Author Archives: Anjali Boyer

business, marketing, planning

Is Marketing Automation Right For Your Business ?

How many of you have ever felt like your marketing budget is going down the drain? It’s a familiar feeling among marketers and the C-suite, and it’s not hard to understand why. Most businesses spend their marketing dollars on data collection and management tools, but they still aren’t getting the results they want.

It’s time to take a step back and re-evaluate. Marketing automation can help you to build customer relationships and improve marketing ROI.

It promises to:

-Improve customer engagement through personalized outreach.

-Increase revenue by targeting the right customers at the right time with the right message.

-Reduce customer churn by reducing customer support costs through proactive engagement.

There are plenty of benefits to using marketing automation: it helps you better understand your customers’ needs, gives you more control over your messaging across different platforms, increases efficiency by automating repetitive tasks like sending out newsletters or responding to customer requests for information (like price quotes), and allows employees with more specialized skill sets (like Marketing Heads) to focus on what they do best instead of having to do everything themselves!

But what does this mean for your business? The reason so many companies are struggling with marketing automation is because they don’t know how to leverage it correctly. Did you know that 75% of MarTech budgets are wasted because of bad data?

Why does this happen? 

First, it’s much work. You need to build your data structure and then figure out how to use the tools that come with marketing automation platforms. It takes time, dedication, and patience—but you can do it!

Second, it’s easy to waste money on bad data. Most marketers don’t understand what makes their data valuable or how they can use it effectively as part of their broader strategy. This can lead to all kinds of problems down the road as you try to measure success in terms of leads or sales generated by your efforts—because you won’t have any way of knowing if what you’re measuring is meaningful.

Third, there are many options—too many for most marketers to keep track of them all. Finding the right automation platform for your needs can be overwhelming.

If you’re not sure how you can use marketing automation to improve your business and customer satisfaction, here are some ways you might want to consider.

  1. Use it to make sure your customers are getting the support they need. A well-designed automated email sequence can include tutorials that walk new customers through signing up for their product or service and tips on how to make the most out of it.
  2. Automate your sales emails so that prospects receive the information they need when they need it most. When prospects are ready to buy, they want to know what’s required and how much it will cost. By automating this process, you can save time and money by ensuring all of your sales messages are consistent across channels.
  3. Use automation to engage customers who’ve already converted into paying users by sending them special offers and discounts based on their buying history and frequency of engagement with your brand (e.g., monthly newsletters). The more engaged customers feel with what you offer, the more likely they’ll repeat.
  4. Send automated surveys after each purchase, asking for feedback on the product or service they received from your company. This will help you learn what’s working well, what needs improvement, and where you need to focus your energy next time around.

Marketing automation is expected to grow by more than $4B over the next five years. This means that there is an opportunity for your business to step up and make better decisions about your campaigns and drive results. 

At Allign Marketing, we have the platform and the team to help your business collect, organize, and analyze data in real-time so you can make targeted decisions about how to spend the marketing dollars. Our goal is to help clients like you get the most out of their marketing efforts by making sure they are spending on the proper channels for their goals.

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Three Takeaways from 2021 for Small Businesses

Year ends are a great time to reflect, review, and learn.

Even with a cautious reopening of the economy this year, there were hurdles to clear, including prolonged lockdown, supply chain delays, and pandemic safety measures.

As we approach the new year, we decided to take stock of key tactics that helped ALLign Marketing’s SME clients thrive and grow through the pandemic and beyond.

Be Consistent with Your Online Presence

When the health authorities announced renewed lockdown measures to stunt the spread of the delta variant, it threatened to put a Michigan-based, family-owned senior home care business operations on hold for an indefinite time. It was a period of uncertainty and anxiety for most businesses worldwide.

Instead of buckling to cost-cutting and waiting for the storm to pass, this senior home care business used its downtime tactically to keep its online presence active. The team pitched in with seasonal and situational content to keep their existing and potential clients well-informed and engaged. From effective safety measures for seniors to finding perfect respite care for your loved one – the team implemented a potent mix of blog posts, social media content, and email marketing to keep their brand game strong.

The approach paid off with the business reopening to an appreciative existing client base and a large pool of new clients and recruiting additional team members to service the growing demand.

Make Use of Time Bound Email Campaigns

The supply chain disruption due to covid-19 has had lasting implications for many businesses. The inability to source goods and raw materials from suppliers or manufacturers at a specific price due to lockdown meant low stock and passing down the price increase to the customers.

A client of Allign Marketing specializes in sourcing and supplying tactile warning surfaces to construction projects – an industry sensitive to the supply and cost aspect of procuring materials. They adopted a customer-first approach when they could no longer stem a moderate price increase from their long-standing manufacturing partners. The plan included a workaround promotional campaign targeting their existing audience.

They decided to execute a short-term nurture email campaign to target their customer base who are already in a buying mood or are researching for an upcoming project. The campaign involved hitting them with more emails over a shorter period for top-of-mind awareness during the decision-making process. Few tactics that got them inquiry calls included a transparent messaging on the price increase, offering a time-bound workaround to the price increase, and reemphasizing their authority over an uninterrupted supply of tactile warning products.

Strike While the Iron is Hot

In-person events may seem like a thing of the past during this pandemic. But when the opportunity showed up with a relaxed social restriction this fall, a mental healthcare client wasted no time.

The long-haul lockdown from the last two years has left a considerable population without social support and an unfavorable spike in mental health breakdown. Armed with this knowledge, the client set out to better the isolation and mental health issues with a 2-day in-person event collaborating with the local farmer’s market.

The 2-day event included a community get-together over food and drinks, social activities for kids and families, promoted social, mental, and wellness sessions. The event had a successful conclusion with a strong turnout and offered an incredible platform for the client to establish itself as a leading voice for community mental health.

What’s Next?

The past few years brought to the forefront the inadequacies and the inefficiency of businesses to adapt to large-scale crises. From the above three examples, we have learned that some of the best ways to respond to a problem while building a thriving business are being online, flexible, and embracing change.

Time for Change

Don’t let global and digital disruption derail your revenue stream – stay ahead with new marketing technology.

Connect more efficiently with the trade professionals who buy and install your parts.

Our new technology is designed for the auto aftermarket. It identifies your repair pro audience online when they are researching immediate repair issues. We connect your brand with technicians in real-time.

GROW YOUR BUSINESS: We’ll Build a Custom Trade Audience For You at No Cost

If you are heading to AAPEX this year, message me on LinkedIn. We would be happy to meet up and share some key digital insights for your brand.

 #AAPEX #AAPEX21

What Are You Missing? Building a Foundation for Success.

Do you hold the belief that the foundation of your business success relies on sales? Most business owners do. However, at the end of the day, you must have sales to generate cash flow. However, if your business is struggling, as crazy as it may sound, sales and cash are not always the solution to your problems.

Do you know one important thing you might be missing? …

Building a strong foundation can be the one missing consideration that can destroy your business success. When we describe success we are not talking about high sales and massive cash flow, but more importantly the ability to achieve maximum profitability. This means understanding ALL the elements of your business, as knowing results in complete clarity: With 100% clarity you can make the intentional decisions that will directly impact the potential to increase your profitability. 

We have provided our clients with a step-by-step approach to reach their profit potential:

  1. Re-examine your target audience:
    Are you focused on the right people? Narrowing your audience can help remove excess or futile marketing efforts.
  1. Review current business process:
    Do you have a firm grasp on all the core processes and activities that make your business run? Always remember to include marketing and distribution management in this list.
  1. List all of your resources:
    Are you up to date on essential resources that are required to achieve your business model? Include items like your CRM system, website, and vendors.
  1. Evaluate your business’s key differentiators:
    How do you maintain your edge against the competition? Try to link a value proposition to each product or service you provide.
  1. Identify your key partners:
    How are you leveraging your relationships to achieve your business goals? Explore strategic partnerships, suppliers, and advertising experts.
  1. Develop an enterprise level strategy:
    How are you generating interest, cultivating leads, optimizing your pricing model and maintaining customer loyalty? Take the necessary time to evaluate the entire customer journey.

With these 6 steps you can empower yourself with a comprehensive understanding of all the components that make up your business. This laser-like approach to understanding your complete business plan can lead to maximum profitability, increased revenue, and greater employee retention.  

We can help with any stage of your business growth plan, and enable you to change the value perception of your brand in the marketplace.