How SMBs can Benefit from Social Media Marketing Automation

Social media marketing automation is changing the way businesses communicate with their clients at every level, from customer service to social media management. The biggest concern over automation was that it would destroy personalization, but the reality is quite different. 

Small business owners can benefit from marketing automation, just like big corporations. There are many variations of marketing automation that can help businesses grow. Here we’ll show you some of the ways SMBs can benefit from marketing automation. 

Social Media Marketing Automation Saves Time

Handling social media is a massive task, from not only creating the content but also managing accounts when it comes to comments and feedback. If SMBs embrace social media marketing automation, they’ll see significant improvement in their time management. This way, the Digital Marketing team can prioritize other activities that require critical thinking, such as creating strategies to generate better outcomes.

 Social Media Profiles Remain Updated

Keeping your social media accounts updated is an essential aspect of digital marketing. An updated account will show customers your company is there for them. Utilizing marketing automation will help you keep your company’s social media accounts active without too much effort.

Before automation, companies required many marketers to handle their social media accounts, but this can now be a one-person job. With automation, marketers need only worry about creating captivating content. After that, they can schedule posts to be published automatically.

Automation Means More Personalization

One of the biggest concerns about automation is that your marketing efforts will lose a personalized touch and people won’t be able to connect with your company. This is false. 

Marketing automation can actually boost personalization. Automation doesn’t replace your content; it replaces repetitive and redundant tasks such as publishing, scheduling or audience segmentation. Your team will therefore be able to spend more time creating personalized content when taking advantage of automation.

If you have ever received an email from a brand you like inviting you to assist in a local event, this is marketing automation at work. Marketing automation systems identify customers’ locations and preferences. This way, companies can send the right content to the right people, which means a more personalized experience.

If you want to learn more about targeting your customers, you can easily study Machine Learning, which is responsible for the sentiment analysis that aligns customers’ interests with your company’s products.

Better Outcomes

According to a recent survey conducted by Constant Contact, 74 percent of businesses that use data-driven marketing automation have seen a significant improvement in their overall performance. Marketing automation takes companies to a new level by providing more personalized experiences for customers.

A recent Invesp survey revealed that the marketing automation industry has increased by more than 77 percent. The report noted marketing automation has become one of the most significant trends in Digital Marketing.

Measurable Results

Thanks to marketing automation, SMBs can easily track the performance of their marketing efforts in a matter of minutes. Platforms such as Google Analytics can provide businesses with meaningful insight into the performance of their marketing strategies. 

This is a crucial factor for any business so it can improve revenue streams by identifying customers’ behaviors, allowing it to implement better strategies in the future. Companies now depend on data science to make smarter business decisions and this also applies to digital marketing. Data-driven systems and automation make it easier for digital marketers to study the nature of their performance and act accordingly.

Increased Revenue

According to the Constant Contact report cited above, 55 percent of businesses that used digital marketing automation increased their revenue. 

The rise in revenue could be attributed to marketing team members prioritizing their time better, leading to more focus on creative and personalized content. It could also be attributed to the companies reducing staff after implementing automation.

Either way, freeing up time for your marketing team to focus on what really matters while also gaining valuable insight into customer behavior is a no brainer. Read on to learn how to transition to social media marketing automation.

Tips for Transitioning to Marketing Automation

1. Think about your goals and create a feasible strategy to implement marketing automation. This is the most critical step because the tools you’ll use will depend on this.
2.  Create an automated ecosystem for your digital marketing team, meaning that you should secure the tools and platforms you need to start automating processes like sending emails, scheduling appointments or replying to messages. Remember to ensure the tools you source align with the goals you have set for your digital marketing efforts. 
3. Onboarding. Everybody on the team must be familiar with the automated platforms. You’ll need to train your digital marketing team to use these tools in order to ensure they utilize them effectively.
4. Segment your audience to create personalized messages. To make customized experiences through automation, you firstly need to know your customers. This will help you create content that’s oriented for them before it’s sent automatically.
5. Don’t buy a system that you won’t need. Remember that this is all about hitting goals and every company’s needs are different. Take some time to evaluate what’s particularly good for your business before making any investments.