Did you know that 51% of businesses use marketing automation? For B2B companies that don’t use the technology, over half plan to implement it. It’s easy to see why with 75% of email revenue generated from triggered emails.
The power of marketing automation is its ability to create customized experiences. Sending out a specific email when a customer asks for it puts them in the driver’s seat of that experience. And that’s just the beginning of what it can do for your customer. What about for your team?
In this article, you’ll see the big-picture effect that marketing automation can have on your organization from the inside out. It could be just the thing to take your company to the next level.
Improve ROI Across All Channels with Marketing Automation
Companies have been using automation to boost productivity and revenue for decades. Since marketing automation can lower fixed and variable costs, margins widen and profits grow.
And it’s not just for large-scale operations— creating a marketing and sales productivity system (MSP) impacts the bottom line for brands of all sizes.
Does your team send out standard follow-up emails manually? How about scheduling meetings with clients via back and forth emails or text messages? Minor efficiency improvements can have a significant financial impact on an organization. Imagine if your entire team improves its productivity.
Despite the advantages of marketing automation, most companies haven’t implemented a strategy of their own.
HubSpot Marketing Automation: Sequences and Workflows
HubSpot offers two types of automation: sequences and workflows. Both will help you create a robust sales and marketing process that will save your team time, letting them focus on growth rather than repetitive tasks.
HubSpot Sequences
You’ll need a Sales or Service Hub Professional to be able to use sequences. It's geared toward sales professionals who are regularly following up with prospective clients.
If your brand has reps who are on the phone and deal with clients regularly, implementing sequence automation can help them gauge client interest, making sure they invest time on the right folks. Also, it will help streamline the follow-up process. All in all, productivity will be higher.
How Sequences Work:
- Follow-Up Emails: With sequences, you can send automatic follow-up emails triggered after certain events occur. This could be a series of emails sent to move a prospect through the sales process.
- Follow-Up Tasks: Following up is time-consuming. In addition to sending automatic emails, sequences allow you to cue up tasks for your team, like make a call at a specific time or other to-do list items. An example is a reschedule request if a customer missed a meeting or updating a spreadsheet.
- Pre-Made Sequences: HubSpot gives you a range of pre-made templates, making it easy to compose a thoughtful email cue. A few examples are product demo requests, conference follow-ups, and appointments. They’re also customizable, allowing you to modify each message, number of emails, and delivery duration.
- Unenrolling from a Sequence: HubSpot allows you to set the case, or set of variables, that will end the sequence. If a prospect books a follow-up call, the sequence will stop. The system won’t barrage the prospect and leaves them in control of the next interaction.
HubSpot Workflows
To use workflows, you’ll need Marketing Hub Professional. There are many ways to create email automation using workflows. Let’s explore examples for each hub.
How Workflows Work:
- Enrollment trigger: Refine the audience for a trigger, like high-engagement leads visiting a pricing page.
- Create follow-up action: Choose how the workflow will respond to an action. HubSpot gives you flexible options like sending an email, creating deals, tasks, or tickets.
- Branching: Use conditional logic—if/then statements to map out what happens when a prospect engages or does not engage.
- Life Cycle Update: When a lead engages, the workflow automatically changes the lead's life cycle stage within HubSpot. It can also generate a task for the sales team to follow up with that lead.
- Follow-Up Flow: When a lead doesn’t engage, you can craft a follow-up email that will be sent out 48 hours later.
- Workflow Activity: HubSpot keeps track of workflow history within every lead contact page. This allows your team to review the engagement from email automation and follow-up activities.
- Automated Email Campaigns: Unlike sequences, workflows send an entire email series over a given time. This makes them useful for building buzz around product launches or automating an on-going webinar campaign.
- Service Tickets: Workflows allow you to create support tickets that are automatically sent to the right team member.
Difference Between Sequences and Workflows
Sequences and workflows achieve the same goal: marketing automation. One difference is that leads will need to be manually enrolled into a sequence, and emails are sent from the connected HubSpot inbox.
Workflows, on the other hand, are automatically enrolled and are sent out through marketing email. Sequences are geared to the sales team. Workflows offer a broader range of applications for the marketing and sales team.
Benefits of Marketing Automation
Sales can use sequences to qualify leads more efficiently, directing attention to contacts most likely to purchase. By using active lists, you can streamline segmentation by moving over leads to the correct campaign, ensuring that your customers are getting the right message.
For the customer, marketing automation gives them the flexibility to choose how and when a brand communicates with them. It makes them the source of input rather than a receiver of one-sided communication.
Making Marketing Automation a Priority
Using marketing automation can increase productivity by saving time from routine tasks. That allows your team to focus on opportunities that drive results, like getting new customers and keeping old ones happy.
It’s the small improvements that add up to the big wins. If you improve the process across your organization, revenue will inevitably go up.
Ready to make marketing automation a priority in your business?
Jason Dzamba is a Growth Marketer at Lean Labs with a background as a productivity strategist, entrepreneur, and project manager. He hosts the Get Anything Done podcast and helps leaders level-up their productivity. His creative outlet is painting abstract art and producing music. He lives in Miami, Florida with his three kids.
