New Research Reveals How to Optimize Marketing Automation

Marketing automation helps marketers get more done in less time, standardize processes, target specific audiences, unify data, capture and analyze metrics, personalize content, and much more. In fact, marketing automation is “very important” to the overall performance of marketing, according to 94% of the best-in-class marketers participating in a recent Ascend2 survey.

But how do you optimize marketing automation to continually increase performance?

To answer this question, Ascend2 and their research partners fielded the Optimizing Marketing Automation Survey, and the Summary Report is available free of charge. The survey was fielded the week of May 27, 2018, and a total of 250 marketing professionals participated. 

Here are a few noteworthy findings:

Finding #1: Top Priorities

To successfully optimize marketing automation, you need a sound plan. And for nearly two-thirds of marketing professionals (64%), creating a successful strategy is a top priority for optimizing marketing automation. Marketing automation is a wonderful tool, but it’s a tool that is only as helpful as the strategy you develop to use it.

64% of marketing professionals agree that creating a successful strategy is a top priority for optimizing marketing automation.
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Finding #2: Challenging Barriers

Delivering personalized content and integrating all marketing systems are the most challenging barriers to marketing automation success for 44% and 43% of marketing professionals respectively. Thankfully, marketing software continues to reduce the challenge of delivering personalized content by collecting user data, analyzing the data, and automating the delivery process. What was extremely difficult a few years ago is now a more streamlined and repeatable process.

Delivering personalized content is the most challenging barrier to marketing automation success for 44% of marketing professionals.
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Finding #3: How Content Personalization is Changing

The impact of content personalization cannot be denied. In fact, if you are going to devote your time and effort to overcome a marketing challenge, why not tackle a challenge that is improving results? A total of 94% of marketing professionals say content personalization driven by marketing automation is improving to some extent, with 45% describing the improvement as significant. Yes, content personalization is here to stay!

94% of marketing professionals say content personalization driven by marketing automation is improving.
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Finding #4: Effective Tactics

Mapping the customer experience and utilizing personalized/dynamic content are considered effective tactics for optimizing marketing automation by 53% and 51% of marketing professionals respectively. Marketing automation is a powerful tool and can be used in a variety of ways to engage prospects, increase sales, and differentiate yourself from your competition.

54% of marketers agree that mapping the customer experience is the most effective tactic for optimizing marketing automation.
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Finding #5: Difficult Tactics

Tactics for optimizing marketing automation like content personalization, artificial intelligence, and predictive modeling, and customer experience mapping are especially difficult to employ for 46%, 45% and 43% of marketing professionals respectively.

Tactics for optimizing marketing automation like content personalization are difficult to implement for 46% of marketers.
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The good news is that technology continues to improve, making tactics like dynamic content and predictive modeling easier to accomplish.

In fact, now may be the perfect time to explore one or two of the difficult tactics on the list below and you may be surprised, it may not be as difficult as you anticipated. 

Download the Optimizing Marketing Automation Survey Summary Report for more data and analysis to optimize your marketing automation.

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