Marketing Automation Tools suck at automating marketing.
I’m not going to try and get you worked up about Marketing Automation Tools, I’m going to try and tell you how they work.
There are great tools out there like HubSpot, Pardot, and SilverPop (you can get a full list here), but don’t expect them to replace the people in your marketing department anytime soon.
Marketing Automation Tools are great for…automating emails and triggering drip campaigns
But suck at…creating great email campaigns, offers, designs, subject lines, and ensuring email deliverability
Marketing Automation Tools are great for…easily developing landing pages and blogs
But suck at…writing headlines, knowing what to test, how to optimize and, umm, how to blog.
Marketing Automation Tools are great for…web analytics and reporting
But suck at…figuring out how to build business intelligence and make strategic decisions.
Okay, I think you get the idea.
We’ve had clients who’ve bought some of these tools (we’ll even recommend some of the better ones), but they often believe these tools will solve all their marketing problems. But if you don’t have the marketing talent to support the tools, they’re just going to create more problems.
Marketing Automation Tools don’t automate marketing “proper”, they automate marketing “processes”.
So, before you go and replace your marketing team with marketing tools, just make sure you know what you’re getting your business into.