Launching a marketing campaign to increase sales for your ecommerce store is a good start. But, without a dedicated marketing team, you might find yourself overwhelmed by the huge amount of marketing tasks on your plate. You can spend countless hours sending marketing emails, posting on social media, responding to customer queries, and manually inputting customer data.
As an entrepreneur, you need to focus your time on high-level strategies for how to improve your ecommerce business without being distracted by individual marketing tasks. What you need is the right marketing automation software that can automatically handle repetitive marketing tasks and free you up to focus on what’s most important for your company.
Here are some of the most effective strategies for marketing automation, as well as a few popular automation software tools to consider using for your own marketing campaigns.
What is ecommerce marketing automation?
Ecommerce marketing automation is the process of using software tools to improve the efficiency of your marketing efforts by automating repetitive tasks like email marketing, data entry, and lead prioritization. Entrepreneurs use ecommerce marketing automation tools to automate tasks across a variety of marketing channels, including social media, emails, and SMS text messages.
Benefits of marketing automation
Ecommerce marketing automation software saves you time and increases the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns. With the right tools and strategies, automated marketing campaigns can offer several benefits to ecommerce businesses, including the following:
Reduced human error
It’s easy to make mistakes if you’re running several marketing campaigns across a variety of digital marketing channels. Marketing automation tools can handle detail-oriented repetitive tasks like data entry, reducing the number of errors that occur from manually inputting and managing so much information.
Tailored customer experience
A good ecommerce marketing automation tool personalizes your marketing efforts based on specific customer behavior. By using strategies like automated customer segmentation, you can create a tailored customer journey based on individual preferences.
Scalability
Ecommerce marketing automations like chatbots and personalized email sequences can maintain customer engagement as your business grows, so you can manage larger volumes of customer data and interactions without a proportional increase in marketing resources.
How to use marketing automation in ecommerce
- Customer segmentation
- Email and SMS marketing
- Chatbots
- Social media automation
- Lead scoring
- Reengagement campaigns
- Automated workflows
There are different ways you can automate marketing tasks. Here are some of the most effective ecommerce marketing automation strategies to consider implementing for your own business:
Customer segmentation
Customer segmentation is the process of dividing customers into different categories based on factors like consumer behavior, purchase history, and other customer data like demographic or geographic information. Ecommerce marketing automation software can automatically gather data, identify patterns, and segment customers into appropriate groups.
By automatically dividing your market of existing and potential customers into specific subcategories, you can create more targeted marketing strategies. For example, you could use marketing automation tools to identify a segment of customers who are most likely to buy a new product line based on their previous purchase history and demographic data.
Email and SMS marketing
Email marketing campaigns and SMS marketing campaigns are two of the most effective tools for engaging with previous and potential customers. Email marketing automation software lets merchants set up email sequences that send based on customer behavior. Examples of useful automated email campaigns include welcome emails, subscription renewal emails, and abandoned shopping cart emails.
Likewise, automated SMS strategies involve sending text messages to tell specific customers about special offers, loyalty programs, and new product launch announcements. By automatically sending personalized messages to customers, automated email and SMS campaigns can save your company time while increasing customer engagement.
Chatbots
Chatbots are software tools designed to simulate conversational communications with your customers. With the rise of natural language processing and AI marketing tools, chatbots are becoming better at automatically giving users helpful answers to complicated questions and alerting you when a specific concern requires your attention.
For example, you could include a chatbot on different landing pages on your ecommerce store. These chatbots give website visitors an easy way to ask questions and learn more about your products or services.
Social media automation
With one study forecasting that global sales through social media platforms will reach about $8.5 trillion by 2030, making sure you have a presence on social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, X (formerly known as Twitter), and Pinterest is an essential aspect of modern ecommerce marketing.
Social media automation is the process of using automation tools to perform tasks like scheduling posts, responding to questions in the comments, and reporting on performance metrics. Automation software is a great way to increase your efficiency on social media platforms by giving you more time to create content and define an overall social media marketing strategy.
Lead scoring
Lead scoring is the process of prioritizing which potential customers are most likely to perform a specific action, like buying a product or service. Ecommerce marketing automation software uses data like customer behavior and previous customer purchases to automatically rank which potential leads are the most valuable. This process of lead qualification can save your marketing and sales teams valuable time by avoiding wasting resources on low-quality leads.
Reengagement campaigns
Reengagement automations involve sending automatic communications to individuals who have previously interacted with your brand, website, or store. Automatic messages offering friendly reminders to customers about unfinished purchases can make the difference when it comes to converting interest into a sale.
For example, you could set up automatic emails to online shoppers who left your website during the checkout flow or abandoned their shopping cart before completing a purchase. To increase your chances of making a conversion, you could also include special offers and discounts in your remarketing communications.
Automated workflows
Ecommerce marketing software gives you the power to create customized workflows that streamline your marketing efforts. You can also set up automated workflows to help different departments work together effectively, such as a trigger that automatically sends qualified leads to your sales team.
Marketing automation tools for ecommerce
Here are a few of the most popular marketing automation platforms to consider using to improve your own marketing campaigns:
Shopify
For entrepreneurs using Shopify as their ecommerce platform, Shopify Automations can help you engage with your customers effectively. You can build custom processes in an easy-to-understand interface. There are also ready-made templates for welcome and winback campaigns so you can focus on growing your business.
You can also integrate apps such as Shopify Flow, which offers a user-friendly platform with a simple drag-and-drop editor that gives you the power to create automated workflows for your marketing campaigns. Shopify Flow also offers loyalty programs that automatically track purchase histories and reward customers with discounts and special offers to convert online shoppers into repeat customers for your online store.
Omnisend
This ecommerce marketing automation platform focuses on email and SMS marketing campaigns, workflow automation, and shopping cart abandonment re-engagement strategies. Omnisend offers pre-built workflows as well as customer segment targeting and integrations with ecommerce platforms like Shopify.
Klaviyo
Klaviyo offers a range of automated marketing tools, including comprehensive customer segmentation based on user behavior, preferences, and previous purchase history. With customizable templates, Klaviyo gives merchants the tools to automate abandoned shopping cart reminders, birthday messages to customers, and personalized product recommendations.
HubSpot Marketing Hub
Marketing Hub is a marketing automation platform that offers a variety of tools, including automated email and SMS sequences, social media automation, and analytics reporting. With ad management and retargeting features, Hubspot offers an all-in-one dashboard for managing your digital marketing campaigns.
ActiveCampaign
With a focus on analytics and reporting features, this marketing tool helps merchants with large contact lists automate email campaigns and increase customer engagement. ActiveCampaign includes lead scoring features, automatic workflow templates, and re-engagement tools.
Drip
Drip is a marketing automation platform that organizes customer data into a single dashboard. With lead nurturing features and drag-and-drop editor tools for automation workflows, Drip focuses on boosting engagement across a range of marketing channels.
Marketing automation ecommerce FAQ
What is online marketing automation?
Online marketing automation is the process of using software tools to automatically perform repetitive tasks like email sequences, data entry, and lead scoring. Ecommerce merchants use marketing automation software to streamline their workflows, reduce human error, and save time.
How do I start marketing automation?
Start by finding a marketing automation platform that includes important automation features like triggered email sequences, chatbots, and analytics reporting. Once you choose the right platform, set up your marketing automation workflow and adjust accordingly based on customer feedback and data analytics reports.
Does Shopify offer marketing automation?
Yes, Shopify offers marketing automation through tools like Shopify Flow and Shopify Email, both of which include automation features that can save you time and improve the efficiency of your marketing campaigns.