What can marketing automation do?
Marketing automation tools help you streamline the entire marketing process by automating repetitive tasks. Actions are taken automatically at the times when they are most effective. This increases the chances of your business generating new leads, making sales, and increasing your marketing ROI - all while freeing up your marketing team to focus on other tasks.
Marketing automation mostly focuses on the following three sections:
Personalization and targeted email marketing
Marketing automation software provides you with customer data that lets you target each customer with the content most relevant to them based on who they are and how they interact with your company. This ensures each lead is always sent the content that will help them overcome their specific barriers to purchase—no more sending out ineffective mass email campaigns to your entire list.
Here’s an example of this in practice.
- A prospect visits one of your landing pages and fills out a form to download your eBook.
- You automatically send them the eBook in an email.
- The prospect clicks on the link to download the eBook.
- They then click on a link to your pricing page from within the eBook—but they don’t take action.
- You automatically send them an email asking if they’d like to set up a call with a sales rep to discuss their options.
- They fill in an online form with a time they are happy to speak.
- A sales rep at your company is notified and calls them at the allotted time.
Identify strong leads
Marketing automation software lets marketing teams score leads based on the likelihood of them buying your product. You set points for each action a lead takes and when the lead reaches a predefined point total, you pass the lead on to your sales team to follow up.
For example, if a lead has opened all your emails, signed up for a webinar, and visited the pricing page of your website, this is a warm lead. Someone who only opens your email sporadically and never clicks through to your website is cold.

Segment your customer base
Marketing automation platforms help you segment your customer base, allowing you to target different groups with the most relevant marketing strategy. By segmenting customers based on their location, the pages they visit, or their buying preferences you can create a better customer experience and stronger customer relationships.
For example, an accountancy firm that offers services in tax, year-end accounts, and payroll could segment its leads based on the pages on their website that leads visit. If they spend a lot of time on the payroll page, target them with the most effective strategy for people interested in payroll.