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Chapter 4: eCommerce Marketing Automation
Introduction
How does marketing automation work?
Marketing automation uses software to automate monotonous marketing work. Marketing departments can automate repetitive tasks such as email marketing, social media posting, and even ad campaigns – not just for the sake of efficiency, but also to provide a more personalized experience for their customers. The technology behind marketing automation makes these tasks faster and easier to do.
What can market automation do for your business?
When we look at the shared challenges faced by businesses, we know that generating leads and keeping customers engaged throughout their journey remain top of mind. Along with these goals, businesses face an explosion of data being collected, but struggle to put it to use.
Marketing automation software can help overcome these challenges by putting data to work by streamlining our workflows.
Most businesses consider marketing automation a middle-of-the-funnel tool, ideal for nurturing leads through automated email sequences. And while email marketing is a great use for marketing automation, this approach can lead to a disjointed experience for prospects and customers as they move from marketing to sales, to customer service.
Prospects are forced through an imaginary sales funnel with arbitrary touchpoints and irrelevant content. Instead of reacting to individual customer needs, businesses serve up the same playbook on repeat.
However, automated marketing strategies should be deployed across the customer lifecycle. When marketing automation is thoughtfully integrated, it creates a fertile ground for healthy, long-term relationships with your customers. When done well, marketing automation delivers three main benefits to your business: personalized workflows, streamlined processes, integrated data and analytics (HubSpot, 2022).
Ecommerce businesses of all sizes can benefit from the kind of software and platforms available today, which are made precisely with the needs of ecommerce businesses in mind. Here are some of the top benefits of marketing automation for ecommerce.
- Save time for your team
Say goodbye to time-consuming, repetitive tasks and say hello to automated workflows that can save you time eventually. 43% of marketers implement marketing automation strategies with the primary goal of optimizing productivity
By automating certain marketing tasks, much less manual work is required to reach segmented audiences at the right time across multiple channels. In addition, marketing automation software collects and analyzes all your data and generates reports that allow you to identify areas to focus on and refine your strategy accordingly
- Eliminates human error
Another benefit is that it reduces the risk of human error. Manual work can be tedious, which means more mistakes can happen. Even the most dedicated and conscientious marketer can sometimes make costly mistakes (such as sending an email to the wrong customer list). With automated tools configured properly, you can put ongoing email sends on autopilot and send them at the right time without adding extra work
- Improves customer retention
Marketing automation tools help improve customer engagement by sending the right message at the right time based on customer behavior.
More than 80% of consumers believe personalization makes them more likely to make a purchase on a brand’s website. 48% spend more money with companies that offer a personalized experience. Those are serious numbers!
- Marketing automation buys you time for optimization
The time you save with marketing automation gives you more time to focus on current and future campaigns. What does this mean for you? Now that your daily tasks are done and running on autopilot, you can afford to look at the “big picture” and focus on your overall strategy instead of getting bogged down in details
You can also take advantage of the advanced testing tools that marketing automation platforms offer. With these tools, you can test variations in real time, such as email subject lines, images, preview texts, and more, and optimize your campaigns by selecting only the best-performing variations (Karolina Petraskiene, 2020).
References
HubSpot. (2022). What is Marketing Automation? https://www.hubspot.com/marketing-automation-information
Petraskiene, K. (2020). A Guide to Ecommerce Marketing Automation for Online Merchants. https://www.shipbob.com/blog/ecommerce-marketing-automation/
Wishpond. (2016). What is Marketing Automation? https://youtu.be/G6c4-28FsAs
Theoretical part – GREECE
Adopting the principles of digital, automated marketing and using matching tools, for eCommerce, in Greece, seems to be constantly gaining ground. The automated advertising market shows a significant increase and SMEs researchers seem to adapt to this new environment. In 2020 digital marketing investments increased by 3,6%, compared to 2019 and specifically, expenditure on digital search advertising reached $ 164.8 million in 2020, an increase of 8.1%, while expenditure on non-expenditure social media ads to $ 82.17 million, up 2% (Kyriakou M., 2021).
Source: Factorialist, 2016
Greek automated marketing in eCommerce, usually, includes processes such as:
- Automatic replies and email notifications
- The best customer targeting based on data from online surveys and automated data collections
- Creating and managing social media campaigns such as Facebook and Twitter with a few clicks.
- Automatic sending of voicemails
- Creating referrals and programs for affiliate partners
- Creating events such as webinars, special invitational videos, or multimedia.
- Accepting and processing electronic payments e. g. “add to card”
- Creating interactive applications that enhance user interaction with the business
- Creating ads, coupons, and other promotions (Sarailis P., 2019).
References
E-FOOD. (2022). E-Food. Retrieved from https://www.e-food.gr/
Factorialist. (2016). Proven Benefits of Marketing Automation Software. The Factorialist. Retrieved from https://factorialist.com/proven-benefits-of-marketing-automation-software/
Gkitsi, A. (2021). Τίναξε την μπάνκα η E–food λόγω πανδημίας. (E-food shook the bank due to the pandemic). Capital.gr. Retrieved February 9, 2022, from https://www.capital.gr/epixeiriseis/3551288/tinaxe-tin-mpanka-i-e-food-logo-pandimias
Kyriakou M., (2021), «Η χρήση του ηλεκτρονικού μάρκετινγκ και των μέσων κοινωνικής δικτύωσης από τις ΜΜΕ» (“The use of e-marketing and social media by SMEs”), Research Papers IME GSEVEE 24/2021, Athens: IME GSEVEE
Sarailis, P. (2019, June 15). Αυτοματοποιημένο marketing: τι είναι, γιατί και πως να το χρησιμοποιείς! (Automated marketing: what it is, why and how to use it!) SocialMe. Retrieved February 9, 2022, from https://socialme.gr/aftomatopiimeno-marketing-ti-ine-giati-ke-pos-na-to-chrisimopiis/
Theoretical part – ROMANIA
Marketing Automation or marketing process automation is one of the most interesting aspects of online marketing and refers to all automation processes on an online site / store, with the goal of selling a product or service and turning them into brand ambassadors.
Marketing automation streamlines your digital marketing efforts, reduces human error, and helps you achieve better results. Instead of performing manual, repetitive processes, you’re able to focus on more strategic tasks such as planning and design, goal development, conducting research, establishing branding consistency, measuring KPIs, and more.
Source: https://pixabay.com/ro/images/search/e-commerce/
References
https://www.getresponse.com/?gclid=CjwKCAiAgvKQBhBbEiwAaPQw3EcyCfXhv9aGwOE9-V3GNdDXYc4jl-nc2MXW3TOyjbFRp7KvyJJqyRoCHyIQAvD_BwE, Retrieved February 20, 2022
https://www.ikea.com/ro/ro/?gclid=CjwKCAiAgvKQBhBbEiwAaPQw3CoIZpVye0p_SZgl4OrrTO8KCNzDVlniBX58xXHuuUKo-A6FbR-2WBoCWC8QAvD_BwE – retreived February 20, 2022
https://www.affde.com/ro/ikea-marketing-strategy.html, retreived February 20, 2022
Theoretical part – POLAND
73% of e-stores in Poland plan to implement advanced technological tools to support marketing and sales activities, recognizing the need for extensive use of IT tools to collect customer data and effectively reach them with the offer. This is the outcome of the Report by K2 Group: Technology and marketing in e-commerce – challenges and trends 2021. In addition, only 2 out of 5 companies measure the effectiveness of Social Selling activities with the help of conversion. As many as 42% of decision-makers of the e-commerce industry in Poland appreciate the possibility of collecting more leads thanks to Social Selling, and another (40%) use it to shorten the sales cycle and the same amount to build relationships based on trust. Interestingly, almost all e-stores (90%) using chatbots do not reliably measure the effectiveness of customer service automation.
Therefore, customer relationship management (49%), relationship management with suppliers (37%), human resources (34%), logistics (34%) and warehousing (30%) are currently the biggest challenge in business management in the e-commerce industry in Poland.
An important element of the growing demands for quality customer service and scaling of online sales is the integration of the e-commerce platform with the company’s business applications. With the change in the pandemic shopping model, as many as 33% of e-shops plan to integrate the ERP system with the e-commerce platform and other sales support systems. It is noteworthy that online food trade in Poland will develop rapidly. Although the value of the e-commerce market in Poland is growing, many shops are not in a good financial situation.
It turns out that many Polish e-shops do not undertake any SEO activities.
It is certainly caused by the lack of sufficient knowledge concerning the role of SEO on the e-commerce market. What’s more, (91%) of customers make their purchasing decisions based on what they find on Google.
Important statistics regarding the Polish e-commerce market have been presented by Senuto (https://www.senuto.com/pl/), analysing the situation on the Polish e-commerce market. 87 489 Polish shops were found across the Internet and 6370 of them were established in 2020. It turns out that 43% of all traffic coming from the search engine is generated by shops in the top 10, 81% is generated by the shops from the top 500, while the remaining (19%) by the shops outside the top 500. Thus, we can see that the e-commerce market in Poland has been dominated by large online shops. However, this does not mean that SEO activities of smaller companies are unprofitable.
As many as three out of four e-shops intend to implement new solutions, investing in marketing automation software (38%) and web analytics (35%), as well as in DMP platforms (Data Management Platform – 31%), CDP (Customer Data Platforms (33%), CRM systems (31%) and BI (Business Intelligence – 20%).
On the Polish e-commerce market, among the available payment methods, the most popular is BLIK, but consumers also appreciate other ways of fast transaction completion – quick transfers and card transactions. Online payment methods are one of the most important factors influencing the choice of a particular online shop. Therefore, e-commerce business owners must take care of the widest possible choice of payment methods. This can be achieved by choosing the right provider, such as Blue Media (https://bluemedia.pl/). This leading online payment provider supports, in addition to BLIK, card payments, pay-by-link transfers, online instalments, subscription payments and much more. Blue Media’s business customers can easily integrate the payment system into their shop running on any popular sales platform. A low activation fee and nominal monthly charges are the only costs. Maintenance of the system and handling of refunds are free of charge, and there are no commissions involved in withdrawing funds.
The trend in 2020 was undoubtedly multichannel. Shops tried to reach the largest possible group of consumers with their products. The popularity of “shopping websites” such as Allegro or Ceneo is noticeable and their share in the e-commerce market grows with each passing month. Undoubtedly, in order to increase sales in e-shop, it is worth betting on increasing the range. Using such platforms as Allegro or Ceneo is the cheapest form of advertisement. However, it is not about advertising but about increasing profits. In order to effectively conduct multi-channel sales, it is worth taking an interest in sales automation offered by LivePrice (https://liveprice.pl/). The tool allows you to manage the price policy of the whole shop in a convenient way.
Omission of omnichannel in your business is, in a way, closing yourself off from the customer, and yet in trade, it is important to maintain a close relationship with them. It is worth noting that when conducting sales in many points, the prices of products cannot be identical. Using the LivePrice application, you can be sure that the appropriate prices will be overwritten to the given sales channels
Although the e-commerce industry in Poland does not fully use martech solutions, it has potential in reaching customers with personalised offers. Among those that will bring new opportunities within the next 2-3 years, are advanced analytics of customer behaviour in different channels, Marketing Automation and Machine Learning with AI.
References
https://estrategie.pl/marketing-automation/
https://edrone.me/pl/marketing-automation/
https://www.promoagency.pl/blog/co-to-jest-automatyzacja-marketingu-marketing-automation
https://bluemedia.pl/baza-wiedzy/blog/ecommerce/podsumowanie-rynku-ecommerce-2021-w-polsce
https://marketingwsieci.pl/podsumowanie-seo-i-e-commerce-w-2021-roku/
https://www.dnb.com/pl-pl/wiedza/newsy-artykuly/liczba-sklepow-internetowych-regiony/
https://przedsiebiorcawsieci.pl/wszystkie/e-commerce-w-polsce-w-2021-podsumowanie-raportu-senuto/
https://www.wirtualnemedia.pl/artykul/e-commerce-podsumowanie-2021-prognozy-na-2022-czesc-druga_1
https://blog.edrone.me/pl/polskie-systemy-marketing-automation-ranking/
https://inpost.pl/aktualnosci-historia-sukcesu-inpost
Theoretical part – SCOTLAND
Ecommerce Marketing Automation is a method that is increasingly followed by more and more businesses worldwide as of course in the United Kingdom. Software-based, it saves time, avoids human error and is a way to enhance customer interaction without requiring time from businesses. Thus, entrepreneurs can focus on other areas of their business.
Examples of automated marketing include automated order tracking, confirmation emails, data collection and analysis for marketing purposes, paid ads and more. At the same time, marketing automation monitors and analyses visitor behaviour.
UK’s online marketing automation software provides users with automation of all marketing processes with the primary goal of saving time. UK Marketing Automation software is offered in the SaaS (Service as a Service) model. See the following website for more information and alternative online software. Marketing automation also affects the B2B sector.This website contain examples of companies that specialize in marketing automation.
Ιn particular, the website refers to the following companies
- Sitecore Email Experience Manager (EXM)
- Marketo
- Dotmailer
Finally, below is another website that includes examples of Marketing Automation companies in United Kingdom.
Some examples of such companies are:
- WorkCast
- Agnew Group
- Dotmailer Group
- ChannelGrabber
- Hurree, Inc
- Gary Smith Partnership
- Dexi
- JDR Group
- Shoppar Ltd
- Social Vend
Each company has its own characteristics, as long as you find the one that best suits the needs and content of the business.
It should be noted that the author of the text does not have any involvement with the companies mentioned above or personal interest while their choice to refer to the text is indicative.
References
Anderson, M. (2021, April 28). London’s Best Marketing Automation Companies – To Work for and Buy From. BestStartup.Co.Uk. https://beststartup.co.uk/londons-best-marketing-automation-companies-to-work-for-and-buy-from/
(2020, December 8). Top Marketing Automation Companies and Startups in the UK. Welp Magazine – Business Strategy, Executive Software, Growth Hacking and More. . . https://welpmagazine.com/top-marketing-automation-companies-and-startups-in-the-uk/
Top UK Marketing Automation Reviews 2022. (n.d.). Serchen. https://www.serchen.co.uk/category/marketing-automation/
MyProtein’s website: https://www.myprotein.com/
eCommerce Marketing Automation. (2021, April 8). DeeperThanBlue. https://www.deeperthanblue.co.uk/solutions/commerce/marketing-automation/
Theoretical part – SLOVENIA
Inbound or Content Marketing is an approach to marketing that is slowly gaining ground in Slovenia. Companies are more successful in reaching their customers with useful content than with traditional advertising. Every blog, tweet, Facebook post, etc. is an Inbound Marketing activity that needs to be strategically planned, effectively implemented and tracked. We have many other online channels that also need to be tracked.
We rightly want to have a good overview and know how successful each activity is. If we monitor each channel individually, this task is a huge undertaking that is difficult even for the most organised person among us.
Marketing automation helps us manage and implement all online activities in one place. This way, we have constant access to all data and can monitor and adapt each step to the current situation. And in the end, we get a contact list with high- quality leads.
What does marketing automation tool provide?
The purpose of the marketing automation tool is to automate the Inbound Marketing processes which have been previously defined in our marketing strategy. There are many tools on the market to choose from.
The main functions of each tool are:
- Content Management System (CMS) is already within the marketing automation solution or there is integration with existing CMS solutions such as WordPress.
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tool: Content must be found; therefore, SEO tool is indispensable. A keyword managing tool is also useful.
- Social sharing: Content must become subject of debate also on social media. Integrated functionality is useful as it enables sharing and monitoring content on social media.
- Generating leads: In order to successfully generate leads, we need smart Call to Actions (CTA) and landing pages with forms to convert visitors into leads.
- Performance data: It is good to know in real time how successful individual content is (blog, e-book, social media post, etc.).
- Lead nurturing: Royal discipline of any marketing automation tool. Automated email marketing saves a lot of valuable time, while smart lead scoring ensures the quality of contacts we forward to sales.
Marketing automation enables that all online activities are being managed and implemented in one place. Thus, we have constant access to all data, and we are able to closely monitor and adapt each step to the current situation. In the end, we get a contact list of quality leads (Saša Vutkovič, 2016).
When dealing with Marketing Automation tools, you need to be aware about the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which is an EU legislation that governs all collection and processing of personal data from individuals inside the EU. GDPR requires that you, as a legal entity, only collect personal data from your users for specified, explicit and legitimate purposes, and that you obtain their clear and affirmative consent before doing so (Cookiebot, 2022).
References
Cookiebot. (2022). GDPR and cookies | Compliant cookie use with Cookiebot CMP. Cookiebot. https://www.cookiebot.com/en/gdpr-cookies/?utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Cent.%2FEast%20Europe%20-%20Generic&utm_content=Cent.%20EU%20-%20ENG%20-%20GDPR%20(Eksakt)
Rodošek, N. (2022). Kaj je avtomatizacija marketinga? Kreativna agencija. https://kreativna-agencija.com/avtomatizacija/kaj-je-avtomatizacija-marketinga/
Vutkovič, S. (2016). Kaj je marketinška avtomatizacija? ISSIMO Group. http://info.issimo-group.com/inbound-marketing-blog-slovenija/kaj-je-marketin%C5%A1ka-avtomatizacija