Email Marketing and Marketing Automation in Complex Buying Processes

Email Marketing and Marketing Automation in Complex Buying ProcessesEmail Marketing and Marketing Automation in Complex Buying Processes 1
Introduction
We often hear the question: "How is Marketing Automation different from email marketing?". In this short paper, we'd like to shed some light on the differences, and explain when to use email marketing and when to use Marketing Automation.
When executed well, email marketing is one of the most powerful tools that a marketer can use. It's more scalable than telemarketing, and it's more personalized and more interactive than direct mail. And on top of that, it's cheaper and more measurable. Email may not be the only channel of communication we use, but it's certainly one of the most important ones. Email marketing has a long history. It has been used since the mid-nineties when the Internet was still in its infancy. Marketers quickly grasped the importance of this channel and started using email in a more sophisticated way. They realized that emails could have personalized greetings, they could be scheduled, they could be measured more accurately, and subject line testing was discovered as a great way to boost response rates. However, the email marketing tools of the past were still mainly focused on consumer applications, where a one-time email can immediately influence a purchase.
Nowadays, many organizations have clients who need a lot more time to make a purchase decision. This is particularly true for business to business environments, and for considered purchases in B2C as well. In this paper, we'll look at how to use email marketing to support these complex buying processes, and whether email marketing or marketing automation are the right tools to use.
Marketing Automation systems take email
marketing to the next level
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Email Marketing for Complex Buying Processes
Complex buying processes may take weeks or months and involve many The email campaigns for the complex sale need to be proactive and different people. In order to be effective, email marketing campaigns need to be address buying stages and buying roles. This requires email sequences that designed to handle this longer buying cycle. Ideally, the content of the campaign cover at least the length of the sales cycle, and that adjust based on the is tailored to the different stages in the buying process. And for each buying needs of the recipient. To make this manageable, the process of starting phase, the campaigns have to address the needs of different roles in the buyer's and adjusting email campaigns should be automated. organization: sales, marketing, CMOs, etc. Email marketing for the complex sales is very different from traditional In traditional email marketing, you send messages when you have something "batch and blast" email campaigns. However, there are still several email relevant to say. In email marketing for the complex sale you need to send marketing best practices that are unchanged. For any type of email messages based on the buyer's needs. Therefore, you have to design multi-step marketing, it's important to have compelling content, create an attractive email sequences that follow leads along their buying path. The goal is to set up a email layout, and ensure that email is delivered to the inbox. lead nurturing process that turns new leads into sales-ready leads. In a complex buying process, buyers will go through multiple stages. It starts with awareness of the type of solution that you offer, through research of possible solutions towards a final purchase decision. In your email marketing, you need to provide the right information for the right stage. For example, in the early stages you want to provide more educational information and thought leadership, while in the final phases reference and analyst information is really important.
In addition to alignment with the stages in the buying process, it's also important to tailor information to the different roles within the decision making unit. For example, the economic buyer will need different information from an end user.
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