We can also become too mired in the details of our journey. And if you have children, you know exactly what I’m talking about. “How many hours will it take to get here?” “I have to go to the bathroom.” “Why are we stopping?” “I’m hungry.” And on, and on it goes. These are indicators that they our precious cargo are more interested in the destination than the importance of the journey. Seeing the big picture can offer us a view that is holistic, and gives us insight that we might not otherwise consider. That is why this final post in our big picture series is focused on starting your marketing automation journey.

Big Picture

As marketers we can become so hyper-focused on specific goals, campaigns or initiatives, we forget the broader context with which they fall into. This big picture view is critical as we begin to understand how marketing automation fits within our business. It’s important to remember that our understanding of this view will enable us to make the right decisions on how to automate our processes and marketing tools.

Over the last couple of weeks, we’ve highlighted broader systems that your organization needs to consider as you evaluate the big picture view of marketing. It begins at the business strategy level, then works it’s way down to your marketing scorecard and goals. As you determine the metrics you would like to impact, it is imperative that these blend into your customer touch-points and not override them. If our customer journey becomes secondary to your goals, we are missing the point. The customers’ journey to your business is the windshield of your marketing efforts. It should be clear and unobstructed.

The Roadmap

With that, let’s climb to a higher altitude and see the big picture landscape of our marketing automation journey. First and foremost, marketing automation is not a bolt-on solution. For automation to be truly successful, you must consider all of your marketing efforts en masse. Some think that a landing page with a compelling call-to-action is all their organization needs to integrate automation. But this is a shortsighted view. Consider our road trip. Let’s say it will require multiple days to get to get to our destination. If we plot our course without considering the climate, construction and traffic at each stop, we may miss alternative paths to help us get there in a more effective and efficient manner. What if it is quicker to go around the big city? What if construction is slowing traffic down?

This is true of your marketing automation journey. If we consider our customer touch-points and lay that context beside the omni channel approach, we will begin to see paths and connections that we may not have considered before. This is one of the key approaches to automation that often gets overlooked. The layering of channels and touch points is as vital to the creation of automated processes as content creation itself. If we don’t evaluate the intersections of the customer journey in connection with the channels we communicate through, our efforts will fall flat.

Start Your Marketing Automation Journey

So now that we have a map of our marketing automation journey, where do we go from here? This is a conversation that will be entirely unique to each organization. We are extremely excited to have assembled a community of developers, users and marketers that have plotted their own journey’s and have committed themselves to share what they’ve learned with you. Mautic is unique in that this community cares about your success. This is not a profit game. This is a journey of connection. You see, when you win, we all win. Here are a few thoughts to get your marketing automation journey started.

• Assemble your team: As we’ve noted in previous posts, your marketing efforts involve a number of teams. As Macy’s discovered, Macys.com was having a significant impact on in-store purchases. The online team learned they had to work with brick & mortar and understand how the customer searches and purchases.
  

  “We used have 2 separate silo’d budgets, we really now have one Marketing budget. And we look at the best way to spend that, what’s the best allocation, what’s the best media mix, whether it’s digital, offline, how do they work together to deliver…yeah of course the most sales, but really, that best customer experience.”

  For more information on Macy’s teamwork, click here.

• Understand your customer: This goes without saying. When you understand your customers needs, you will be more in tune to their purchase cadence. You will know more about their buying habits, how they seek your product or service out and what tools/communities they use to evaluate. This will help you deliver the right value at the right touchpoint.
• Determine the channels: The channels which you communicate and connect with your audience, will be incredibly important. If your customers are online, than connect with them there. If they are in your stores, connect with them there. If they are in both places at the same time, make the connection seamless. Don’t tackle every channel if your customers aren’t there and don’t automate what you don’t have the structure for.
• Automate with a goal: You should never automate without a set of goals you are seeking to achieve. Automation should further assist your audience/customer in meeting their need. It should never be self-serving. When you deliver value, your customers will remember. They will follow you because you care more about meeting their need than meeting their bottom line.
• Review and verify: This is as critical to the process of automation itself. Always be testing. Always be analyzing your audiences’ behavior and purchase cadence. This is an area that, as marketers, we need to become more adept at understanding the information that is being gathered with every click, every visit and every purchase.
• Adjust course if needed: Marketing automation is not a “set-it and forget it” proposition. It is a complex digital conversation that grants you access to the voice and cadence of your customer. Your customers change. They are constantly looking for value in every area of their life.

Remember, your marketing automation journey is more about relationship building than it is about channels, touch-points and data. With every piece of information you learn more about who your customers are, what their likes and dislikes are, and how they desire to be connected with. Our job is to listen, and trust that we’ve provided value at the right touch-point, through the right channel and at the right time.

For a full-size PDF of “Your Marketing Automation Journey” visual represented above, click here.

Honda finds marketing rhythm

Massive music effort targets hard-to-reach millennial buyers

Honda, as it turns out, also wants to be cool — cool enough to make an impression on the hundreds of thousands of millennials who pack the park for two weekends every fall. Hence the HR-V on-site and the massive Honda Stage it faces, where popular acts such as The Weeknd, Alabama Shakes and alt-J perform. Honda’s presence in Austin is part of a massive marketing effort that uses music to attract the fleeting attention of millennial car-buyers.

Read the full story: https://www.autonews.com/article/20151116/RETAIL03/311169967/honda-finds-marketing-rhythm

Panera Bread: Marketing Flows Through Cost Of Goods Sold

If you haven’t read Panera’s update on their Animal Welfare program and new commitments, you might want to check it out. Panera Bread (NASDAQ:PNRA) isn’t the only company advocating for the ethical treatment of animals, but they are one of the first restaurants to push so aggressively against the common practices. By pushing against these commonly accepted practices Panera is able to generate goodwill with their target audience. That goodwill serves to bring in customers in much the same way as marketing expenditures.

Read the full story: http://seekingalpha.com/article/3686416-panera-bread-marketing-flows-through-cost-of-goods-sold

Easy Jet Shows Why Customer Intelligence will be Pivotal for Digital Marketing in 2016

It was a well-crafted email campaign, personalised and inspired by a deep-rooted understanding of the customer. A few days ago, I read a blog on the PPC Hero platform, where the author was mistaken segmentation for customer intelligence or insights. Customer segmentation uses conventional parameters like gender, age group, nationality, earning bracket and a few others. On the other hand, customer intelligence goes deeper to more unconventional insights like a customer’s motivations, fears, frustrations and deep-seated habits.

Read the full story: http://customerthink.com/easy-jet-shows-why-customer-intelligence-will-be-pivotal-for-digital-marketing-in-2016/

These three articles all cover different aspects of marketing. Honda is actively seeking to meet their audience where they play and improve their public image by appealing to the interests of their target audience. Panera is handling marketing in much the same way however, rather than just spending money to meet their audience they are taking a more humanitarian approach by not only appealing to the interests of their audience but at the same time improving their business and their world. EasyJet is demonstrating their active approach to customer engagement through listening and responding with personalized marketing and intelligent marketing.

Lastly, we promised an interesting trend we’ve noticed in popular news outlets, you’ve probably seen it, but it may be happening even more than you’re aware. Here’s an example:

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As people become more and more immune to advertising on the web advertisers are seeking new ways to engage with their audience. This marketing strategy is interesting because it requires brands to do more than just create a flashy ad or a catchy tagline. This trend forces more thoughtful marketing. Marketers are now creating content both useful and informational for their target audience. In essence this new trend is simply content marketing being placed on the web where their audience visits. If you’re a marketer you should consider whether sponsored content marketing like this is a beneficial strategy for your brand.

Also, keep in mind that marketing automation involves much more than just setting up a fancy campaign drip flow. You can successfully use marketing automation and the Mautic platform to build personalized marketing strategies and intelligent marketing like what you read about from EasyJet. Curious? You should read more about how marketing automation with Mautic will give you powerful and personalized customer engagement.

Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice Viral Marketing Continues On LexCorp Website

An important aspect of viral marketing is making fans feel like they are taking part in the world of the film that’s being hyped, and so, WB has chosen to portray LexCorp as an actual entity, and it’s made for some entertaining moments and reveals. For one, there was the faux interview with Fortune that revealed that Jesse Eisenberg is, in fact, playing Lex Luthor Jr. in the upcoming blockbuster. This undeservedly caused quite a stir, as many fanboys did not realize that pre-New 52 Luthor was technically Lex Luthor Jr.

Read the full story: http://wegotthiscovered.com/movies/batman-superman-dawn-justice-lexcorp-viral-marketing-continues/

How Arby’s Broke Its Marketing Slump and Became One of Today’s Beefiest Brands

The brand’s turning point arrived about two years ago. It was either going to crash and burn or rise to the challenge of its teetering brand. The difficulty was figuring out what made the brand special and what it stood for.

The team came to a consensus on what was at the core of the Arby’s brand: meat.

“We’ve done that through creating engagement with our customers where the brand can fit into cultural events. We jump in where we think we have a right to jump in. We don’t push content and ads through our social media channels. We listen,” said Arby’s Restaurant Group brand president and CMO Robert Lynch.

Read the full story: http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/how-arbys-broke-its-marketing-slump-and-became-one-todays-beefiest-brands-167625

How Lego’s Marketing Vp Led the Awesome Team that Stole the Oscars

Though The Lego Movie, a fan favorite and $468 million blockbuster, earned not a single nomination in the animated feature category, the 83-year-old Danish toy company proved it didn’t need one. During a two-and-a-half-minute rendition of “Everything Is Awesome,” dancers fanned out through the audience to hand yellow Oscar statuettes (made from Lego bricks, naturally) to the likes of Meryl Streep, Clint Eastwood and, most memorably, Oprah Winfrey, whose look of surprise and delight reached 35 million viewers. In fact, according to data crunched by Amobee Brand Intelligence, Lego dominated the night with close to 47,000 social mentions and 44 percent of the real-time discussion. That little Oscar trick handed the toy brand some $7.5 million of free advertising. Not a bad night for a loser.

Read the full story: http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/how-lego-s-marketing-vp-led-awesome-team-stole-oscars-167467

Email Deliverability 2015: Are Messages Reaching Inboxes?

Only 79% of legitimate marketing messages sent by brands are arriving in consumers’ inboxes, with the rest ending up in spam folders or getting lost, according to a recent report from Return Path.

The report was based on an analysis of 357 million marketing messages sent by recognized brands to subscribers. Inbox placement statistics were based on performance across more than 150 mailbox providers in North America, South America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region.

This year’s 79% email deliverability rate is down from 83% in 2014, the analysis found.

Read the full story: http://www.marketingprofs.com/charts/2015/28649/email-deliverability-2015-are-messages-reaching-inboxes

We start this week with a reminder that honest and transparent marketing is always the best way to build a strong brand and consumer loyalty. Recently Ubisoft failed to do this and as a result are struggling with a bit of a PR nightmare.

Ubisoft accused of ‘deceptive marketing’ for Heroes of Might and Magic 7

“The CE Edition is advertised as coming with a PC DVD,” writes melchior1090 on Imgur. “But no game is even provided with the package. Buyers have to issue tickets to Ubisoft to have the game activated on their account. And are refused refunds.”

Read the full story: http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/10/12/ubisoft-accused-of-deceptive-marketing-for-heroes-of-might-and-magic-7

The Get-Rich-Quick Schemers Who Love the GOP

Donald Trump and Ben Carson, lack any experience in elected office. Much less attention has gone to something else the two men share: a history of entanglements with companies that have been rightly criticized for hawking get-rich-quick schemes to the broke and desperate. The business model, which is perfectly legal, is called multilevel marketing.

Read the full story: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_bills/2015/10/trump_carson_bush_all_benefited_from_multilevel_marketing_schemes.html

Square says its super-simple email marketing tools are paying off for small businesses

Six months after introducing square marketing, the company has data that shows its digital coupons increase sales. If you pay attention to news coming from Square, you know that it’s been a long time since all it did was process credit-card payments using its itty-bitty swiper. The expansion of its small-business services began in earnest back in 2012, with an app that transformed an iPad into a cash register. In May 2014, it turned receipts into miniature customer surveys and started fronting money to small businesses that they could repay a little bit at a time from their Square transactions. In April of this year, it launched Square Marketing, a service that lets businesses send digital offers such as discounts to their customers. And in August, it started to help businesses schedule appointments.

Read the full story: http://www.fastcompany.com/3052058/square-says-its-super-simple-email-marketing-tools-are-paying-off-for-small-businesses

Startups: Why Giving Stuff Away For Free Is The Best Marketing Tool

Startups – giving stuff away for free is the best marketing tool. This story demonstrates why. Austin has been named the best American city for startups, according to a report by the Kauffman Foundation and the surprising second is Miami. The data is part of an infographic exploring Factors that Influence Startup Success. It reveals interesting facts and statistics relating to age, professional background and sectors as influences on the success or failure of a startup.

Read the full story: http://www.forbes.com/sites/amyguttman/2015/10/11/startups-why-giving-stuff-away-for-free-is-the-best-marketing-tool/

Your time is limited, we find interesting and useful articles for you to quickly review the highlights of and how they affect marketers. Today’s stories covered everything form deceptive marketing, questionable multi-level marketing, the power of simple email marketing, and the best marketing tool ever: giving stuff away for free. We hope these articles help you as you plan and execute your marketing strategy.

Mautic, free marketing automation software, is a fantastic tool to help you build a transparent and simple email marketing system and help you give things away to your target audience. You’ll love all that marketing automation can do for you and do well.

Straight Outta Compton

“It seems as if there has been a new must-read piece about N.W.A., Straight Outta Compton or gangsta rap every single day for the last few months. The release of F Gary Gray’s flick on group has served as the hook for so many people to relive the halycon days of old and there have been many fine pieces of work as a result.

But Straight Outta Compton is one of times when the marketing folks managed to work every single angle for the best possible result. Be it the way in which that iconic poster was pimped out or even the way in which a lot of the narrative around the Dre album was all about the film, Straight Outta Compton’s sales pitch could not have been better scripted. It helps, of course, that there was a lot of articles waiting to be written about that era and the film presented the perfect excuse.”

Read the full article: http://www.irishtimes.com/blogs/ontherecord/2015/08/24/straight-outta-marketing/

Beyond Email: Use Multi-channel marketing automation to generate and nurture leads

“While marketing automation is a hot topic across industries, many marketers are daunted by the complexities of combining customer journeys, content strategies, and dense technologies. Marketing automation technology allows marketers to generate and nurture leads with sequenced, segmented, and automated campaigns that deliver content at scale, with minimal intervention. Automation can be used to dynamically change content; test messaging; and sequence messages and notifications. As with any marketing initiative, the goal should always be focused on providing content that benefits your customers.”

Read the full article: http://www.econtentmag.com/Articles/Column/Marketing-Master-Class/Beyond-Email-Use-Multi-channel-Marketing-Automation-to-Generate-and-Nurture-Leads-105834.htm

Why you can’t get buy-in for your great marketing ideas

“It’s not entirely their fault, though. Unfortunately, many marketers are restricted by their boss’s reluctance to invest in new ideas and approaches to marketing. Why spend thousands of dollars to fix what isn’t broken? It doesn’t matter that a new approach could reach an entirely new audience, or help you reach your existing customers more effectively. Stepping out of the marketing comfort zone when the bottom line is at stake is scary.”

• You focus on tactics not results
• You don’t highlight the competition
• You don’t pay attention to cost
• You don’t set reasonable expectations

Read the full article: http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveolenski/2015/08/21/why-you-cant-get-buy-in-for-your-great-marketing-ideas/

This last article is especially relevant as Mautic addresses many of these fears and concerns and helps you make a compelling reason for using marketing automation. The buy-in with Mautic and your great marketing ideas together is easy!

A recent proximity marketing experiment using beacon technology has delivered encouraging results for drinks giant Coca-Cola, which may now seek to extend the test to other areas. In a pilot scheme conducted in May and June this year, Coca-Cola linked up with Norwegian publisher VG, proximity network Unacast and cinema chain CAPA to make offers to cinema-goers who had a VG app on their smartphone.

Read the full article here: https://www.warc.com/LatestNews/News/Coke_tries_out_beacon_marketing.news?ID=35242

Four Quadrants of Marketing To Probe the Consumer Mind

A recent study shared in the Harvard Business Review brings the marketplace of the mind closer to key business factors: How typical a brand is of the category it’s in – how central it is – and also how distinctive it is. That leads to a matrix with four quadrants in which your offering might fall.

• Aspirational: This quadrant houses brands that are highly distinctive but also hold wide appeal.
• Mainstream: Customers have little trouble identifying brands that are typical of an industry and this quadrant represents those quite typical but lacking much distinctiveness from competitors.
• Unconventional: These brands score high on distinctiveness but are viewed as atypical of the category.
• Peripheral: These brands lack centrality or distinctiveness.

Read the full article here: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/careers/management/four-quadrants-of-marketing-to-probe-the-consumer-mind/article25969172/

New Customer Onboarding Goes Beyond Slick Marketing

New customer onboarding in many industries is as simple as downloading an app, inputting a name and email address, and clicking to accept terms and conditions. Seeking to replicate this mostly digital experience, banks and credit unions have increased their marketing investment in acquiring and onboarding new customers and members. Key points: First Impressions Matter, Challenges to Effective Onboarding, Improving Onboarding Process, Benefits of Onboarding.

Read the full article here: http://thefinancialbrand.com/53464/new-customer-onboarding-success-strategies/

Color Is Critical In Marketing

Color influences our attitudes, emotions, and definitely our decisions in purchases. Making the right decision on which colors will be used in your marketing campaigns and your website will greatly impact your business. Pick the right colors and you will see high conversions and increase of revenue, pick the wrong colors and you might be standing in the Sahara desert, alone and miserable. Overview of all the top colors and companies who use them.

Read the full article here: http://www.business2community.com/consumer-marketing/color-is-critical-in-marketing-01302029

7 Mistakes That Will Doom Your Marketing Automation Implementation

By default, most good entrepreneurs understand marketing. This doesn’t mean that you love executing daily and weekly marketing activities. But it does mean that you respect and appreciate the need for strong marketing efforts. But despite this positive outlook, it can end in doomsday. If you’re not careful, you can make fatal mistakes that do more harm than good to your marketing. Even small mistakes can cause your company a bit of embarrassment that’s best avoided.

1. You haven’t established clear objectives.
2. You don’t understand your customers.
3. You didn’t choose the right automation software.
4. You lack a documented marketing process.
5. Your marketing and sales teams don’t work together.
6. You aren’t offering the right kind of content.
7. You’re selling instead of nurturing leads.

Read the full article here:
http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/247236

Pro Prankster Perfect Viral Marketing

Using the Car Lister auto-buying platform is as easy as lifting the front wheels of a Ford Escape taxi off the ground. At least that’s what the pranksters at ad agency Thinkmodo wanted you to believe in a recent stunt. Car Lister’s CEO enlisted the New York viral-marketing agency to pull off a stunt to bring more visibility to the site, which allows dealerships and private owners to sell vehicles in a community-like setting with the help of photos and video previews. So Thinkmodo staged a dispute between a New York meter maid and a rude taxi driver who refused to move from an illegal spot.

Yet it was all just a clever scheme to generate viral attention for Car Lister. The stunt illustrates the power of viral videos that spread rapidly online and are then picked up by TV shows for prolonged exposure.

Read the full article here:
http://www.autonews.com/article/20150720/RETAIL03/307209995/pro-pranksters-perfect-viral-marketing

Study With Major Brands Compares Ad Recall For Mobile and Desktop Promos

When people were asked if they remembered seeing full-page ads, 38 percent recalled seeing the ad on a desktop. Forty-three percent of those who were served the ad on smartphones, tablets and desktops remembered the ad.

Banners had the lowest ad recall rates. Thirty-three percent of people who looked at banner ads on a desktop remembered seeing the ad later. The same percentage of people who saw it on multiple devices remembered seeing ads, meaning that solo desktop banners are just as effective as cross-screen standard ads, even though brands pay extra for smartphone and tablet ads.

Read the full article here:
http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/study-major-brands-compares-ad-recall-mobile-and-desktop-promos-165905

Amazon’s Brand Takes a Hit on Social Media During #PrimeDay

Even with negative tweets up 241%, Amazon claims big win overall. The social media sentiments around Amazon took a noticeable turn for the worse during the first 13 hours of Prime Day, which has the e-commerce site offering a slew of deals to celebrate its 20th birthday. Deals like 35 percent off Velveeta Shells & Cheese—on a day the Seattle-based company predicted would rival Black Friday—created negative responses on Facebook and Twitter.

Read the full article here:
http://www.adweek.com/news/technology/amazons-brand-takes-hit-social-media-during-primeday-165901

5 Ways Live Video Can Rock Your Content Marketing

As content marketers, we can tap into the power of live video to grow our influence, build communities, encourage engagement, and interact with our fans and followers in a whole new way. Not sure where to get started with streaming video? We’ve got 5 suggestions for you:

1. Live Events
2. Live Announcements
3. Live Interviews
4. Live Video Blogging
5. Live Panel Chats

Read the full article here:
http://www.business2community.com/content-marketing/5-ways-live-video-can-rock-your-content-marketing-01275553