A short historical past of promoting automation and the way it can be just right for you

Marketing automation is more popular today than ever.

59% of companies are currently using Marketing automation software, and 28% plan to use marketing automation within the next two years.

Not to mention the marketing automation software industry is geared towards almost three times worth 2019-2025.

Why?

Because a well-executed marketing automation strategy will help you increase lead generation and close more deals with less effort.

But where did it all start?

In this article, we take a look at the history of marketing automation and what to expect from it in the future.

We’ll also outline how it can work for your business.

What is Marketing Automation?

Marketing automation is all about using software to automate repetitive marketing tasks. It saves your team time, your business money, and offers your leads and customers the best possible marketing experience. (Marketing Automation Guide 2021)

As a marketer, your daily schedule is pretty busy. Automation allows you to streamline and scale marketing without adding more people to your team.

Whether you’re sending a series of welcome emails or tracking customer engagement, modern marketing automation enables you to use your time more efficiently.

Marketing Automation History: Where It All Began

It all starts in the early 90s – home of Nintendo 64, Windows 95.

1. The Early 90’s: The First Marketing Automation Tool

In 1992, Unica (now known as IBM Campaign) developed the first marketing automation platform.

At the time, the internet wasn’t that big of a deal. Companies certainly didn’t use it to make sales the way we do today.

As a result, Unico’s automation system mainly focused on email marketing.

But this marketing technology has set the precedent for the future of marketing automation.

2. The Early 2000s: The Rise of Cloud-Based Tools

With the rise of the high-speed Internet and the increasing use of the Internet, the Internet has become a direct line to consumers.

And cloud-based automation tools were some of the first to hit the market.

With companies like Salesforce and ActiveCampaign at the helm, SaaS companies started using the internet to deliver automation software to end users. Anyone with internet access could download the program.

By making this software available at affordable pricing plans, marketing automation became accessible to smaller businesses for the first time.

3. Late 2000s: Marketing automation continues to evolve

In 2006, the use of social media increased. And in 2008 mobile commerce came into effect.

Which changed the way we interact with brands.

To respond to the growth of online and mobile commerce, marketing automation began to evolve.

It wasn’t just about email marketing anymore. Automation platforms directed their focus to all-in-one marketing and sales platforms. That included social media integrations and (because of the need to see where your sales were coming from) analytics.

Marketing automation platforms began to scale their services to help companies track their marketing activities, manage their customer relationships, and see the data points of everything.

The line between marketing automation platforms and CRM was starting to blur.

4. The early 2010s: the acquisitions

Between 2010 and 2014, the marketing automation industry took a huge step forward financially.

Here is a breakdown of some of the acquisitions that have been made, all of which came in in excess of $ 5.5 billion:

As a result of these acquisitions, a small number of large companies began to take over the marketing automation industry.

5. Late 2010s: Interest in marketing automation is growing

Interest in marketing automation and technology continued to grow. By 2019, 75% of companies were using automation tools.

With the Industry is growing, we also saw more marketing automation platforms come into the spotlight (and not just from Salesforce and Oracle).

This increasing competition forced platforms to become more affordable. This would allow more small businesses and startups to access these tools.

And as more and more companies use the platforms, the quality of automation continued to improve.

How does marketing automation work and what can it do?

It is difficult to give a single answer to this first question. But let’s try.

Marketing automation is about using previous customer data to create a system that will automatically perform tasks aimed at improving the effectiveness of your marketing efforts.

With this data, marketers can, for example, create a marketing strategy that automatically engages leads with the right marketing messages at the right time via email, social media, or directly on your website.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the most important avenues for marketing automation.

Email automation

Email marketing automation enables marketers to send targeted and personalized emails.

An action usually triggers a automated email to send. From signing up for a discount code to leaving the shopping cart, automated emails keep the conversation going with your company’s prospects (without your involvement).

Marketers can also automatically divide their leads or contacts into groups. This helps them target the right people with the right messages (but we’ll talk more about segmentation later).

Here is a simple example of simple email automation:

Website automation

Website automation usually includes Pop-ups (like modal forms) or Chatbotstriggered by the behavior of your website visitor.

These automations encourage people to take action on your website, from participating in conversations to providing their contact information.

Here is an example of an automated message triggered by a visitor:

Paid advertising

Paid ads, also known as pay-per-click (PPC) is pretty much what it sounds like. You pay to have your ads appear in search rankings (but only when a user clicks your ad).

The search engine will show your ads to people searching for your target keyphrase.

But that’s not automation.

Marketing automation comes into play when we talk about it Retargeting – an advertising approach that shows your ads on various websites and social media platforms exclusively to people who have visited your website.

For example, if you visit Instapage’s website and look around for a while but don’t buy, you may see a banner ad like this the next time you’re on a news website:

Why should you use marketing automation?

If you’re still not convinced of the benefits of marketing automation, let’s take a closer look at these:

1. Save time on repetitive tasks

Almost half of companies say that one of the main benefits of marketing automation is saving time on repetitive tasks.

This saves many companies time by using marketing automation.

Whether you’re sending welcome emails or message a customer on live chat, Automation frees up your schedule so you can focus on other things.

All you have to do is create the automation, fill in the content (whether it’s an email, an ad, or a social media post), and the rest is history.

2. Coordinate sales and marketing goals

When you combine your sales with marketing automation, you are adjusting the company’s goals and efforts.

Everyone is on the same page and leads can easily come from a Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) to a sales qualified lead (SQL).

As a result, Your marketing team can spend more time focusing on increasing conversions, and your sales team can focus on increasing sales.

It’s a win-win situation.

3. Understand your customers better

Using a marketing automation solution gives you a better understanding of your customers.

It would be pretty difficult to create a personalized customer journey without understanding what that journey is, right?

You need to know how customers behave so that you can target them with the right messages at the right time.

So when it comes to marketing automation, you get a deeper understanding of the entire customer journey.

4. Maintain leads

Marketing automation helps you nurture leads more efficiently.

As?

By targeting consumers with relevant content based on their position in the sales funnel.

Let’s take an example:

1. A user signs up for a welcome discount code. You send them an automated welcome email.
2. A week later they will send a reminder to use their discount code. In the following week you will follow with more information about your product.
3. Each of these automated emails is tailored to a specific phase of the customer journey and helps you nurture the lead from one phase to the next.
4. As a result, your lead nurturing becomes more likely to be a full conversion.

Now that we know a little about what marketing automation can do today (and why you should adopt it), how does it look in the next few years?

The future of marketing automation

The global pandemic forced companies to reevaluate their relationship with consumers. While businesses struggled to weather the storm online Customer experiences even more important than before.

Fortunately, marketing automation helped with this.

Automation helped marketers personalize the customer experience, reach a wider audience, and understand what consumers are looking for.

In 2020 alone 41% of companies saw sales increase due to the use of AI and automation in their digital marketing campaigns.

But what does that mean for the future of marketing automation?

The future looks bright for marketing automation.

Search suggestions …

• The marketing automation software industry will grow 19.2% between 2020 and 2025.
• The industry will generate revenue of $ 25.1 billion by 2023, up from $ 11.4 billion in 2017.

In other words, marketing automation will persist. We can expect more brands to use it, more personalization in marketing and more automated customer journeys.

The advancement of technology will also help marketers improve their insights and better understand their customers.
So if you’re new to marketing automation, now is the time to try it.