The Power of Marketing Automation

Manon Audibert is the marketing manager of Higher Logic.

In the digital age, marketing is all about expectations. One might expect to create a fluffy, designer-worthy cake from online marketing tactics of associations.

Without the time and resources necessary to meet those expectations, even well-intended marketers may see their efforts fall by the wayside.

Marketing automation can bridge the gap between expectation and reality, allowing teams of all sizes to get closer to their goals.

In a perfect world, you would want to think through all of your email campaigns, including what you will promote and the idea flow. You want them to be cohesive, to tell a story, but you’re writing against a deadline The right messages can be sent at the right time with automation.

Think of it as a marketing superpower that will allow you to trade time consuming, error prone tasks for more innovative, outcome oriented endeavors.

Is automation the right thing for you? There are signs that your current efforts aren’t cutting it The inability to make the member experience feel personal, low member engagement, and understaffed marketing teams are some of the red flags. Marketing automation trends and best practices will help you fix the issues.

There are the latest trends.

According to Arritt, many people are hesitant to embrace marketing automation because they fear it will cause communication overload. The practice reduces extraneous communication. It isn’t just about giving end users what they want, it’s also about keeping out what they don’t

This is considered in the context of conference registration. Arritt said that with automation, people who have already registered can be removed from the campaign. I have asked members to sign up for something they registered for two months ago.

The answer isn’t to move away from automation but to add more, especially considering the rapid nature of technological advancement

The technology is moving quickly. Association members are not used to that speed. They don’t like to be frustrated. They don’t want pages to take a long time to load.

Keeping up with these expectations is even more important as for-profit groups enter association territory. Arritt said that associations talk about providing a member experience like that of Amazon. We should know our members better than Amazon does.

The Great Resignation can be mitigated by an automated approach to digital marketing. Associations can’t go without marketing in the face of turnover, but automated, evergreen campaigns keep efforts moving.

The best practices.

Arritt says to boost authenticity by sending emails from an individual rather than an organization.

She said not to have members reply to general email addresses. If you want to add a personal touch, reply to someone. The point is that members know they are engaging with a human, even if that person is seven different people over seven years.

The same personalized customer service can be delivered by automation.

The analogy my colleague came up with was that if you were working at the Gap, someone would look at a sweater. Arritt said that you are trained to ask if you can start a fitting room, help with size, and check for inventory. You can use web tracking and engagement scoring to get the right message to the right person when you know they’re interested.

Another tip is to automate smaller programs that don’t get a lot of attention.

Arritt said that there are programs where you think you should promote that, but you’re too busy to focus on a low priority task. Almost all of them should be done by automation. You have to figure them out and then check them twice a year.

Work with a provider that provides automation training. Arritt is a direct partner at Higher Logic.

She said that associations don’t want vendors. Digital marketing partners have an active user community and on-demand training.

The combination of engagement tools like community and marketing automation and expert guidance can help align your association’s marketing expectations with the real-life experiences your members deserve.

A member experience solution that provides a powerful but simple approach to community, marketing, and member engagement is called Higher Logic Thrive. Visit thrive.higherlogic.com to learn more about how Higher Logic’s years of experience, research, and feedback can solve your problems.

The picture is a handout photo.