Did you know that the Earth doesn’t revolve around the sun? In fact, the Earth, along with the sun and all the other planets of the solar system is orbiting around a center of mass (a point in space) of the solar system!
Peanuts are also not nuts, and neither are beans nor peas. And there is no “dark side of the moon”.
Surprising, or even shocking? Maybe. These are all prevalent misconceptions. So many people take these as facts, and we even learn some at schools, also though they are not correct.
Here’s one more: CRM and Marketing Automation are not the same thing!
I do understand where this misconception comes from though; both are admittedly intertwined as they both seem to have the same goals of finding, nurturing, closing, and retaining leads successfully.
And while both are essential to the process of growing customer base and closing deals, they perform different functions.
Here is the main difference between the two:
While the marketing automation software is more focused on the marketing side of things – this means it works to attract leads and leads them into the funnel.
While CRM software is more focused on the sales side of things – and so it is more concerned with the development of those leads once they are already in the funnel.
Usually, Marketers use marketing automation software to schedule and track marketing campaigns such as email campaigns.
SEE ALSO: How to Choose the Right CRM Software for your business.
Here are some of the features of Marketing Automation Software:
- Email Marketing: You can automate email campaigns easily (Campaigns such as newsletters and promotions).
- Lead Nurturing: the ability to reach and nurture prospects based on customer demographics, behavior, and more.
- Landing Pages: Some Marketing Automation Software come with tools that make building pages easy even for people with no prior experience as designers or developers
- A/B Testing: Some Marketing Automation tools have A/B testing to allow you to test different variations of campaigns to see which ones are most effective and combine the different successful elements to create the best campaigns you can.
- Social Marketing: Many Marketing Automation tools now have built-in social media options or have the ability to integrate with social media marketing tools easily
- Segment Customers: Marketing Automation software come with segmentation tools that allow you to place customers in groups based on their behavior in the past to target them with campaigns tailored to their needs.
- Marketing: Customers don’t exist only on email or only on social media; the online world is vast and comprehensive, and Marketing Automation Tools know this. They allow you to create more cohesive campaigns that run on different channels; Social Media, Email, Video, etc.
- Analytics & Reports: Reports and analytics tools help users understand their customers, their campaigns, and how the interaction between the two is going to better improve their future campaigns.
- Prioritize Leads with Lead Scoring: Some Marketing Automation tools will enable you to prioritize your leads based on the probability of them converting or on the size of the deals.
- Follow-Up with Leads Automatically: With automated tools, you will be sure that every hot lead is followed-up with right away, no matter what the time is.
All of this means that we’ve explained is true: Marketing Automation and Marketing Automation tools help foster leads and get them ready for the sales team steps in. Once the lead has become a qualified sales lead, it’s time for CRM to start tracking their interactions and working its magic.
CRM store information such as your purchase history and dates and notes on interactions with the company through phone conversations, emails, etc.
CRM is then used by the Sales and Customer Service teams to optimize the one-to-one interactions between the customer and the company to increase sales and improve customer satisfaction.
Some benefits of CRM software include:
- Better Client Relationships: Members of sales and customer service teams will have all the information about the clients in one place so you can better understand them and be able to forge a stronger connection and a deeper relationship with them.
- Contact and Lead Management: CRM software allows you to track and manage the sales process in a more direct and personalized way as it is done on a per customer basis instead of the traditional approach.
- Task Management: Most CRM software will come with a task management tools that lets reps assign, schedule, and complete tasks which are related to the sales process – all in one convenient location.
- Sales Forecasting: Forecasting will help users by giving them a benchmark to see whether or not they are on the right track to getting the results they need.
- Email Integration: CRM will allow you send email from the tool directly. That helps you track things such as open rates, click rates, responses, frequency, etc.
- Tracking through different outlets: Most CRMs will synchronize with various social media outlets to monitor which ones are leading to the most traffic.
- Reporting gives you the data that helps you understand your sales cycle better and be able to make sales forecasts.
The Best of Both Worlds:
Now that you know the difference between the two, you should also know that the two software tools are often integrated. As both help sales teams meet their goals in a variety of ways, business owners often see it as beneficial to use both tools to help them achieve their goals more efficiently, more quickly, and with fewer errors while also improving customer satisfaction. In such cases, the customer journey will start with the marketing team, but as he is going from marketing to sales, he also goes from the Marketing automation tool to the CRM tool.
Moreover, some CRM companies have acquired, or even developed Marketing Automation software so that users can have both in one suite. These hybrid CRM/Marketing Automation tools include options provided by InfusionSoft, Zoho CRM, and Salesforce Pardo.
And that’s it, folks! I hope you found this article useful if you did, share it with your friends.
You can also take a minute to learn how to Choose the Right CRM Software for your business.
If you have any questions or comments, feel free to leave them below and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
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