emarketer Marketing Automation Roundup

Transcription

1 emarketer Marketing Automation Roundup DECEMBER 2013 Automation now touches more of the marketing landscape than ever before, and business-to-business and business-to-consumer marketers alike are taking it up to improve their businesses. emarketer has curated a roundup of key trends, statistics and information relevant to marketers looking to automate anything from lead generation to CRM and beyond. sponsored by

2 Marketing Automation Roundup DECEMBER 2013 Marketing Automation Overview Automation now touches many facets of the marketing ecosystem, and both business-to-consumer and business-to-business marketers have taken up various forms of automation to help run their businesses more efficiently and effectively. According to April 2013 data from Forrester Research, among B2C marketers, automation was most commonly used in the areas of web analytics and social media monitoring, both selected by 83. For B2B marketers, web analytics and US B2B Marketers, service providers were key elements of marketing Some adoption automation for 73 each. Adoption of marketing automation, especially among B2Bs, is expected to increase significantly next year according to research from BtoB Magazine. More than half of respondents to an April survey by the magazine said they would have complete adoption of marketing automation in place by next year, up from 26% who expected to reach that level this year. According to data from Holger Schulze, B2B marketers around the world are most commonly using automation to generate and nurture leads, though as of June 2013, nearly four in 10 said they still did not use marketing automation. One reason could be money: US respondents to the BtoB Magazine survey said this was a major obstacle to using marketing automation more effectively, along with poor integration with sales and marketing initiatives. Level of Marketing Automation Adoption According to 28% 10% 2% Moderate adoption 28% 28% 17% Strong adoption 22% 36% 29% Complete adoption, with integration of marketing automation into sales and marketing initiatives 18% 26% 52% Source: BtoB Magazine, "Marketing Automation: Best Practices in a Rapidly Changing World," Nov 11, Ways that B2B Marketers* Worldwide Use Marketing Automation, June 2013 Generate leads 36.7% Nurture leads 36.1% Actively create content to feed automated campaigns 28.2% Engage with customers 26.0% Sporadically use content for marketing automation campaigns 15.1% We don't use marketing automation 39.0% Note: *respondents belong to the B2B Technology Marketing Community on LinkedIn Source: Holger Schulze, "B2B Content Marketing Trends 2013," June 27, Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 2

3 Usage Widening for Programmatic Techniques Execs plan serious strides in next two years Majorities of US marketing executives are already using a wide variety of programmatic approaches to their jobs, according to research from the Winterberry Group and the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). A September 2013 survey found strong majorities using audience segmentation, auction-based media buying, insight development, and automation of back-end and premium digital media buying processes. But programmatic s reach will get even farther. While 79% of respondents currently use segmentation, more than nine in 10 plan to do so in the next two years. And similar percentages plan to use real-time bidding or other auction-based media buying. Content optimization techniques are also expected to reach more than two-thirds of marketers in the next two years. While brand safety issues are the leading barrier for advertisers looking to expand their approaches, the benefits seem to outweigh the costs. More than half of advertisers said programmatic approaches could help them more effective target consumers across all the digital media they consume, while nearly as many valued the efficiency in value and transactions they could achieve through programmatic buying. On the publisher side, benefits were even more striking, largely because publishers expect to glean higher rates from inventory that used to be difficult or even impossible to sell. Programmatic Approaches that US Executive Marketers Currently Use vs. Plan to Use*, Sep 2013 Audience segmentation 79% Utilization of auction-based approaches to media buying (e.g., through a real-time bidding platform) Insight development Automation of back-end processes 59% 63% Automation of "premium" digital media buying processes Content optimization 47% 59% 69% Automation of traditional media buying processes (e.g., purchasing print advertising) Currently 22% 44% Next 2 years 79% 86% 88% 86% 79% 91% Note: *in the next 2 years Source: Winterberry Group and the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), "Programmatic Everywhere? Data, Technology and the Future of Audience Engagement," Nov 4, Leading Objectives that Drive Interest in Programmatic Approaches According to US Publishers and Advertisers, Sep 2013 Efficiently value and transact digital media Improve operational efficiency Expand yield from owned inventory More effectively target consumers across digital media Deliver a better customer experience Improve speed-to-market Improve relevance of marketing messaging Improve insights into consumers Publishers 63% 63% 61% 26% 16% 12% 9% 7% Advertisers 49% 33% 12% 55% 30% 9% 24% 21% Source: Winterberry Group and the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), "Programmatic Everywhere? Data, Technology and the Future of Audience Engagement," Nov 4, Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 3

4 Automation, Integration of Inbound Marketing Still Limited Inbound marketing primarily used to drive leads Inbound marketing tactics, including content marketing, search engine optimization and use of social media marketing, are all critical for businesses looking to generate leads. But these tasks are also difficult to pull off, particularly the creation and marketing of content. That was seen as both the most effective and most difficult inbound marketing tactic in a survey of B2B and B2C marketing professionals worldwide, conducted in September 2013 by Ascend2 and Research Underwriters. Marketing automation is one technique to make inbound marketing tactics more strategic and complementary, as well as reduce much of the guesswork of inbound marketing, but the survey found that at this point, few were actually employing marketing automation. Just 16% of B2Cs and 14% of B2Bs reported using marketing automation extensively to manage their inbound marketing. That said, over 40% from both types of companies were employing marketing automation to a limited extent, indicating that use could grow in the near future. Taking a look at those who ranked their inbound marketing tactics as very successful vs. those who saw them as unsuccessful, 45% of successful inbound marketers used marketing automation, vs. only 9% of unsuccessful inbound marketers. The study found that integration was a key factor distinguishing the successful from the unsuccessful as well. Sixty-seven percent of the companies that saw themselves achieving strong inbound marketing results had integrated the inbound marketing program, whereas only 9% of the least successful inbound marketers did so. Only a slim 9% of successful inbound marketers didn t bother integrating. Measuring performance was additionally a key factor separating the good inbound marketers from the bad, and giving further fuel to the idea that putting the different tactics under one umbrella, which can manage and assess their impact, may be worthwhile. In this case, nearly half of successful inbound marketers measured performance, vs. 9% of unsuccessful inbound marketers. Most Difficult Inbound Marketing Tactics to Execute According to B2B vs. B2C Marketing Professionals Worldwide, Sep 2013 B2B B2C Content creation and marketing 59% 45% Lead nurturing and scoring 38% 33% Use of marketing automation 32% 31% Search engine optimization 30% 36% Social media/social networking 27% 33% Blogging or guest blogging 25% 21% Outbound marketing integration 21% 24% Press and public relations 15% 16% Social sharing buttons 6% 3% Source: Ascend2, "Inbound Marketing," Sep 25, Use of Marketing Automation to Manage Inbound Marketing According to B2B vs. B2C Marketing Professionals Worldwide, Sep 2013 Don't use 39% B2B Extensive use 16% Limited use 45% Don't use 43% Source: Ascend2, "Inbound Marketing," Sep 25, 2013 B2C Extensive use 14% Limited use 43% Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 4

5 Behavioral Data Is Key to B2B Marketing Automation Marketing handles much of the purchase cycle that formerly went to sales The internet has become a primary source of information, recommendations and reviews when business decision-makers contemplate potential purchases. This places significant responsibility on marketers, who must now guide and nurture these leads via digital through the majority of the buying cycle. Relying on automated solutions to create and deploy lead nurture programs is not new, but business-to-business (B2B) marketers are eyeing them with a renewed focus, according to a new emarketer report, B2B Marketing Automation: Using Behavioral Data to Power Lead Nurture. Marketing automation is a solution that makes use of technology to perform some of the heavy lifting associated with communicating to prospects and existing customers across multiple channels such as , social media and a company s website. Automation can also be used to score leads, segment audiences and nurture those audiences throughout their customer life cycle. In 2012, one in 10 digital marketing dollars spent by US B2B marketers went to marketing automation, according to a survey by Wakefly, a digital marketing firm that also advises clients on marketing automation programs. Though a greater portion of budgets were allocated to web redesigns and pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, marketing automation had the largest yearover-year growth of any area: 233%. But most marketers and industry professionals tend to agree that the basic use of marketing automation is insufficient for persuading today s B2B decision-makers, and relevancy is key. Achieving relevancy can be difficult. In a February 2013 survey, BtoB Magazine found that the ability to reach the right buyer at the right time ranked as the No. 2 challenge among US B2B marketers looking to meet the changing needs of B2B prospects. Most agree that moving beyond a batch and blast use of marketing automation in order to arrive at a more relevant, effective lead nurture program requires one thing: data, and in particular, behavioral data. Ways that B2B Marketers* Worldwide Use Marketing Automation, June 2013 Generate leads Nurture leads Actively create content to feed automated campaigns Engage with customers 26.0% 28.2% 36.7% 36.1% Sporadically use content for marketing automation campaigns 15.1% We don't use marketing automation 39.0% Note: *respondents belong to the B2B Technology Marketing Community on LinkedIn Source: Holger Schulze, "B2B Content Marketing Trends 2013," June 27, Allocation of Digital Marketing Budget Among US B2B Marketers, 2011 & 2012 % of total budget Web redesigns 15% 24% Pay-per-click advertising 16% 21% Website maintenance/features 15% 14% Marketing automation 3% 10% Landing pages 7% 9% SEO/content 14% 7% marketing 12% 7% Social media 6% 5% Display advertising 3% 2% Other 9% 1% Source: Wakefly as cited on company blog, March 28, Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 5

6 Behavioral Data Is Key to B2B Marketing Automation (Continued) If [companies] are missing title information or firmographic information, they re going to have to make guesses about what s relevant to the individual, and a guess is introducing risk to the experience with that individual, said Maribeth Ross, vice president of marketing at NetProspex, a company that provides B2B marketing contact lists and data services. Behavioral data, however, can minimize those risks. In tracking a prospect s digital footprint across websites, , search and even social, B2B companies can begin to understand a potential buyer s needs, wants and interests based on as little information as an address or a cookie ID. It all really comes down to using cross-channel marketing automation technology that s fueled by data to be able to personalize the content we re delivering to the buyer and keep the sales team apprised of where that individual is in the buying process, said Joel Book, principal of marketing research and education at ExactTarget, owner of B2B marketing automation platform provider Pardot. The brand that responds fastest and demonstrates a commitment to really serve the individual by delivering content that is personalized and aids in his or her buying process, that s the brand that s going to win the deal. Leading Challenges to Meeting the Changing Needs of B2B Prospects According to US B2B Marketers, Feb 2013 Lack of budget and resources to implement new strategies 59% Inability to reach the right target at the right time in the buying decision 39% Inconsistent support and lead follow-up from sales 38% Poor infrastructure to collect and analyze data within marketing 34% Lack of understanding of the metrics needed at each stage of the buying decision 22% Lack of knowledge about strategies for emerging marketing channels 19% Note: n=243 Source: BtoB Magazine, "The Evolving B2B Purchase Process: Attribution across the Sales Funnel" in conjunction with Bizo, April 8, Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 6

7 Mobile and Targeting Drive Up Opens Mobile conversion rates still somewhat depressed Nearly one in three s sent in North America during Q were opened the highest number in recent history. Mobile device adoption and the use of marketing automation to send more targeted s are having among the biggest impacts on performance, according to a new emarketer report, Benchmarks: Key Metrics and Trends for A February 2013 survey from enterprise service provider BlueHornet showed that 71.8% of US users ages 24 to 40 said they typically read their personal throughout the day. Mobile plays an undeniable role in enabling consumers to check from anywhere and at any time of day. Marketing Performance Metrics in North America, Q Q % 95.7% 96.5% 96.3% 96.5% 95.9% 96.1% 96.0% 96.4% Data from marketing software provider Knotice showed mobile phones and tablets accounted for a combined total of 41.1% of US opens in H2 2012, up from 27.4% in H Some marketers and solution providers have recorded even higher open rate shares. Pam McAtee, Epsilon s senior vice president of digital solutions, said mobile now accounts for 60% or more of all opens for most clients. She expects that percentage will continue to climb before plateauing at around 70% to 80%. We re tracking consumers opening [ s] multiple times on multiple different types of devices, McAtee said. We can see that they opened an on a mobile device and then on a desktop, predominantly in that order. They re using mobile devices to sift through their and clean up their , and then they re going back to a desktop and converting. Though open rate performance suggests an increased level of initial engagement with , additional data from Experian Marketing Services showed measures more indicative of conversions declining between Q and Q Click-toopen rate dropped 9.6% year over year, and transaction-to-click rate fell 15.6%. However, average order size increased about $23, suggesting fewer clicks resulted in purchases, but that those purchases were more substantial. 23.3% 5.9% Q1 22.2% 5.2% 23.8% 5.5% 24.8% 5.2% 26.2% 4.7% 25.6% 4.4% 27.2% 4.5% 27.4% 4.5% 31.1% 5.1% Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q Nonbounce Open rate Clickthrough Source: Epsilon, "Q Trends and Benchmarks," July 2, US Marketing Open Rate Share, by Device, H & H % of total Mobile phones 20.63% Tablets 6.76% Desktop computers 72.61% Tablets 12.10% Mobile phones 28.98% Desktop computers 58.92% H H Source: Knotice, "Mobile Opens Report," April 11, 2012 & Feb 19, Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 7

8 Mobile and Targeting Drive Up Opens (Continued) Marketers like Andrew Kordek, co-founder and chief strategist of marketing agency Trendline Interactive, said mobile s lack of effect on conversion-focused measures is indicative of consumers overall lack of confidence in purchasing via mobile devices. To drive greater engagement with , whether on desktop or mobile, companies are using marketing automation via triggered messaging. Triggered s enable marketers to use automation to respond to a user-prompted action or behavior. Consumers opened one out of every two triggered s in North America in Q1 2013, according to Epsilon. Triggered s are timely and often behaviorally relevant, but relevance is only part of a larger ability to personalize communications. October 2012 data from Experian Marketing Services noted US marketing s that were both triggered and personalized saw 29.2% click rates compared to 23.3% for triggered s lacking personalization. Marketing Campaign Metrics in North America, Q & Q Total open rate Unique open rate Click-to-open rate Total click rate Unique click rate Transaction-to-click rate Transaction rate Revenue per Average order Bounce rate Unsubscribe rate Q % 15.5% 16.3% 3.8% 2.7% 5.4% 0.11% $0.12 $ % 0.16% Q % 17.0% 14.7% 3.9% 2.7% 4.5% 0.09% $0.12 $ % 0.14% % change 9.7% 9.7% -9.6% 1.6% 3.0% -15.6% -13.0% -0.8% 14.4% -36.7% -15.8% Source: Experian Marketing Services, "Q Quarterly Benchmark Study," May Triggered * Marketing Performance Metrics in North America, Q Q Nonbounce Open rate Clickthrough Q % 46.8% 12.9% Q % 40.4% 9.8% Q % 46.8% 11.7% Q % 48.0% 11.5% Q % 45.9% 10.4% Q % 49.8% 9.8% Q % 47.7% 9.7% Q % 46.7% 9.0% Q % 50.0% 11.2% Note: *campaigns that were deployed as a result of an action (e.g., abandon shopping cart, confirmation, thank you and welcome) Source: Epsilon, "Q Trends and Benchmarks," July 2, Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 8

9 B2B Perspective: Integrating CRM and Marketing Automation Platforms Kevin Quiring Managing Director of Sales and Customer Service, North America Accenture Kevin Quiring, managing director of sales and customer service in North America for Accenture, works with the business management and technology firm s clients on multiple initiatives including performance management and customer data management. Quiring spoke with emarketer s Lauren Fisher about aligning customer relationship management (CRM) tools and marketing automation platforms and the inevitable integration of the two. emarketer: What are some of the trends you ve seen in business-to-business (B2B) lead management among clients? Kevin Quiring: Overall, lead management is a hot topic right now. Businesses are placing renewed emphasis on generating new business something that started with the 2008 recession either through acquiring new customers or growing existing customers. They re introducing new products, and they re trying to do acquisitions not nearly as many as they had done prior to the recession and expand into new markets. To do this, they re taking a closer look at their lead management programs, which in good times are fairly ignored at major organizations. So, they ve really started to drill down on that. But when you focus specifically on lead nurture, particularly with some of the largest enterprises, the left hand doesn t know what the right hand is doing. There are four main challenges for B2Bs looking to manage their leads. The first is a chasm between marketing and sales. The two aren t working together. Second, there s certainly a lack of technology around automating lead management. That s not to say there aren t great marketing and sales automation tools out there, but they re not integrated. When you focus specifically on lead nurture, particularly with some of the largest enterprises, the left hand doesn t know what the right hand is doing. Third, there is a lack of organizational accountability for performance management around the success of lead generation and nurture. You have separate groups being benchmarked against lead generation and lead nurture. Companies should be measuring the end-to-end return on investment (ROI) of both programs. Finally, there s a failure to apply customer data into analytics and insights that can enable marketers to better qualify and distribute leads. emarketer: How are companies addressing the lack of technology around automated lead management? Quiring: We see many brands in the electronics, high-tech and insurance industries investing heavily in creating an end-to-end solution for lead generation, nurture and overall lead management and looking to measure these tactics in various stages and holding people accountable for those outcomes. They re not waiting for the perfect technology solutions to emerge. They re taking the CRM and marketing automation platforms like Salesforce.com and Eloqua or Aprimo and Oracle to create a workable solution. There s a lot of customization and integration that goes into doing this. And then there s the analytics component that is being integrated. Companies are using analytics to start to apply the historical data they have on sales opportunities and conversions to look at all of the key characteristics in the average length of buy cycle, conversion rates and deal size so they score leads appropriately. Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 9

10 B2B Perspective: Integrating CRM and Marketing Automation Platforms They re finding the salesperson s intuition and the marketer s opinion on what lead will be good or bad is interesting but not predictive. When they start to apply that data and organize it in a way where they can statistically analyze and score leads up front, they get a more accurate picture of actual opportunity. Web-based scoring is the easiest, but to be able to integrate that into your company s CRM system and tap that historical data is really key. emarketer: What type of technology or solution would be needed for the analytics component? Would a marketing automation platform or a CRM system be enough to do this type of analysis? Quiring: In most instances, companies are using a statistical analysis tool like something from SAS. The SAS models are built and then programmed onto the database to provide updated scoring of new opportunities and existing opportunities on a continuous basis. The marketing automation system still does the lead capture and consolidation, but the calculations are done via SAS. emarketer: Do you have an example of a company that has been successful at integrating these solutions for an improved lead management process? Quiring: We have a B2B telecommunications client that offers its clients everything from voice to wireless to unified communications to IT consulting services. From a sales standpoint, trying to close a deal when prospects have the potential to be interested in so many diverse products requires multiple sets of activity. The salesperson s intuition and the marketer s opinion on what lead will be good or bad is interesting but not predictive. But if the prospect is on the site one day reading about machine-to-machine services and that lead comes in, marketing needs to know enough about that company and that individual rather, the marketing system needs to know enough about those details and the profitability this potential lead could provide to be able to score the lead. The B2B telecommunications client is able to do that. Its system takes into account things such as monthly billing revenues and can even smooth that out for one-time purchases of hardware. So rather than just looking at the brand the inquiry came from and the channel it came from, its using both the marketing automation platform and the CRM tool to look at the prospect s historical relationship with the organization. Once its qualified the lead, it then uses an analytics solution to determine how to best distribute that lead. For example, it wouldn t just want to send that lead to the machine-tomachine division it would also need to alert the current sales rep and maybe the sales vice president. Analytics can also tell how much effort it should invest in closing the lead. The scoring system will look at all of the past deals of every product and service [the B2B telecommunications client] has ever sold to the company and how much time those deals spent in the pipeline. By looking at the time spent in the pipeline and the customer s historical procurement process, it can estimate the total time to close. Now it can weigh the amount of effort required on the part of the sales and marketing departments to determine how to best handle the lead. The scoring takes into account the overall ROI on that sales process to determine whether or not to hand the lead to a sales team or let the prospect drive the process on its own. Sales reps typically sell only one of those products. So if an historical relationship with a client is on providing voice and IP bandwidth for the company s phone system, the sales rep might not know that prospect is also interested in machine-to-machine services. Marketing Automation Roundup Copyright 2013 emarketer, Inc. All rights reserved. 10

11 # 1 Marketing Automation Highest Score, 2013 Sirius View Report Best Marketing Automation Solution How Modern Marketing Works eloqua.com or call Copyright 2013, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Oracle and Java are registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

12