There are hundreds of brands competing for your target audience, which makes it increasingly important that you use marketing automation tools to optimize your performance.
eCommerce marketing automation allows you to target your potential customers in a very personalized way. This way, you can generate more quality leads that will later convert into paying customers.
Tools are plentiful and a quick Google query will supply you with hundreds of options. For this particular article, we aren’t focused on which tools to use, but rather what you should think about using those tools for.
Not particularly sure where to start with eCommerce marketing automation? This will help you as you dive in and decide which software is right for you. We’ve gathered the six best strategies that can use automation to increase sales and conversions.
1 – Track Lead Sources
Lead source refers to the original point at which leads first learn about you. Here are some common examples of lead sources:
- Organic search
- Social media
- Digital advertising
- Email marketing
- Blogging
If you want to increase sales and conversions, you have to monitor different lead channels and identify which channels are most effective in driving quality leads. Automation of lead source tracking allows you to see which channels drive the most conversions to your eCommerce website, so you can invest more effort and spendings into these channels.
2 – Employ Behavioral Segmentation
Behavioral segmentation is the process of sorting and grouping customers based on the types of products and content they consume and the cadence of their interactions with your eCommerce website.
To put it simply, behavioral segmentation is when you divide your total market into smaller groups based on the behaviors they exhibit. You can build segmented lists of customers based on the following information:
- Rate of usage of your product
- Benefits sought
- Purchase behavior (frequency, recency, the amount spent on your products, etc.)
- Brand loyalty status
- Activity on your website (CTAs clicked, content viewed, etc.)
- Readiness to purchase
Implementing automation of behavioral segmentation will help you better understand your customers. This way, you can craft more personalized content and offerings that will help your sales and conversions.
3 – Implement customer relationship management
Customer relationship management (CRM) is an approach to managing all of your company’s interactions and relationships with customers and prospective customers.
CRM automation supports a diverse spectrum of automation to increase productivity, improve customer experiences, and boost sales. CRM automation consists of three major areas – marketing, sales force, and customer service automation.
Marketing automation
Marketing automation helps to market more effectively on various channels and automate repetitive tasks, including automation of welcome emails, email drip campaigns, data syncing, and lead generation.
Sales force automation
Sales force automation is used to automate the business tasks of sales. Some examples are the automation of lead assignment, order processing and tracking, information sharing, call scheduling, contact management, inventory monitoring, and sales forecast analysis.
Customer service automation
Customer service automation helps to optimize the servicing speed and improve customer satisfaction. With customer service automation tools, you can optimize customer self-service, use AI-powered chatbots for quicker 24/7 support, automate case routing, and password resets.
4 – Launch Customer Loyalty Programs
For many eCommerce businesses, retaining existing customers is a key to long-term growth. In fact, studies show that acquiring a new customer costs five times more than retaining an existing one. Implementing customer reward and loyalty programs is a great way to keep your retained customers active and engaged.
eCommerce marketing automation allows you to segment your market to identify customers worth inviting to reward and loyalty programs. You can integrate a marketing automation system that will help you get relevant data on the most loyal customers.
After identifying your loyal customer base, you can use email marketing automation tools to send them invites for the loyalty program. Then, you can use automation tools to collect and analyze relevant data to evaluate the performance of your loyalty program.
The good news is that some eCommerce platforms allow you to launch and automate customer loyalty programs.
5 – Engage Dormant Customers
Dormant customers refer to the customers who were previously active but now show a declining interest in your brand (such as no transactional or financial movement) over a period of time.
A large number of dormant customers indicate that the marketing efforts previously spent on them were not effective. The good news is that the right marketing stimuli can reengage customers who lose interest in your products and slowly detach from your brand.
With eCommerce marketing automation tools, you can segment your dormant customers into several groups based on their previous activity. Then, you can employ email automation software to engage each of the dormant segments with relevant and personalized content (such as exclusive discounts). Alternatively, you can use the same mechanisms to collect feedback that will help you identify what makes customers lose interest in your brand.
6 – Automate Social Media Marketing
Social media is a great avenue for any eCommerce business as it allows you to increase brand awareness, expand your customer reach, and, as a result, improve sales and conversions.Â
Social media marketing automation enables you to optimize your content and ensure it will reach the right audience. You can leverage social media marketing automation to do the following:
- Build targeted lists
- Execute your social media campaign
- Posts scheduling
- Automation of social media advertising (such as Facebook or Instagram ads automation)
- Measure social media activity
- Analyze marketing performance
Wrap Up
eCommerce marketing automation is a great way to boost sales, conversions, optimize performance, and, most importantly, build more personalized relationships with your customers.
By employing automation, you can segment your customer market to deliver more personalized content. Automating lead source tracking is a great way to identify which channels are performing well. Implementing CRM automation allows you to automate processes on three fundamental levels: marketing, sales force, and customer service.
Besides, you can use automation tools to launch customer loyalty programs, engage dormant customers, and optimize your social media campaigns!
