The 7 key takeaways from the AutomationDay 2022 day

The AutomationDay 2022 event took place on October 4 and brought together nearly 500 people who took part in three conferences and four workshops around the themes of Marketing Automation and customer relations. 

From 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., renowned speakers followed one another to share the latest digital marketing trends. Led by the masters of ceremony Stéphane Couleaud and les Experts du Web, Maud and Anthony Rochand, this day was also supported by six sponsors: Webmecanik, Winbound, Marketinguautomation.fr, Inwink, EMDay and Vocaza.

A look back at these seven insightful sessions! 

The morning conferences

The morning of Automationday 2022 gave three speakers the opportunity to present varied and new topics, offering participants insights into omnichannel, Marketing Automation trends, and the possibility of putting marketing at the service of the environmental cause…  

Everything you need to know about the omnichannel barometer Frédéric Eugène-L’Exact – La Poste Solution Business

Frédéric Eugène-L’Exact,  Director of Innovation and Customer Experience at La Poste Group joined Céline Lebrin, Director of Research & Data Science, to talk about the omnichannel barometer. Here are the elements that stood out to us during this conference: 

Here are the top 3 most-used channels in 2021: 

• Email
• Social media
• Website

Channel no. 1 : email, which represents 60% of the channels used by companies to reach their target audience. Its advantages are reach, personalization, and low cost, but it also has a tendency toward saturation.

Channel no. 2: social media also represents 60% of channels and makes it possible to create a relationship with the consumer, stimulate interactions and drive traffic to the website. Despite common misconceptions, Facebook remains the most-used social network in 2021 at 85% of social media users. The second is far behind with LinkedIn at 46%. Instagram closes the list at 40%.

Channel no. 3: the website represents 56% of the most-used channels and first-party data is becoming key as cookies become scarcer. The challenges? Staying connected with the data declared by users on their website and optimizing the journeys that lead to personal areas.

Postal mail comes just off the podium. But that is no reason to forget it. Postal mail, which represents 50% of channels, is an opportunity to mix on- and offline. The high audience appeals to different senses and therefore emotions. The positive impact is four times greater than a post on social media.

In itself, the strategy consists of setting up channels adapted to the customer lifecycle: the challenge is to create a mix that matches your customers’ expectations. Here are some examples to illustrate very different objectives:

• Bonne maman: recruits new customers via email
• Potager city: recruits new customers on social media
• Petit bateau: loyalty-building
• Nespresso: re-engaging abandoners

How can you create efficiency and stand out knowing that 38 million emails are sent every minute worldwide? When you implement an omnichannel strategy, you must keep the Omnichannel Triangle in mind.

• Capture attention
• Be memorable
• Encourage engagement

We were talking about the postal channel earlier, if we take our omnichannel triangle again:

• A consumer spends more time becoming aware of a brand when they go and get their mail than when they open their emails –> point 1, capture attention
• The home is the place where decisions are made –> point 2, be memorable
• Encourage the consumer to respond to the letter sent with a promotional code –> point 3, encourage engagement

In summary, there are not necessarily good channels for your strategy. You need to think about how to articulate and create a better relationship for marketers in their use of the marketing mix.

The 6 automation trends that will define the future of marketing automation

For our second session of the day, Camille Cocaud, founder of Time to Growth, did us the honor of sharing the 6 future trends that will define the future of marketing automation. 

To determine these trends, Camille based herself on three criteria aimed at optimizing processes, that is to say, focusing attention on the resources that bring real benefit: 

• time 
• efficiency
• costs

1st trend: no code and low code

How should this trend be understood? Do you need to be a senior developer to understand it? Rest assured, it is much simpler than it looks. By definition: all the tools that make it possible to use bots to develop web tools.

We all agree that the deployment of automation is slowed down by the lack of IT skills (Information Technology). That is why using no-code tools is a solution to make innovation easier. In fact, you have to use all the tools at your disposal to develop web tools. If you want to find the tool that will make you a true expert, the French website Quels outils nocode offers many references. On our side, we recommend the Zapier tool. Easy to use, the tool lets you connect two software solutions via APIs.

No code makes innovation easier thanks to process automation. 80% of tech solutions will be created by non-tech people. No code will therefore accelerate companies’ digital transition and respond more quickly to their needs.

2nd trend: hyperautomation

It makes it possible to create automated systems: maximize results and streamline processes. Retrieving the IP address of a visitor on your website or collecting data on LinkedIn is possible thanks to hyperautomation. For that, you need automation tools with an accessible API. Phantombuster is one of the tools you can use.

3rd trend: Machine Learning and AI 

You will be able to analyze large sets of data. The goal is to find insights that you would not necessarily have analyzed by hand. This allows personalization at scale. Setting up the automation of manual tasks will offer patterns and workflows we would not necessarily have thought of.

Where to use AI:

• for behavioral analysis

for lead scoring and segmentation

• for generating social media content
• PPC advertising (cost per click)

4th trend: hyper-personalization

The personalized customer experience shows significant conversion rates. 

You can personalize it through :

• emails
• the website
• digital advertising
• e-commerce
• content

In terms of numbers, email is 6 times more likely to convert a prospect if it is well personalized and an ad has a 50% chance of performing better.

5th trend: funnel marketing

To move your leads forward in the conversion funnel, it is good to use marketing automation tools. The objective here is to deliver personalized content at each stage of the conversion funnel using specific triggers.

6th trend: social media management/ads

We all face this issue every day:  creating content and visuals is time-consuming and therefore costly because the number of platforms to feed has multiplied. That is why, to lighten the workload, it is possible to: 

• Automatically schedule your content distribution
• Analyze it effectively thanks to analytics with the return of many insights for informed decisions.
• Generate content through AI

What do you think of these six automation trends that we will see in the future? Let us know what you would like or contact us here with any questions about marketing automation. Note that only 51% of companies use automation tools, so using automation is a competitive advantage.

Marketing drives consumption! How can it be put at the service of the environmental cause?

This conference delivered by Théo Guillaumin from Beyond Growth opened up new perspectives regarding our relationship with marketing and (over)consumption.

A few benchmark examples of marketing strategies in favor of the planet:

• Patagonia: don’t buy this jacket
• BackMarket: buy only if you need it 
• Patagonia: anti black friday → celebrate what you already own
• Envie.org: Green is the new black

Patagonia remains the benchmark in terms of committed marketing. But then, how can the success of Time for the planet be explained? The company drew a lot of inspiration from Patagonia’s marketing codes:

1. They have a PPF = Product Planet Feat. Time for the Planet addresses a need that goes beyond a simple personal need
2. The importance of communities in these projects to convince as many people as possible
3. They used LinkedIn, basing a large part of their growth on this network.

The place of LinkedIn in their TFTP funnel (Trivial File Transfer Protocol, file transfer protocol): 

Time For The Planet used LinkedIn in their conversion funnel:

• in inbound marketing using personal branding in order to give viral reach to the movement 
• in outbound marketing by using outreach (mass sending of emails or messages on Linkedin)

Their mastery of their topic and their marketing enables Time For The Planet to convert 1 person out of 2

In 2020, Time For The Planet launched a major outreach campaign. By using the power and network of the Time For The Planet partners, it obtained the following results: 

• Between 400 and 600 contacts per day with a focus on people interested in sustainable development
• 50% acceptance
• +15/20% follows the Linkedin page

This outreach campaign  had major repercussions for a minimal budget. This was notably thanks to the use of the Phamtom Buster software, which automates the sending of targeted messages.

Personal Branding or capitalizing on your LinkedIn account

This is the power of the algorithm on LinkedIn. It favors creators of relevant content on linkedIn. For example, one of the founders of Time For The Planet reaches astronomical figures with 23 million views on his posts and 59,000 net followers on his profile at a rate of 5 posts per week. It is therefore important to use Personal branding to your advantage.

Company page: use the strength of your community

Their goal was to bring as many people as possible to their page to increase its visibility. To keep the example of Time For The Planet, their communication actions enabled them to reach 280,000 followers on their LinkedIn page. The repercussions? 50 million views on their post and more and more people joining the project.

Use the Growth Loop

When a person becomes a shareholder of Time for the Planet, it encourages them to post about it on LinkedIn, add it to their profile, which once again increases the visibility of the page.

B2B acquisition strategies for impact companies:

• Intent Based Outreach: get in touch with companies at the right time, thanks to a trigger
• Allbound strategy: inbound + outbound
• Mass outreach: a team that will contact on a large scale, betting on volume
• Co-marketing
• Referral strategy

The afternoon workshops

Our sponsors joined us throughout the afternoon of October 4 to offer participants practical workshops to bring their marketing and sales strategy to life. From email deliverability, to the combined use of a CRM and Marketing Automation software, to the best tips for engaging your B2B customers over the long term… These experts were by our side from 2 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Here is our recap:

CRM and Marketing Automation: 2 tools, one strategy 

Sophie Panot, sales and marketing director at Webmecanik shared the value of using two fundamental tools to convert leads: CRM software and Marketing Automation software to be used together in order to have a SMarketing strategy: 

Smarketing: marketing is at the service of leads and sales

The basics of CRM and Marketing Automation

• CRM: a knowledge base for prospects/customers AND a sales management tool (corresponds to the bottom of the funnel)
• Marketing Automation: automates marketing actions in your conversion funnel. You store in software all the behavioral data of your contact: page visited, click on email, etc… which allow you to activate marketing automation scenarios (corresponds to the top of the funnel)

One strategy → tools that serve this strategy

Previously, there was marketing on one side and the sales team on the other. Today, it is important to link the two, particularly for 6 reasons.

The 6 reasons to integrate these two software solutions 

1. Automated management of lists and segmentation: organize your contacts with segments and adapt the content of your campaigns
2. Auto-responders and triggers: automating your marketing is essential for very simple tasks. The objective here is to respond to customers instantly.
3. Consistently qualify the data in your CRM by using your contacts’ information to encourage them to act.
4. Your customers’ data speaks to you. Use factual data and cross-reference it dynamically to focus on the most important KPIs.
5. Have a reliable picture of your customer journeys by mapping them in order to optimize their actions as much as possible.
6. Make GDPR easier by letting the prospect explicitly give you their consent

Sophie’s advice? Put in place a content strategy and carry out a self-diagnosis of your strategy

Bonus to amplify the reach of your CRM strategy: the Derrick application!

This Google Sheet extension allows you to scrape and enrich data from your Linkedin Sales Navigator. This extension is inexpensive, requires no technical knowledge and lets you create prospect lists in just a few seconds in Google Sheet… A must-have!

How can you optimize the deliverability of service emails?

Laurent Garnier, member of Emday and ChapsVision shared his best tips for better deliverability of service emails.

A service message is a transactional email send.

A reminder on deliverability: it is a set of technical and marketing means implemented in order to optimize the delivery of an email into an inbox.

At the beginning, everything depended on the content, which did or did not place you on Spammer lists.

Today, unlike mass mailing, to optimize deliverability we rely on finer segmentation.

What are the factors influencing deliverability: 

Two factors influence email deliverability: the human factor and the available resources. They are both governed by the medium used and the company’s practices. For example, we have

Marketing pressure is the most important factor in the deliverability of your emails. The important thing is to create a climate of trust and respect, so it is important to take care of your brand image. For this, it is important to use the right email between mass emailing and service emailing.

Mass emailing, service emailing… What is the difference between these two notions? Beyond the number of sends of this email, it will be much easier to generate a positive emotion with a service email, which can help build trust. This type of email is very rarely, if ever, classified as SPAM by users. This is sometimes not enough, which is why it is important to properly respect security protocols.

And then what? We strongly advise you to follow the “BIMI” (Brand Indicators for Message Identification)  trend which, in marketing terms, could spark the interest of marketers.

How can you engage your B2B audience over the long term?

Pascal Laforest, from the Inwink platform, goes into detail on the best practices for engaging your B2B audience over the long term. 

In five points, he explains the importance of defining your value propositions, choosing the best tools to deliver your message, paying attention to the constraints that the user might encounter (too many marketing emails for example), and finally, finding the best way to engage your community thanks to a good relationship with your prospect and the value you bring them.

Define your value propositions and message

By being an expert in your field, you gain a certain credibility that gives confidence to your audience. It is also important to invest in producing valuable content by hiring a content manager for example. Finally, by taking a “developer” approach, you will be able to follow your objectives step by step and reach them more quickly.

Choose your tools to deliver your message

The multiplicity of tools can quickly discourage us because there is as much content to produce as there are tools. How can you be sure your audience receives your message when it is over-solicited? Too much similar content generates a loss of efficiency, like webinar syndrome during lockdown: it is increasingly complicated to maintain your audience’s interest.

Other pitfalls that prevent the audience from receiving your message:

Regulators exist to avoid the many solicitations caused by marketing emails for example, which requires even greater vigilance, because IT departments also reinforce anti-spam rules. Ad blockers are now present on many web browsers, which blocks the transmission of the message. Finally, regulation aims to make third-party Analytics disappear.

B2B Engagement: a new Marketing approach 

Faced with all these constraints, Pascal Laforest proposes a new approach whose objective is to create an engagement relationship with his clients. He recommends building a relationship and bringing value to your audience. 

Who is trying to engage? 

With the same effort, it is possible to meet the needs of different targets (prospects and customers) and create value. To do this, he recommends defining the objective of engagement, establishing a two-way relationship made easier by digital, and betting on the reach of your brand. The ultimate goal is to create a community and measure its performance.

How do you set up a community?

1. Bring in visitors
2. Turn an unknown visitor into a known member
3. Bring members back
4. Use the collected data to build loyalty

Measuring the performance of a community: one key KPI to monitor: 

The revisit frequency of your members (once a week is a good target); if this is not the case, put re-engagement actions in place.

Interested in this topic? Head to the replay to discover the detailed presentation by Pascal Laforest, expert at Inwnik.

Are you more Team “Lead Machine” or Team “Quick Win”?

To conclude this day rich in insights, Isabelle Defay from the Winbound MV Group marketing agency helps you find the strategy that works for you during this final workshop of the day. She looks at two strategies that are widely used in our professions: the “Lead Machine” and the “Quick Win”. So which is the most effective? Spoiler: perhaps a mix of the two 😉 

To start this webinar, Isabelle Defay discusses the current context that she describes as VUCA (Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, Ambiguity). VUCA means that the company must rethink its strategy and show agility: adapt its objectives and allocate resources accordingly to develop its sales.

She then goes into the description as well as the advantages and disadvantages of the two strategies.

For the “Lead Machine” strategy, she points out the following advantages:

Permission-based or “elegant” marketing:

This strategy makes it possible to provide an identified audience with relevant content with the aim of generating interest and engagement toward the content, capturing data, and providing hot leads to the sales force.

Strategic fundamentals:

You must clearly define your value proposition, know who you are speaking to and what problem you are solving. In this way, you will be able to understand the prospect’s decision cycle in order to support them through your content, then identify through which channel to convey your message and when.

Appropriate levers, tactics and resources:

The Lead Machine strategy requires an optimized website and an expert business blog. Expert content must be adapted to the decision journey and relayed on social media. It is also necessary to equip yourself with a marketing automation tool and a CRM. You must also implement marketing actions (webinars, trade shows) and nurturing actions. Finally, the sales force must be aligned with these actions to handle the leads.

But, of course, the “Lead Machine” strategy has its limits. It requires time in its construction and deployment. There is a certain inertia before the machine is launched and the first leads are generated. A real investment dedicated to content creation is mandatory. Finally, lead processing must be adapted and smarketing alignment must be put in place to truly benefit from this strategy.

The “Quick Win” strategy operates in a radically different way and relies more on fast work than on foundational work.

The first mission is to set yourself a SMART objective and KPIs. To do this, Isabelle Defay recommends relying on what already exists, prioritizing, thinking through your actions and being agile.

During the session, she shares a “Quick Win” example: a boost action on a target, mixing digital and print. To do this, the following must be put in place:

1. Sending a printed book
2. An email on D+2 with a personalized video
3. A nurturing scenario with high value-added content
4. A phone follow-up to secure an appointment 

To conclude this session, the expert explains that the most effective solution is indeed a marketing mix strategy, combining the “Lead Machine” and “Quick Win” strategies.

Here are her recommendations for being ready to deploy it in your company: 

1. Talk about the change in strategy internally
2. Share the objectives
3. Set common KPIs
4. Define the resources (people, budget, time, technical)
5. Do not fear test & learn

Do you want to know even more about the marketing mix and these two ultra-effective strategies? Discover the replay!

We once again thank the AutomationDay organization for allowing us to attend this day dedicated to Marketing Automation and Sales, and we are already looking forward to next year for the 2023 edition!

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