Marketing automation will help you get more out of your digital fundraising campaigns, and it will also help you save time. As a fundraising manager, you have the challenge of launching a large number of projects with a team and resources that are always limited. Why not use software to carry out marketing actions in an automated way? In this post we offer you basic information so that you can assess what you need to take this step. Initially, you will have to add a new project to your folder ;-), but once it is up and running it will free up quality time to use it to launch new ideas and create value for your audience.
As we will see, marketing automation is applicable in each and every one of the phases of the conversion funnel. From the moment a person meets your organization for the first time to a possible conversion in any of its forms (donation, subscription, purchase, etc.).
Why should you apply automation to your digital fundraising?
Let’s see what are the main advantages that you can benefit from..
It allows to simplify processes
The different automation softwares make it possible to shorten and face complex marketing processes that would otherwise be more difficult to face.
Cost reduction
The fact that automation allows you to focus on the tasks that truly generate value multiplies the efficiency of your work, while reducing costs and staff time. It gives you the possibility of having greater control of marketing actions, including more precise monitoring of the process and evaluation of results.
The possibilities of segmentation and personalization are multiplied
The analytics and different elements that make up automation marketing allow you to follow in detail the behavior, tastes and interests of each of the people who are interested in your organization. Behavioral targeting is much more accurate and efficient than targeting based on user profiles, and offering a personalized response to your audience will make people in your social base feel better treated.
Lead Nurturing and Lead Scoring
You will find marketing automation extremely helpful in your lead nurturing and lead scoring efforts.
Lead Nurturing. Refers to the set of techniques aimed at increasing the level of bonding of leads in your organization. The objective is to mature the relationship so that they consider taking a step further (that they carry out the conversion action that you have defined for them). How to do it? We must establish a pattern of continuous communication with the appropriate frequency through which we provide them with information of interest, invitations to events, online services, ask for their opinion through surveys, offer ways of participation such as forums or support signatures…
Lead Scoring. This concept basically refers to the possibility of properly qualifying all leads based on their behavior, situation, etc. which allows launching more specific, profitable and effective fundraising campaigns.
What do you need to implement marketing automation in your organization?
Automation must be part of a consistent global inbound marketing strategy at all stages of the customer journey, from acquisition to loyalty. For this reason, it is key that you produce valuable content for your target audience that allows you to follow the evolution of each of your leads from the time they get to know the organization until they decide to collaborate with it.
On the other hand, you must clearly determine which are the points of contact of your organization with your audience. This way you will know when you need software to monitor their activity. And you will also need to define the different stages of the funnel that your collaborators go through and the characteristics of each of them, as well as the set of tools that correspond to them.
Regarding technical elements, you will need to configure:
Labels
They will allow you to segment the database based on them and define the actions that will incorporate a certain label.
Triggers and automation elements
They are the valuable interactions that allow us to segment our audience based on whether or not they respond to them: click to open an email, completed forms, click on a link, etc.
Landing pages
A well-configured campaign is useless if you don’t have an optimized and action-oriented landing page: capture leads, participation…
Digital environments where you can apply marketing automation
The main environment where you will apply automation is email marketing. Here you will find tools like Mailchimp that goes far beyond being a simple mass emailing software and allows you to segment based on labels, define automated routes based on user behavior through conditional logic and branch points, customize the message to every recipient, get quality, accurate insights into the impact of every email… Mailchimp was recently named #1 Marketing Automation Software in Capterra’s Top 20 report and makes it easy to get into the market. world of automation through documentation, pre-built templates and online training.
But email marketing is not the only channel to apply automation:
Campaign automation
Both in social networks and in search engines, it is important to know how to precisely define the different profiles of supporters and their interests in order to offer a personalized message to each of these groups. The large digital advertising platforms offer useful tools to program dynamic content, through variables, conditioned to behavior, with remarketing options… that will allow you to impact your potential audience more efficiently.
Automated customer management
Most CRMs on the market allow you to establish flows, alerts, relationship changes, etc. based on user interactions.
Monitoring of behavior on the web
We can know practically everything that a user does in our web environment: if he scrolls, where he clicks, where he comes from, what content he consumes, how he interacts… This information is very relevant for digital marketing if we are able to transform it into knowledge and make it actionable. For example, we have technology that allows us to automate the content of our landing pages so that it responds better and better to our target audience and achieves better conversion rates.
Now it’s time to start
Initially it is not necessary to undertake a very ambitious marketing automation project, it is best to plan in phases and set partial objectives. For example, start with the implementation of personalized autoresponders in all your points of contact with your audience. As a first step, yes, you will need to make sure that you have the appropriate technological tools and minimal training for your team.
Go ahead and start an automation project. It is a medium-term investment that will give you great joy in terms of the efficiency of your digital fundraising actions, time savings and the ability to grow and face new challenges.