This is Part 3 of a 3-part series on the software and tools needed for successful Marketing Automation:
Introduction – The Marketing Automation Toolkit Blog Series (Sneak Peak)
Part 1 – Membership Sites
Part 2 – Professional Website Building
Part 3 – [You Are Here] – Marketing Automation Software
Conclusion – Marketing Automation Tools: Why Are They Important?
Marketing Automation Software is business changing technology.
Infusionsoft, Aweber and Meet Edgar will allow you to stay in touch with prospects and customers…
… Automatically.
However, this doesn’t mean NO effort (although once you get your routine down it can FEEL effortless). You still have to create the content and messages you’d like your audience to experience.
Marketing Automation Software allows you to systematize and organize your marketing beyond anything you ever thought possible.
You can literally take a new lead and guide them through your sales process, on auto-pilot.
Infusionsoft
Infusionsoft is the only all-in-one sales and marketing automation software for small businesses that combines CRM, email marketing and e-commerce.
KEY FEATURES:
• CRM
• Marketing Automation
• E-Commerce
• Built-in metadata and keyword fields
• Drag and drop to craft and publish landing pages
• Web Forms
• Social Sharing
• Easy Publishing, Landing Pages
• Email marketing, Automated Campaigns
• Multimedia marketing management
• Marketing reports
• Scoring tool
• Referral Program Management
• Track orders, sales totals, accounts receivables
• Payment Processing
• Lead Scoring & Distribution
• Quotes & Orders
• Opportunity Management
• Sales Reports
• Multimedia Marketing
BENEFITS:
– Simplify Sales Activities
– Qualify and Distribute Leads
– Automate Sales Tasks
– View Sales and Conversion Reports
– Manage Opportunities and Pipelines
– Capture Leads with Web Forms
– Segment Customers
– Manage Your Calendar and Tasks
– Import and Manage Data
MARKETING
– Build Relationships with Campaigns
– Follow-Up with Smart Autoresponders
– Share Content Socially, Measure Results
– Look Professional with Attractive Emails
– Get to the Inbox with 99% Deliverability
– Capture Leads with Web Forms
– Track Results with Reports
– Get Personal with Behavioral Triggers
– Market Offline with Multimedia
E-COMMERCE:
– Create a Storefront and Shopping Cart
– Create Electronic Order Forms
– Sell More with Discounts, Upsells and Trials
– Offer Payment Plans
– Trigger Post-Purchase Follow-Up
– Invoice and Collect Electronically
– Manage Product Inventory and Fulfillment
– Grow through Affiliate Programs
AUTOMATION
– Build Smart Campaigns
– Qualify and Distribute Leads
– Automate Workflow
– Create Smart Promo Offers
– Invoice and Collect Automatically
– Track and Deliver Products
– Create Personalized Communications
Over 23,000 small business owners use Infusionsoft to get organized, save time and grow sales. The one-drawback to Infusionsoft is that it’s NOT plug-and-play. It takes time to learn.
But it’s time well spent.
AWeber
AWeber Communications is popular for its superior autoresponders and is a solid performer in most aspects of email marketing.
KEY FEATURES:
• A/B Split Testing: You can create A/B versions of an email campaign and test to see which version is more successful.
• Alias Email: You can create an alias email address to send email blasts from.
• Autoresponder: You can create auto-response emails.
• Image & File Hosting: Aweber will host the images and other documents used in your campaigns.
• Integration: The product can integrate with other software applications or websites.
• RSS to Email: Emails are automatically sent when an RSS feed on a website or blog is updated.
• Scheduling: You can schedule the specific time and date of your email blasts.
• Social Media Sharing: You can share directly through social media websites.
• Triggered Campaigns: You can create auto-responding campaigns that are triggered by customer behaviors.
BENEFITS:
When it comes to campaign effectiveness: There’s a lot more to keep your eye on besides revenue numbers and subscriber counts.
To really understand how your campaigns are working, you need to look at how your customers are interacting with your emails.
AWeber provides just this kind of data, which is accessible at any time through Aweber’s email reporting dashboard. You can bring up charts that show how many of your contacts opened your emails and how many clicked on the links within your message.
This kind of information tells you a lot about how engaging your emails are and helps you identify problem areas to solve.
You can also bring up data on your subscribers, including location information. And records detailing when and why customers unsubscribed from your list.
Although most email marketing companies provide access to some customer data: AWeber provides you with exact information you need to create better, more effective campaigns.
Meet Edgar
Edgar is a social media scheduling tool like no other. Instead of publishing your updates just once and throwing them away like yesterday’s trash: Edgar carefully catalogs them in a limitless library that you build over time.
FEATURES:
• Facebook profiles, fan pages, groups
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• No software, downloads, or plugins
required
• Compatible with Firefox, Chrome, and
Safari
BENEFIT:
All of your updates are sorted into categories that you create and publish on a schedule that you choose. So Edgar publishes what you want, when you want it. No manual scheduling, no busywork, and no hassle: just the peace of mind that only Edgar can provide.
(NOTE: download this Free In-depth Guide: “The Marketing Automation Toolkit: The EXACT Marketing Automation Software to Transform Your Business into a Lead Generation, Follow-Up and Sales Machine on Auto-Pilot.”)
