On a moonlit night, a silhouette is perched on a rooftop, surveying the streets below. Suddenly, their target appears! The figure winds up and hurls a crumpled paper at the target, hitting them squarely in the head. As the figure runs off, the target opens the paper to read, “Attend our webinar next Tuesday, the beloved customer!” Confused, the target, who has never done business with the figure, tosses the message aside and goes about their evening, forgetting the whole thing.
This is basically what it looks like when you don’t use data to send your messages.
Data, or more specifically, actionable data, is the perfect sidekick to that mysterious marketing figure from the rooftop. With the right intel, messages get sent to the right place and make a stronger impact on the recipient. Actionable data comes from the careful analysis of a lead’s behavior, which indicates where they are in the buying process, and is the keystone that makes marketing automation possible, let alone useful.
Here are 4 ways that actionable data enables marketers:
1. Deliver messages to the right target
Based on a lead’s prior actions, you can determine if they’re a potential buyer, a brand new lead, or a returning customer. After you identify them, you can make sure they receive appropriate messages about new products, benefits, or exclusive member deals.
If done well, veteran customers will continue to take advantage of all of your relevant services and new leads will become buyers.
2. Fix what’s broken
“NOBODY IS CONVERTING FROM MY GOOGLE ADS CAMPAIGN AND I DON’T KNOW WHAT’S WRONG, AHHHH!”
Calm down! There are many ways to figure out what’s going wrong.
Between Google Analytics and the behavioral data from your marketing automation, you can pinpoint where the issue is and get to work fixing it. No clicks? Time for a new ad. No form submissions from your landing page? Set up an A/B test to experiment with improvements. With actionable data, you can backtrack and get pointed in the right direction.
3. Gauge lead temperature
One of the most useful pieces of data coming from marketing automation is the behavioral score. You can assign points to almost any action involved in the marketing journey. Some may be low-scoring, like visiting a certain webpage or simply opening an email. Others will be worth more, like downloading a whitepaper or requesting a demo. A lead’s score will tell you if they’re cold and need education, or hot and need a sales call.
4. Make life easier for sales
Speaking of sales calls, a marketer using actionable data is the sales team’s best friend. The marketing team has already spent time nurturing those leads with emails, PPC ads, and informative content so they know when it’s time to hand it off to the sales team. When you’re handing off hot marketing qualified leads, sales calls go more smoothly, and everyone goes home with happy piggy banks.
Let’s talk more about what data is important and relevant to your company. Contact Centrus today to see how you can use marketing automation and actionable data to generate leads, effectively nurture them, and boost revenue in a way that is customized to your mission.
