In today’s marketing landscape, there’s an increased need for customer segmentation, a growing choice of marketing channels, the necessity to integrate more third-parties, and the seemingly endless touch points necessary to forge strong customer relationships. Today’s CMOs have to have peripheral vision in order to achieve bottom line results and hit revenue targets. And this is why they are continually looking to find the best tools and processes to make it happen.
As brands become increasingly interested in adopting marketing automation, more of them are exploring what it takes to incorporate its capabilities into their overall marketing and sales strategies. But it isn’t an easy task. Marketing automation often requires a major shift in how companies execute and deliver their marketing campaigns. Yet, for those with the desire and flexibility to build dedicated marketing automation and demand generation teams, the results are well worth the effort.
In working with various types of agencies and brands and seeing the successes and struggles of various marketing automation teams, we at Net-Results know what CMOs invest in first – people. Without the right team, the MAP is like a nicely decorated box with no gift inside. Without the right people, everyone might have an idea of what to do, but no one has a clue of how to do it. The right people with the skills and passion are the building blocks of a viable marketing automation team.
As a general recommendation of what an effective marketing automation team looks like, I’ve narrowed it down to three essential roles. Size of company, vertical,etc. all factor into this but if you don’t have at least these three key pieces you will struggle to succeed with your platform.
1. The Champion
The Champion is the master technician when it comes to your MAP (and possibly your CRM system). With a solid understanding of how to make the system work from a technology standpoint, a Champion has to understand how to support the business workflow and seamless integration between the Marketing and Sales process. With strong analytical skills, the champion is the most technical MA user on the team. Couple this with strong demand generation skills and this person becomes one of your most essential team members.
2. The Scientist
The Scientist is the backbone of information capture, analysis and reporting. By understanding and interpreting insights and data of marketing information, the Scientist is able to analyze data on any and every level. The Scientist and Champion work together to plan and execute on various insights in an effort to maintain focus on the data that accurately measures the real results. This is a tough position to find, and many organizations look to an agency to help them fill this role in the short term while training an internal transitioning resource into this role.
3. The Creator(s)
Creators produce the brand assets that are used to execute on marketing programs and map content throughout the buyer’s journey. This comes in many forms such as white papers, articles, blog posts, designs, logos, spec sheets and any and all other pieces of content and design that are necessary to move prospects and customers closer to a ‘buy’ decision. Most organizations generally have a team of Creators, made up of graphic designers, content marketers and social media marketers. If you’re lucky enough (especially in a small business) to have someone handle all of those responsibilities then you should never let that person get away!
In the construction of a holistic marketing automation team, three distinct roles are must-haves. It’s painful to see a MAP go to waste as a result of ineffective use. This is why we always tell brands and agencies that as strong as our platform is, you need the right people to make it work to reap its true benefits.
Are you fueling your demand generation and marketing automation processes with the right team?
