CRM and Marketing Automation Orchestrate Performance

CRM systems are an excellent tool to help a sales teams manage, track, and report on their sales process, but they have not adapted well to the rapidly changing, online-enabled buying environment that is prevalent today. In short, CRMs are good at managing the selling process, but not as good at managing the buying process. In the past sales organizations drove the customer buying process through tightly controlled marketing campaigns, but today’s control is in the hands of consumers who often make their decision on what to buy and from whom long before they ever make contact with the company.

Consider the changes in how most people find, evaluate, and make purchase decisions today. The lion’s share of activities are performed by the buyer, with little or no interaction between the buyer and the seller. Advancements in online, social and mobile technology have changed how customers buy; they don’t call the company, they go online and research for themselves. Marketers must fill the gap by providing a consistent and educational presence that positions their product and company to be part of that customer evaluation process. Today’s buyers do their own homework and then interact with you only when they are ready. As a result, sales teams often wind up engaging much later buying cycle than they have in the past.

Marketing Automation software provides the missing ingredient by supplementing CRM systems like Salesforce and others. If implemented correctly, with enticing call to actions, targeted communications and educational and helpful downloads, marketing automation can help grow your business and boost your online presence while leveraging the value of your existing CRM systems. As a result, marketing automation has experienced the fastest growth of any CRM-related segment in the last five years and demand is expected to increase by 50% this year alone. More and more companies are embracing marketing automation because it can shorten the sales cycle, uncover new upsell and cross-sell opportunities, and maximize the lifetime value of every customer.

Do your marketing team have the tools they need to effectively nurture leads and guide these prospects through the sales funnel? Whatever tools you choose, aim for a process that generates more and better-qualified leads who have displayed buying intent, while also uncovering those who should be dismissed. As a result, sales can spend less time with inefficient and unproductive cold calls and more time in front of prospects who are actually ready to buy.