5 SMS & Email Marketing Automation Workflows to Free Up Time

Time is precious, whether you’re on a marketing team of one or 30. Many companies invest in a marketing automation tool, but they often spend more time maintaining the tool than actually using it to automate their marketing.

Here are five email and SMS marketing workflows you can implement to free up your time to accomplish other tasks, such as building strategic plans, analyzing data, creating new content, or even taking the dog for a walk.

1. Post-Webinar Nurture

Webinars can bring in lots of leads, but how do you keep them engaged when the event ends? A simple lead nurture workflow can turn those leads into opportunities without sales contact needed. Attendees may have questions about the products or services discussed in the webinar. Sending them relevant and helpful information is a good approach.

Depending on the number of products or services you are displaying in the webinar, you can create several email streams. Each stream should have its own product-specific content.

If you capture data before or during the webinar on products of interest or pain points, you can use that information to send them down a personalized email journey. Personalization in marketing is key to keeping leads and customers engaged with your products and brand.

2. Review Collection

This one can get overlooked because it’s not necessarily revenue driving, and many sales teams are already collecting feedback. What if you could set up an email and SMS workflow that would work behind the scenes to collect reviews and feed the responses back to your CRM? No phone calls or data entry needed.

Keep in mind that review solicitation should be timely. Send an email to new customers minutes after they have purchased. Reach out to lost deals shortly after they have left the process. If customers haven’t opened the email after a few hours, it’s worth following up with an SMS message to see if they are more responsive in that channel.

3. Re-Engagement

There are two audiences for this type of campaign: past customers and leads who have fallen out of the funnel.

Past customers are those who have previously bought from you. They no longer need your service or have gone elsewhere for a better offer. A re-engagement campaign attempts to win them back.

Leads who have fallen out of the funnel are those leads that never converted into paying customers. They haven’t engaged with your emails in months or have abandoned their shopping cart. A re-engagement campaign reels them back in and puts them back in the running to become a customer.

Lead scoring is a great way to identify potential customers. A re-engagement campaign can boost someone's score and move them closer to becoming a Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL).

When attempting to re-engage an audience, it's helpful to offer incentives for their engagement. For example, offer a whitepaper to those who click through an email CTA button or a promotion to those who open your email.

Getting crafty with subject lines can come in handy here as these recipients probably haven’t opened communications from you recently.

4. Customer Appreciation

Email communication is not always a priority for customers who are not due for renewal or those who are content with their service. But failing to nurture relationships with current customers is a missed opportunity.

It’s important to build relationships with your existing customers to keep them happy and increase their lifetime value. Retaining current customers is just as important as lead generation. It is not always appropriate to send a cross-sell message or renewal offer. However, it is important to continue building the relationship.

A customer appreciation workflow is easy to stand up and goes a long way. The emails don’t need to include an offer or anything fancy; it’s just a note to show you care. After all, who doesn’t appreciate a thank you?

5. Cross-Sell Products or Services

Depending on your product or service, you might have opportunities to cross-sell current customers. Creating an email workflow for this requires a strategy behind which products to cross-sell, and when.

Create a workflow to send an SMS to customers who purchased your product. Ask if they need help. You could then follow that up with an email showcasing other products in your offering that might complement their recent purchase.

The key here is to ensure you are being helpful rather than “salesy.” Always ensure your content is relevant to the customer; otherwise, they might end up in your re-engagement campaign!

These email and SMS workflows can be designed to give you back time in your week. If you want to learn more about how they can help your business, please reach out to us. We would be happy to help develop a plan to achieve your goals.