Probably not. After all, if they took the time to choose a card with a design and message that reflects who you are, you’re more likely to think of it as a thoughtful gesture. If they hand-wrote a few lines with a special greeting, your positive reaction may become even greater.

That’s the kind of experience brands need to deliver to their customers. It could be an email message with a special offer, an online ad that showcases a new offering, or a text message that goes straight to a customer’s smartphone.

These may be considered simply “content” if they are generic. When brands approach them as an opportunity for content personalization, however, they come close to achieving that “birthday card” effect.

Content personalization is the effort smart marketers take to ensure everything they put in front of customers uses data to match their:

• Histories: Customers receiving the content should see right away that the brand recognizes who they are based on past purchases, where they’ve clicked on the web site or other indicators.

• Preferences: The content should leverage the digital channels that customers have clearly identified they want to use when they engage with a brand.
• Needs: When content is personalized, it’s never a waste of time for customers to look at it because it speaks to their paint points or interests.

There is no question that this is what people want from their favourite brands. According to Salesforce’s most recent State of the Connected Consumer report, 84% of customers say that being treated like a person, not a number, is very important to winning their business. Apart from moments where customers interact directly with employees, content is the way brands can provide them with that kind of treatment.

Content personalization also aligns with the goals of all marketing departments, such as deepening the relationship with customers and increasing their propensity to buy. By converting more people into active purchasers, content personalization can help marketers dramatically increase the return on investment (ROI) for producing and distributing content.

The best way to get started with content personalization is adopting a platform that can centralize all customer data so that the marketing team – as well as any other department or group within the company – has a single view of that customer’s profile. This leads to far better targeting.

From there, you can begin to use technologies like artificial intelligence to go beyond simple segmentation and begin to take more of a one-to-one approach with each customer – communicating with them in a way that proves you’re paying attention to the journey they’ve taken with you so far.

These are just some of the ways content personalization works in practice to attain higher conversion rates:

1. Landing pages that land more clicks

Many branded email messages, text messages, and ads lead people back to a landing page – the same landing page with the same images and text.

Content personalization means making each landing page almost as unique as a snowflake. It can still promote a featured product or service, but the text could offer different reasons based on what a particular customer has ordered in the past, or what they’ve searched for on your site.

A personalized landing page could also include each customer’s name, feature products in their size or style, and even offer a unique discount code to get more conversions.

2. Product recommendations that resonate

We’ve probably all gotten the occasional suggestion from a brand to buy something that raised eyebrows? “What would make them think I’d want this?” you might say to yourself.

This reflects a disconnect in terms of the data the brand uses, and in some cases may reflect a lack of sufficient data. Today, brands can go beyond simply basing recommendations based on previous purchases. With the right technology companies can synthesize broad customer data and serve up ideas based on purchases from customers with similar profiles.

They can also offer easy ways to collect feedback and further refine their product recommendations. This can be as simple as a thumbs up/down button to rate a recommendation as relevant, or fields that let them key in categories or items they’d like to see in the future.

3. Quizzes and surveys that don’t just ask, but answer

Content personalization isn’t limited to historical data you’ve collected. You can also develop engaging digital experiences that let them have fun while offering more details that give you a sense of what they really want.

Think about an online survey or quiz that helps them reimagine their goals, or see their personality type based on their interest (examples could include a retailer whose quiz segments people into a “Fashionista,” “Comfort queen,” or similar category).

These kinds of surveys and quizzes can couple this kind of “grand reveal” at the end with inspiration for products and services that match the results. Customers who see themselves in the data will be more likely to keep clicking through.

Content personalization and the customer experience

Although what’s been described in this post sounds quite tactical, content personalization is not just a trick to get more sales.

By personalizing what you say at every possible touchpoint, you’re ultimately developing a better customer experience. It will help people as they first discover your brand, and as they continue their journey through the consideration, purchase, and post-purchase phases.

If customers need to seek out service and support with their purchase later on, for instance, personalizing content through a chatbot or landing page could reinforce the idea that they are truly valued as individuals. This will keep them coming back for more purchases over time.

When content has a real “just for you” feel to it, customers take it personally – in the best possible way.

The post Turn Clicks into Conversation with Content Personalization appeared first on Salesforce.

Now imagine sitting down with a random customer and showing them the segment where their profile sits.

“I guess that makes sense,” they might say. “But there’s more to who I am than that.”

And of course they would be right. People are multi-faceted. A person may identify as a parent, but also sees themselves as a social justice activist because of the time they spend volunteering. Another customer might be a senior citizen but is still highly active in sports and enjoys the latest Marvel blockbuster as much as a Gen Z person.

Just because someone’s currently in the “repeat customer” segment, meanwhile, they may be thinking more carefully about future purchases and won’t necessarily stay loyal to your brand for much longer.

Segmentation is a tried-and-true approach to improving the way brands market to their customers, but it only gets you so far. The future is in hyper-personalization – where you leverage a combination of automation, artificial intelligence (AI) and data to create highly contextualized messages to specific customers.

Hyper-personalization goes a step beyond segmentation, which relies on broad trends around how customers have liked or acted upon a brand’s marketing content, and data from third-party cookies.

Companies often reach a plateau with segmentation because it is usually built into the early stages of campaign planning. Using hyper-personalization, on the other hand, becomes deeply woven into every interaction a brand has with each unique customer at every stage of their journey. This includes when they make a purchase, when they seek out service or support and when it’s time to re-engage them.

In the fifth edition of Salesforce’s State of the Connected Customer, 56 per cent of customers said they expect all offers to be personalized. As more brands become well-versed in hyper- personalization across the customer journey, those expectations will rise even higher.

The road to hyper-personalization begins with taking better control of all your customer data. Using a platform like Customer 360, for example, brands can bring everything they need to know about each customer into a single unified view.

At that point, it’s a matter of taking the rules-based segmentation you’ve done up until now and begin using AI to recommend how individuals are behaving, the best way to optimize their omni-channel path and hyper-personalize every form of communication. This includes:

Customize advertising to reflect individual interests and needs

Brands tend to think of ads as a mass media form of marketing, but with good data they don’t have to be. Instead, marketers can serve up ads that speak directly to a customer’s favourite products and services or even include call-outs, such as their names. This shows the customer there’s a reason they’re seeing the ad online – and that there’s probably an equally good reason to click through and learn more.

Design landing pages aimed at an audience of one

Though they sometimes seem to have a similar purpose, landing pages should be much more than the digital equivalent of a brochure. They should immediately welcome customers into an environment where they feel recognized. You can do this by displaying offers and pricing that reflect the geography where they’re based, offers based on what they’ve viewed on your site and options to let them reconfigure what’s being shown based on their own preferences.

Price and promote based on a person vs. a campaign

Running a 10% sale to attract young women is a segmentation strategy. Hyper personalization means you use AI to develop an offer for an individual (Let’s call them Brian). You might offer a bigger discount because Brian is one of your most frequent shoppers or is a high spender. You might also use AI to recommend accessories Brian has never noticed on your site before. You could even set a timeline for a promotion or offer based on Brian’s typical habits when he spends with your brand.

Fill in the blanks on their behalf

Every moment of friction you put into a customer journey puts your conversions at risk. The one many brands overlook is when they expect customers to complete detailed online forms in order to place an order to sign up for a service. Automate this chore for your customers and have everything pre-populated when it comes time for them to take the next step. They’ll thank you by taking it much faster.

Send notifications that feel like they’re coming from a personal shopper

A regular text message lets customers know when you’re running a sale. A hyper personalized text message tells a specific customer about the status of their order, such as when it has been shipped. Notifications via e-mail or any other preferred channel should feel the same – as though they’re only getting sent information that relates to who they are, what they like and when they would want to know.

Reimagine what it’s like to be rewarded

Lots of loyalty programs are based on collecting and redeeming points. Hyper personalization treats points as only one piece of the puzzle. Instead, you can use AI to develop rewards and incentives that show how much a brand understands – and appreciates – the relationship every one of their customers has developed with them.

There was a time when hyper-personalization seemed like something only the biggest brands in the world could offer their customers. Thanks to advancements in digital technologies, however, companies of any size, and in almost any industry, can make the most of their data and provide the kind of journey that more customers will want to take – and keep taking.

The post How To Hyper-Personalize The Customer Journey appeared first on Salesforce.

Sales teams work hard. So do marketing teams. Ideally, the work they do should be in lock-step, where the interest and demand generated by marketing campaigns helps sales reps accelerate their journey to closing more deals. That’s not how it plays out in many organizations, unfortunately.

Even within Canadian small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs), there can be situations where sales and marketing are anything but aligned. Sales reps might ignore the leads produced through marketing, for instance. Marketers, meanwhile, might be focusing on products or customer segments that aren’t top of mind for the sales team.

Account-based marketing (ABM) represents an opportunity to change all that for the better. That’s because ABM is a methodology that has both groups agree upon a target list of top accounts. These become the basis of campaigns in which leads are nurtured through highly personalized content, helping them become more confident and prepared to make a purchase or sign a contract.

When it’s done right, ABM brings an increased focus and rigor to the way a company connects and provides value to its most important customer segment, treating them like the VIPs they are. That’s why it has gained so much traction within businesses. According to the eighth edition of Salesforce’s State of Marketing report, for instance, 89% of business to business (B2B) brands and even those whose end customers sell to consumers are using ABM platforms.

Sales and marketing alignment is a perquisite to ABM campaigns because success depends on both groups working in a coordinated, consistent fashion. That’s the only way to ensure the targeted accounts get the kind of relevant, contextualized content and engagement they deserve.

In a sense, the decision to pursue ABM could be the perfect catalyst for addressing long-standing issues between marketing and sales teams. Gain alignment now, in other words, and it can benefit your business whether you’re working on an ABM campaign or not.

1. Begin the ABM education process with sales early on

Some reps and managers in your company may already be familiar with ABM, but it would be new territory for others. In both cases, they might still have some resistance to ABM because they’ve heard it requires greater effort or a more complex process for nurturing leads and prospects.

Approach the sales team with an invitation to fully understand the ABM opportunity. This is your opportunity to make something akin to an “elevator pitch,” where you walk through all the benefits of ABM and what it could mean for the company’s ability to accomplish key objectives in terms of growth.

It’s not always easy to “sell” something to sales people, of course, so make sure the meeting is a true dialogue, where you answer questions in detail and with honesty. Gain support to approach ABM as a united front at the outset.

2. Break down silos to make ABM a collaborative effort

Even if you get buy-in for an ABM campaign from your sales team, you still need to make sure they don’t go off into their own corner while the marketing team retreats into theirs. Working in silos can lead to miscommunication, errors and longer time to complete key projects and processes.

Instead, discuss with the sales team how often you should connect on an ABM campaign based on all the tasks that both departments will need to do and areas that require ongoing conversations. Some of these tasks include:

• Defining the ideal customer profile (ICP) and agreeing on the target list of accounts

• Developing any value propositions around the offering being promoted

• Selection of key channels to engage target accounts

• Brainstorming on content that will nurture target accounts in stages

• Hand-offs between marketing and sales to get deals closed

This doesn’t mean marketing and sales have to be sitting down in person all the time. Make use of tools like Slack, where you could set up a dedicated channel to stay in touch around an ABM campaign and any details that require action or follow-up.

3. Agree upon shared ABM metrics and KPIs

Like any partnership, sales and marketing teams will only get where they need to with ABM if they can track their progress.

This can require looking beyond the typical ways these departments assess their success. For marketers, the volume of marketing qualified leads (MQLs) may not matter as much as how well their work on an ABM campaign leads directly to revenue generation.

For sales, the result of ABM might be measured based on how it helps them in areas such as their sales velocity, win rate, influenced pipeline and churn, among others.

Make analyzing these metrics and optimizing your ABM campaigns based on what they tell you the focal point of your regular check-ins with sales. It will build greater credibility for the initiative as a whole and help develop a shared understanding of what works and what doesn’t.

Have a unified view of ABM data

One final thought to bear in mind: ABM campaigns can become rich with data about your customer’s behaviour, from the content that drives engagement to the way they choose to interact with the sales team.

The best way to derive value from all that data is to work off a single platform, like Customer 360, which provides a single view of the truth. This not only applies to ABM campaigns specifically, but to all the work marketers and sales reps do every day.

ABM is a game-changer for companies whose marketing and sales groups approach it as a tag-team. Seize the chance to make sure your SMB is one of them.

The post How To Align Sales and Marketing Teams for ABM Success appeared first on Salesforce.

Unlike second-party data that you purchase through a marketplace, or third-party data that is collected and aggregated via web site cookies, zero-party data represents a huge opportunity to personalize the way you develop a relationship with your customers. It even goes beyond first-party data that you might have been collecting all along.

While first-party data such as website visits can provide incredible insights, it can take time and considerable effort to get at them. Think of first-party data as the raw material, such as coal, that has to be refined – or in this case, analyzed – in order to produce a diamond.

In contrast, zero-party data is like panning for gold. When you discover it, the value is already there. In other words, this is data in which customers are giving explicit information about their preferences, interests, pain points, and expectations of your brand.

Zero-party data is gold because it is unambiguously providing information customers want you to know. You may need to make some inferences and ask them for more details to draw the right conclusions, but it’s like a direct line to your audience compared with other forms of data acquisition.

Companies haven’t always invested in first-party data collection because it can require more of an internal lift. There are many established services and providers of second and third-party data. In fact, Salesforce’s most recent State of Marketing Report found 75% of brands are still relying upon second and third-party data. With privacy concerns and regulations on the rise, that may not be viable for much longer.

Zero-party data depends on setting up consistent and customer-friendly processes to get the right quantity and quality of responses. Any company can do it, though, and it’s critical to gather every source of customer data you can find.

Once you see the range of options available, there’s no reason to put off collecting first-party data anymore. It should be a business imperative as you build a customer experience based on trusted input.

1. Build feedback into the customer journey

In large businesses, it’s common to have contact centre agents wrap up a call by asking customers a few standard questions about how well the interaction went. Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) can do the same thing through digital channels from the moment customers make a purchase to long afterwards.

Think about how you could set up feedback forms, for example, when customers finalize their checkout on an e-commerce purchase. Were there items they were looking for but couldn’t find? That could inform the range of products you keep in stock. How did they hear about you? Their answers will show which marketing channels to prioritize. Would they recommend you to friends and family? A brief testimonial could do lots for your reputation.

You can create similar feedback forms that are served up via email after they’ve made a purchase to see how they’re enjoying the product and their experience, or at any point where they might be ready to share their thoughts.

2. Go deeper with one-on-one interviews

It doesn’t matter whether or not they have a huge following on social media services like Instagram or TikTok. Your customers are the true influencers, because their peers can often relate to their feelings and experiences. That makes taking the time to practice some active listening with some of them a powerful opportunity for brands.

Look through your existing data to identify a handful of your most loyal customers, or those who seem to make significant purchases. Let them know how grateful you are for their business, and ask them whether they’d be willing to take a few minutes to discuss their experience on a brief call.

These interviews can delve into the good, the bad and the ugly from a customer experience perspective. You can also get a sense of what makes each customer unique, which can ensure you segment your database with greater precision.

If this sounds like a lot of work, consider how you might be able to repurpose these interviews as marketing content. Ask their permission first, of course, but depending on how they go, some of this first-party data could become fodder for your best-performing blog posts, or even the basis of a podcast.

3. Invite customers to a preference centre

Why do people love services like Facebook? Easy – it’s a way for them to build highly personal curations of their photos, videos and favourite moments throughout their lives. It’s like a living diary, except it’s open to their family and friends. Preference centres offer similar benefits to your customers.

Rather than guessing at what customers will want, preference centers act as a digital hub where they can provide zero-party data to their heart’s content. This includes what products they tend to buy from you, and items that they’ve put on their wish list for later. They can clearly spell out what kind of items they buy for themselves, and when they come to your business looking to buy a gift.

A good preference centre also helps clarify the best ways to communicate with customers, which is essential to a healthy relationship. You’ll know whether they want to get email, a text message or even direct mail. They’ll spell out areas or subjects where they’d rather not be contacted. The best part is that if they change their minds at any time, updating it in the preference centre is just a few clicks away.

These are by no means the only ways to collect first-party data, but they’re three sure-fire ways to get started. Your goal should be to have a mix of mechanisms for getting specific insights on a set timeline (which can help with a marketing campaign) and those like a preference centre that are evergreen sources of constantly updated first-party data.

This is the moment to begin collecting first-party data – and potentially gain a first-mover advantage in developing a more personalized approach to marketing.

The post 3 Ways To Collect Zero-Party Data appeared first on Salesforce.

1. The message landing in their inbox is important, based on what the brand knows about your interests, needs and aspirations.

2. The message will provide value – not just necessarily in offering a product or service for purchase, but information, inspiration or insight.

3. The message should help develop your relationship with the brand in a positive way.

Not every email marketing campaign delivers on all these promises, of course. Some come with subject lines that tease value but don’t actually provide it. Others have clearly been sent with a “one-to-many” mindset, treating everyone in the database the same way.

These and other missteps may actually lead customers to not only delete a brand’s message, but unsubscribe from their list entirely and avoid giving them more business in the future.

Smart brands make sure this doesn’t happen, because they recognize the ongoing power of email as a digital marketing channel. It’s a medium where marketers may be able to offer more detail than is possible via a text message. They may have more control over the creative elements than when they advertise on third-party platforms like social media services. It’s a channel they effectively own.

Maybe the eighth edition of Salesforce’s State of Marketing report put it best: “Customers say that email is among their preferred channels to interact with brands, second only to the phone.”

With that in mind, Canadian small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) have an opportunity to boost productivity and efficiency in how they manage email campaigns via marketing automation. When they use those sorts of tools in concert with a more holistic platform like Customer 360, they can also make greater use of data to target the right message to the right people and continuously improve results.

A few basics to keep in mind: people are no longer reading email on desktop PCs alone. Make sure you use the tools available to optimize your messages to be read easily on mobile devices like smartphones.

Next, remember that email is a two-way communications medium, so make it easy for people to provide feedback. This doesn’t have to be limited to sending a reply to your email campaign. Integrating social media functions into your messages provides additional opportunities for your customers to share their opinions of your brand in a public forum, and even their family and friends.

Other email marketing trends worth following include:

Hyper-segmentation

Several years ago, a popular meme showed that, despite their obvious differences, King Charles and Ozzy Osborne share many of the same traits. For example, they’re the same age, both live in London, have children and enjoy interests such as sports, cars, and dogs. That means they might traditionally be grouped in the same customer segments.

Having access to more customer data allows brands to get much more granular than superficial demographics. This can include targeting based on the last item someone purchased, interests they’ve shared through first-party surveys and occupation, among many other options. The more relevant your segments, the better you’re able to send an email campaign that particular customers will want to open.

Hyper-personalization

You might not always write a formal salutation when you’re emailing your best friend, but that’s probably because the contents of your message reflect the fact it was written with them in mind. Contrast that with a lot of email marketing from brands that looks as though it is aimed at the widest possible audience.

Marketing automation allows for personalization that would have been impossible to do if marketers were to manually try and customize messages for each recipient. You can not only address customers and prospects by name, but include details that show you’re paying attention to where they’ve visited you online, their preferred product details (such as style or price), and even specific promotional codes.

Go even further by hyper-personalizing based on the subject line of the message, the day and time you send it, and even creative aspects such as images that will resonate. It’s what connected consumers increasingly expect.

Interactivity

“Open, scan, delete” is probably the journey most of us take through our inbox. Brands can slow that process down considerably when they take advantage of rich interactive content that gives recipients something more to do with their messages.

Use a product carousel, for instance, to let customers move through a series of products and services rather than focus on just one. Provide them with a quiz that gives them a fun way to compare their preferences and interests with their peers. Let them launch a survey to provide more detailed feedback on what they want from their customer experience, or products and services they’d like you to add.

AI-powered optimization

The only way to successfully run email campaigns is to test and learn. You might need to switch up your subject line, your segments, or the entire contents of your message to get the performance you want. Until recently, this was done by looking purely at analytics based on historical data from your campaigns.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has changed that by empowering marketers to get predictive insights into how customers are likely to respond to a particular email campaign. This brings a new level of rigor to the testing they do, and allows them to make changes with greater confidence that improve open rates and other critical metrics.

The emergence of generative AI, meanwhile, allows marketers to create a much wider set of iterations quickly and easily on their email campaign content, from subject lines to the text or images of each message.

Email is a tried-and true marketing channel for a reason. Advances in AI and automation should give you many more reasons to make it a powerful part of your brand strategy in 2023 and beyond.

The post Discover the Top Email Marketing Trends of 2023 appeared first on Salesforce.

Given ongoing economic challenges, it’s only natural that many Canadians will be more intentional about how they manage their finances. This includes their everyday spending on groceries and sundries, as well as considering when they can afford to make a big-ticket purchase like a house or a car.

Inflation can have a big impact on the costs of these items. It can also influence the decisions of companies around how many people they can employ, and whether they have to reduce headcount. Marketers need to keep all this context in mind as they tell their stories through digital channels to ensure they demonstrate an understanding of customers’ current situation.

An ad campaign that talks up the fun of impulse buying or indulging in luxuries, for example, might not resonate with customers who are keeping a close eye on their pocketbooks. Similarly, marketing that plays to concepts like the “fear of missing out” (FOMO) might make customers feel worse at a time of increased anxiety over their financial future.

Course-correcting your marketing strategy amid inflation may require taking a step back and changing up the content of creative assets, as well as making customer segmentation and personalization a more urgent priority. When customers feel like they’re just one of the masses seeing the same message from a brand, they might tune out. When a brand markets to them in a more one-on-one fashion, however, they feel recognized and appreciated.

Another quick win is to increase – and optimize – your brand’s presence on digital channels. Making it easier to research, buy, and receive support online saves people time, which is almost as important to them as saving money. Remember they’ll probably be starting their journey in these channels, even if they wind up visiting a physical store.

Platforms like Customer 360, which includes Marketing Cloud, make it easier to adjust your approach to building a brand because it streamlines workflows through advanced automation. It also allows you to get a single view of customer data to better understand what they want and need.

The best way to market amid inflation will vary depending on the unique nature of every business, but these are some ideas to help develop an actionable plan that works:

1. Instead of ‘shrinkflating,’ provide additional value

The most recent period of inflation has been marked by a trend that is sometimes described as “shrinkflation,” where brands charge the same price or more for a smaller version of their products. While this can address rising operational and manufacturing costs, it has an obvious impact on the customer experience and their satisfaction.

Smart marketers will avoid shrinkflation and look for ways to give their customers more – not necessarily more of the same product or service, but more to help them address their needs or enjoy their purchase. Examples include:

· Rich interactive content that demonstrates how to use a product or service in novel ways

· Digital customer communities that help peers share knowledge and solve problems together

· Webinars or in-person events that provide a first look at new products and services

2. Use lifetime value data to boost customer loyalty

Review your customer data. Who has spent the most, or the most often? Who has been actively promoting your brand on social media or similar channels? Who has left positive reviews on sites that attract more customers?

Many brands have loyalty programs, but they’re limited to asking everyone to sign up and earn points based on purchases. A data-driven approach to loyalty will start by calculating the lifetime value (LTV) of every customer, and proactively rewarding them to ensure they stick around despite high inflation.

These are the customers you should be targeting with a special offer or promotion. This could include discounts, but also invitations to an “inner circle” of customers who advise on product roadmaps, or the ability to test out new products before they’re officially released. Be creative with your loyalty program to make it worth being a member.

3. Develop content marketing assets that build empathy

Inflation affects everyone, from brands to customers alike. Your marketing campaigns should reflect that.

When it becomes necessary to raise prices, for instance, brands should be ready with messaging that helps educate customers about the rationale, in a tone based upon honesty and kindness. If you’re able to run a sale or create new bundles of your existing products, on the other hand, note how it was done with the pressures of inflation in mind.

Some brands may consolidate or rationalize their product portfolio in order to manage costs. Rather than disappointing customers who can’t find their favourite items, get in front of the issue with marketing that speaks to the popularity and value of the products that remain.

Think of inflationary periods as an opportunity to showcase the best of what your brand has to offer – not only its products and services, but an ability to speak to customers in a way that shows you care, and that we’re all going to get through these economic challenges together.

The post 3 Marketing Strategies To Implement Amid Inflation appeared first on Salesforce.

Not every ad campaign will deliver the desired results, but by continuing to experiment and test their approaches, marketing teams have a good chance of doing better on their future campaigns.

The ability to tell a compelling story about a brand and its value proposition, meanwhile, is never fully realized. It takes ongoing practice to fine-tune how the story is articulated, and the best way to showcase it across various marketing channels.

Practicing the art and science of marketing involves going beyond sticking with the tools and techniques you’ve always used before. It’s a process of learning about new technologies, more strategic actions, and how to enhance the way you evaluate your progress. In other words, it’s about continuing to reskill or upskill your marketing function.

Successful small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) need to pay particular attention to the skill sets among their marketing teams. They may be competing against much larger rivals with deeper pockets, including more resources to invest in the latest tools and more people to take advantage of them.

Reskilling and upskilling can level the playing field for SMBs because some of the most transformative technologies allow them to scale their marketing efforts as though they were much bigger than they are.

There’s also greater flexibility in how to acquire and develop new marketing skills. Just look at platforms like Trailhead, which offer loads of courses that marketers can take at their own time, for free. This is the kind of training they can easily apply in their day-to-day work and deliver significant results that help their brand achieve critical business outcomes.

Although the list of areas for reskilling and upskilling is always in flux, these are among the best bets to consider, regardless of economic or other business challenges:

1. Advancements in marketing automation

In the early days, automation in marketing helped create dramatic improvements in productivity for those who were responsible for managing digital ad campaigns or building their brand on channels like social media. The technology has only gotten better since then, with artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities that help marketers on multiple fronts.

By making greater use of customer data, for example, marketers can use automation to not only get more creative work in front of their eyes but deepen their ability to personalize content. They can use platforms like Marketing Cloud to analyze performance across a wide variety of metrics and predict what customers may want and need from their brand next.

2. Communication strategies leveraging data literacy

As your company gets better at marketing strategically using data, you might begin developing what’s called a data culture. The marketing team is in a great position to support that kind of culture by providing role models in how they develop their data literacy.

Depending on your industry or the customer base you’re serving, for instance, the marketing department may be responsible for helping people understand information relating to their pain points. This could take the form of research that educates them on key trends. Data literacy skills are necessary to effectively communicate statistics or other complex findings to your target audience.

Data literacy is equally important behind the scenes, where marketing teams may be interpreting what they see on their dashboards in terms of engagement with creative assets, buying behaviour, or changes in customer loyalty.

3. Marketing to a mobile-first audience

Your customers may come from all walks of life, but chances are they’ll have at least one thing in common: they’re probably carrying a smartphone in their pocket, or using a tablet or laptop for much of their everyday computing.

We’re becoming a mobile-first society for a reason. It’s a lot easier to perform activities like researching products, making purchases, and getting help when you have a device that’s highly portable for the job. That makes mobile messaging a priority for marketers who want to meet customers where they are.

Mobile messaging can range from texts and SMS campaigns to notifications they receive on a branded app. It’s not just a matter of keeping things short, but inspiring customers to take desired actions. In other words, it’s a skill well worth developing.

4. Attracting high-value customers via account-based marketing

In a business-to-business (B2B) environment, it doesn’t always make sense to focus on marketing to the entire world. Sometimes the bigger opportunity lies in identifying the most potentially profitable customers who will drive the lion’s share of your results. This is the core thinking behind what’s known as account-based marketing (ABM).

Success with ABM isn’t just about creating a target list of accounts, though. These campaigns often demand a thoughtful, comprehensive approach to nurturing the relationship with the right content and offers. Technology is fundamental to pursuing ABM because you need to plan, execute, and monitor the progress of ABM campaigns with great care.

5. Partnering for greater performance through distributed marketing

Brands don’t always achieve their goals on their own, especially when they’re SMBs. They might market and sell their products through a network of resellers if they’re B2B vendors, for instance. A direct-to-consumer (D2C) brand might want to complement its e-commerce strategy by featuring some products within traditional retailers.

These are great examples of distributed marketing, which tends to depend on knowing how to collaborate with a mixture of internal stakeholders and external third parties. Fortunately, tools like Slack make it easier than ever to keep in contact with other teams and partners. There are many features within marketing automation programs that can assist with distributed marketing too.

Need more ideas for the marketing skills that will build brands in the future? Check out the latest findings from Salesforce’s eighth annual State of Marketing Report.

The post Your Marketing Team Needs These 5 Skills to Deliver Success appeared first on Salesforce.

Building a brand should be conceived as all the activity a marketing team does to help accelerate the company on its path to growth. That could mean more customers, a greater share of wallet among existing customers, and greater long-term loyalty.

Contributing directly to revenue and growth wasn’t always considered core to the marketing function. Running an ad campaign could help boost sales, but it could be difficult to prove how much. The disconnect between what a marketing team was spending, and the return on investment (ROI) sometimes prompted skepticism about the real value of brand-building.

Today, the advancements in technology and the increased use of digital channels make investing in brand-building – including tools to support it like marketing automation – a no-brainer. As Salesforce discovered in the 8th annual State of Marketing Report, a whopping 87% of marketers say their work provides greater value than it did a year ago.

The difference is that data and automation helps marketers on multiple levels. Harnessing the right data makes it easier to identify the most engaged customers and prospects, for example. Automation helps streamline the workflows that make marketers more productive. Yet data and automation is also helping marketers be more creative, with the ability to iterate variations on ideas at breakneck speed.

Brands don’t have to wait months or years to benefit from marketing automation. Platforms like Marketing Cloud were designed to be adopted quickly and easily, allowing teams to focus on deepening their understanding of their target market’s biggest needs and designing the best possible customer experience in response.

If you’re a Canadian small or medium-sized business that wants to take advantage of marketing automation to turn your team into a value centre, here are some tactics you can apply right away:

1. Shift marketing to focus on first-party data

There’s nothing more relevant, from a marketing perspective, than the information you’ve directly collected about your customers. It’s the best way to come up with creative content that resonates, and opens the door to greater personalization across every channel.

According to The State Of Marketing Report, however, three-quarters of those surveyed admit they rely heavily on third party data collected via web site cookies and their partners. That’s probably because historically, first party data from social media conversations, e-mail, and purchase histories have been siloed within companies.

Platforms like Customer 360 address that by centralizing first party data and making it far easier to mine for in-depth behavioural analysis. Make this a top priority if you really want to see growth from your marketing efforts.

2. Create a guided customer journey by syncing across business functions

Customers can wind up interacting with a number of different departments as they research products and services, make a purchase, and then seek service or support. Marketers need to ensure the right messages are present throughout each of these touchpoints so they can help lead customers down the most desirable path.

Marketing automation helps here by allowing you to set triggers no matter where customers are in their journey. If they’re talking to the customer service team, for example, they can learn about other products that might help them avoid future troubleshooting issues. When they’re talking to sales, they can be informed about the latest promotions of product bundles. This is really a way of automating upselling and cross-selling so it feels natural and seamless.

3. Tap into AI to craft a more bespoke customer experience

How will your next campaign land with your target audience? Artificial intelligence (AI) takes away the guesswork that used to be the basis of answering that question by sifting through vast quantities of data to predict customers’ next moves.

This builds upon the richer customer profiles you’re able to create with marketing automation. Machine learning capabilities will be able to identify the kind of content that will speak to a particular customer’s needs, aspirations, or answer their most commonly-asked questions.

AI can also help fine-tune the way you market to customers through particular channels. While the State of Marketing Report found e-mail is still the dominant channel and accounts for more than 80% of outbound messaging, there’s also been considerable growth in push and SMS notifications. Overall, 90% of marketers surveyed are using AI to automate customer interactions.

4. Make content creation, approval, and distribution as turnkey as possible

Companies can’t afford to have their growth prospects stall because the marketing department is late on getting a campaign out the door. That usually happens when collaborating among marketing team members isn’t fluid. This is an even bigger issue as more companies adopt hybrid work models.

When marketing automation platforms are run in the cloud, it means team members can successfully create, review, or approve content no matter where they are. Advanced search and tagging ensures nothing gets lost in the shuffle, and you’ll wind up spending more time tracking the performance of a campaign instead of trying to get it live.

5. Keep up with more KPIs than ever before

Having a lot of people watch a video is great. It’s fantastic to see hundreds of thousands of people like and share your brand’s social posts. However marketers also need to track how many people go from landing on the company’s web site to clicking through to an e-commerce purchase.

Then there are the age-old metrics such as customer satisfaction (CSAT) and customer lifetime value, among many others. The State of Marketing Report found marketers are looking at a wide variety of key performance indicators (KPIs). This includes revenue, which topped the list at 88% of marketers surveyed.

No matter which KPIs matter to your brand, marketing automation provides a dashboard to see them all at a glance, while providing a toolkit for taking actions that will move the needle on all of them. In other words, you’ll be in a much better position to continue building your brand – and thereby furthering your company’s growth.

The post 5 Ways To Grow Your Business in 2023 With Marketing Automation appeared first on Salesforce.

The most successful brands have always tried to be innovative, of course. This is best reflected in the ads and other content they create as part of their marketing campaigns. Storytelling is an area rife with innovation because you can focus on a new idea, a fresh angle on an old idea, or a compelling narrative.

The changes in customer expectations following the impacts of the pandemic and recent economic pressures like high inflation call for a different kind of innovation, however.

Brands should be harnessing their creativity not only in the campaigns they develop but the way they engage with customers across every touchpoint, and in how they run their marketing operation for maximum productivity and efficiency.

If there were one slogan all marketers should memorize this year, it’s this one: automation is the way to meet or exceed expectations.

By using data more strategically and deploying digital technologies to streamline their workflows, brands won’t only prove they’re worth customers’ attention. They’ll won’t only prove their products and services are worth purchasing. They’ll prove it’s worth it for customers to invest in a relationship with them – because the brand is ready to listen, respond quickly to their needs–and even anticipate them.

The latest edition of Salesforce’s State of The Connected Customer Report shows how this translates into trust. More than three quarters of business buyers said they trust most companies to meet or exceed their expectations. Nearly as many consumers (64%) said the same thing.

The stats were highly similar when businesses and consumers were asked if companies have the intent to meet expectations, and the capabilities to do so. Connected customers are savvy enough to know that the technology and tools are widely available for brands to work in ways that earn their trust. Marketers simply have to follow through and deliver on what the majority of them believe.

In practice, this means taking advantage of marketing innovations such as:

1. First party data collection and management platforms

If you’re sick of having to click a box consenting to the collection of third-party cookies on nearly every web site you visit, you’re not alone. Those notices were put in place because regulators need to ensure those browsing online are aware of how their personal information might be used for retargeting purposes.

Rather than rely on third-party data, brands should look at how they can fine-tune their marketing strategy to encourage customers to provide their first-party data. This could include responses to a survey, subscriptions to their email newsletter, conversations they have with customers on social media, or data from their CRM.

Next, brands should leverage their first-party data to provide more contextually-aware marketing campaigns using a customer data platform (CDP), which will integrate the data and make it actionable.

2. Collaboration tools that unify teams and provide consistent experiences

Hybrid work may be the norm in many brands for the foreseeable future. They can complement the flexibility those models provide by equipping their employees with applications that let them work as cohesively as though everyone was in the same boardroom.

There are already countless marketing teams that stay in constant contact through dedicated Slack channels, for instance. Others are adding video conferencing tools and virtual whiteboards to make conversations even more dynamic. These tools not only provide a better employee experience, but can help trigger discussions that lead to the most innovative marketing strategies.

Customers may not realize these tools are being used, but they appreciate the results, such as marketing messages that are consistent, accurate, and up-to-date.

3. Artificial Intelligence (AI) that adds critical details to the customer journey map

Plenty of brands have conducted some form of journey-mapping exercise, whether it’s their current state, future state, a “day in the life,” or a service blueprint. A journey map becomes a true foundation for innovation, however, when brands add artificial intelligence (AI) to bring all the relevant customer data together.

Instead of isolated customer journey maps, marketing automation powered by AI helps you understand your past results and predicting how customers may respond going forward. Think of it as a guide that helps you follow your customer journey map and lead them where they truly want to go.

4. Digital experiences that offer new frontiers in customer experience

If you’ve ever used Instragram or Snapchat, you’ve probably seen how easy (and fun) it is to use a filter to change how you look, or how your environment looks. That’s a basic form of augmented reality (AR), and brands can use it in a variety of useful ways.

Think of how AR could let you empower customers to see how products will look inside their home, for example, or how it could animate an otherwise static retail store display. The same is true of virtual reality (VR), which brands can use to set up “shop” in the metaverse. These are channels where customers with an innovative mindset are on the lookout for like-minded brands.

5. 360-degree customer views that reimagine the possibilities of personalization

Treating customers as individuals is easy when you’re a small mom-and-pop shop that only serves a handful of local neighbours. How do you replicate that at scale, when your customers could span continents and time zones?

Centralizing data into a platform like Customer 360 provides a single view of your buyers, bringing automation to the art of customer relationship management. For instance, it can analyze data and trigger a prompt for you to reach out proactively when new products arrive that align with a customer’s known interests based on their purchase history. It can even foster a more emotional connection between a brand and its customers, because you can also personalize how you provide service and support. This might include something like handling returns, or providing experiences that help the customer feel like your brand genuinely knows and cares about their wants and needs.

While you may have been hearing about the concept of personalization for a while, it’s more critical than you might think. The State of the Connected Customer Report found that 56% of customers say they feel companies treat them like a number, and 71% of consumers switched brands at least once in the past year. As consumers spend more time online, a world of choice opens up, freeing them from restrictions of past habit and allowing them to explore new options that might better align with their current priorities, preferences, and lifestyle changes.

More automation fuels more innovation – and that means more customer expectations that brands can exceed in 2023. Get even more insights and ideas by downloading the eighth annual Salesforce State of Marketing Report.

The post Marketing Innovations to Exceed Customer Expectations This Year appeared first on Salesforce.

If you’re not one of the hundreds of millions who have already downloaded the app, it might be difficult at first to understand how TikTok is significantly different than similar social media platforms. After all, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter have all been successfully working with brands for years to try out advertising capabilities along with features that offer organic reach.

Part of what makes TikTok stand out is its format and approach. First, the content is predominantly video-based, with short clips taking up the entirety of the user’s screen. This is in contrast to social services where the use of text descriptions and links have been the primary way brands have engaged with potential audiences.

TikTok was also notable in creating a more dynamic split between the content each user chooses to follow, and the content it curates on their behalf. At the top of the app’s interface sit two headings: “For You” is the content that TikTok recommends based on other clips you’ve watched, commented on or liked. The “Following” section located on the other side, needs to be deliberately clicked on.

This makes for a very different kind of “feed” on TikTok, where the chances of seeing content and people you didn’t know about previously is high. You can then choose to follow those accounts, or simply engage with the content as you please.

Beyond that, there is a sort of “tone” on TikTok that may sometimes feel less polished, or more ‘authentic’ than the aspirational images on Instagram, but more thought-through than the randomly-posted content you might see on Twitter or Facebook.

As with any marketing activity, though, your main focus on using TikTok should be about earning your customers’ trust. As the fifth edition of Salesforce’s State of the Connected Consumer revealed, 74% of consumers say communicating honestly and transparently is more important now than before the pandemic. Customer loyalty today has never wavered more with 71% of consumers having switched brands at least once in the last year. As consumers’ priorities and behaviors shift, businesses must shift with them.

If that isn’t enough to help you see the value in marketing on TikTok, here’s are some other arguments to make the business case:

1. TikTok’s audience is huge – and filled with coveted demographics

On a worldwide basis, TikTok has achieved an astonishing 1 billion monthly active users. Though that doesn’t make it the most-used social media service, it’s worth noting that users spend an average or more than 1.5 hours on the platform a day.

For those focused more locally, TikTok’s Canadian user base is estimated at nearly nine million people, an increase from more than six million people just two years ago. They also tend to be from younger demographic cohorts. Data collected in 2022 suggested approximately 43% of Canadian TikTok users are aged between 18-29 years old.

2. TikTok’s algorithm is open to newcomers

Brands and creators who spent the last several years accumulating large following on other social media channels have a great advantage. They know that when they share content, it is likely to be seen by their audience compared to recent users who might not be noticed by the algorithm.

TikTok’s algorithm is designed differently, with a focus on discovering new content and people. This has helped drive what might be described as more viral results for many who haven’t been active on the platform for very long.

3. TikTok users are prepared to spend

Plenty of people might log into TikTok to get a quick laugh or to see behind the scenes moments with their favourite celebrities, but they’re just as likely to be on the lookout for their next purchase.

Last year, for example, one of the trending hashtags and phrases on the platform was “TikTok made me buy it.” Advertisers have capitalized on this by promoting products to an audience that is ready to see some relevant recommendations.

4. TikTok is filled with opportunities to engage authentically

There’s a lot of what may appear, at first glance, as copycat content on TikTok. You’ll see many users imitating the same dance moves, for example, or attempting to recreate a stunt. These are actually challenges that spread organically across the platform.

There’s nothing stopping businesses employing the right social media talent from participating in these challenges, where a simple logo or branded clothing might be all it takes to pique users’ interest in learning more about your brand.

Other options include partnering with TikTok influencers for branded collaborations, where those with high follower counts try out your products and services and share their experience. You can jump on trending hashtags or even trending audio in a way that might align with the theme of your latest campaign. Don’t forget those tutorials, either: people might be looking for clips that help them solve common challenges.

5. TikTok offers features tailored to brands

It’s easy to set up a TikTok for Business account. This offers you access to audio and video content, educational resources and most importantly, audience data.

This means you can build upon the marketing efforts you might already have been making in other social media channels to drive greater results. By using marketing automation, for example, you can add TikTok to the channels you use to gauge customer sentiment, build brand equity, and drive more e-commerce sales.

Marketing on TikTok doesn’t necessarily require the kind of production values you might associate with a TV commercial or a billboard campaign. It’s really about joining conversations with everyday consumers in order to build their brand affinity and trust. That means not only sharing content but liking and commenting on others’ TikTok clips.

If TikTok hasn’t been a part of your brand’s social media toolkit so far, now is the time to start leveraging it not only as a tool for marketing success, but as a way to share brand authenticity and establish trust with the customer, in order to build and maintain their loyalty.

The post Marketing on TikTok: Why You Should Get Started appeared first on Salesforce.