Lead-nurturing automation is a new strategy to successfully shepherd lead engagement opportunities to improve sales outcomes.
Forrester Research refers to lead-nurturing automation as a “lead-to-revenue management automation solution” and shares that such systems were developed to “bridge a gap between lead generation activities (e.g., direct mail, telemarketing, and email campaigns) and selling activities (e.g., closing the deal) managed by a customer relationship management (CRM) system.”
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How do you prevent lost leads? Find out here.
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Your marketing and sales strategies and tactics must align with critical steps in the buyer’s journey to engage and nurture leads and contribute to revenue goals. Implementing an automated lead-nurturing system isn’t an option; it’s essential to capture lost lead opportunity revenue.
4 Barriers to Automated Lead Nurturing Success
What holds organizations back from implementing successful automated lead-nurturing strategies?
#1. Strategy—Many marketers are not sufficiently fluent in using data or understanding the buyer’s journey to develop an inbound digital marketing strategy to support successful automated lead nurturing.
“The most significant barrier to marketing automation success is the lack of an effective strategy (52%).” —Ascend2 “Marketing Automation Trends Survey” (2016).
#2. Budget & Management Support—Many marketing budgets historically have been very conservative. It is essential to have a budget sufficient to support the automated marketing system and the required strategic support necessary to ensure ongoing management.
54% marketers who have not yet implemented marketing automation cite lack of budgets as a major obstacle preventing implementation. —Regalix “The State of Marketing Automation” (2014)
“Main barriers to adoption of marketing automation are: 1) no need 2) no budget 3) no management approval.” —ResearchCorp “Demand Generation Adoption Survey” (2014)
#3. Knowledge—Implementing the marketing automation system and program, as well as integrating the system with a CRM or other systems, takes time and a diverse skill set, which most organizations do not possess in-house.
63% of companies outsource all or part of marketing automation strategy planning. 51% use a combination of outsourced and in-house resources, 12% outsource all to a specialist. 37% use in-house resources only. —Ascend2 “Marketing Automation Trends Survey” (2016).
13% of the marketers said a lack of technical proficiency in their team was stopping them from adopting marketing automation. A lack of understanding of benefits is holding back 12%. —Redeye and TFM&A Insights “The Marketing Automation Report 2014” (2014)
“Technology integration complexity is the most challenging obstacle to success, 50% of companies indicate. The result is that only 25% of companies have extensively integrated their disparate marketing technology systems. Nearly as many (22%) have not integrated their marketing technologies at all.” —Ascend2 “Marketing Technology Strategy” (August 2015)
#4. Content—Researching and developing persona-based content takes both time and knowledge to ensure the content hits conversion goals.
One of the most challenging obstacles to success is lack of quality content (40%). —Marketo & Ascend2 “Marketing Automation Strategies for Sustaining Success” (2015)
Automated Lead Nurturing Prevents Lost Leads
Your customer is now driving the buying process. To keep them from looking elsewhere, automated lead nurturing attracts them with personalized content while saving you time and effort. Can you afford to lose lead opportunities?
Isn’t it time for your organization to benefit from a strategic data-driven approach to automated lead nurturing?
For a personalized, 30-minute consultation on how best to position your business for marketing success, contact Patty Cisco by phone at 419.629.0080, email or website.
