppliers.
Have a new employee joining the team? All of their onboarding can be handled with a series of automated emails.
Organizing drives to promote internal promotions? Manage applicants by sending them automated emails.
Provide a plan to boost business? Send out automated emails updating people on progress and benefits.
One piece of advice from a marketing automation professional is to keep your internal contacts and your external prospects/leads/customers very, very separate. You shouldn’t make it complicated to analyse your marketing email database by storing all of your contacts in one place.
Email automation has many practical applications beyond simply communicating with customers and prospects. My goal in writing this article was to provide you with some guidelines for optimising your marketing automation tool and enhancing your company’s internal operations.