Marketing Automation vs. Email Marketing: What Are the Key Differences?
Are you puzzled about understanding the difference between marketing automation and email marketing? It is not shocking because there is a lot of contradictory information available on the internet. Many people describe email marketing as a capability to send content and track the success of email campaigns. Some industry experts have devised email marketing automation as a kind of halfway house between these two terms. Apart from all this, numerous marketing tools control marketing automation, personalization, email automation, and analytical functionality. In some cases, they are also compatible with AI or machine learning features.
Email Marketing
When it comes to marketing automation vs. email marketing, there are stark differences. While these tools utilize email as the main network to engage with a potential audience, email marketing tracks the actions performed by recipients of your email.
Marketing Automation
Marketing automation software monitors all digital interactions that a lead has with your business. It observes all the data into an activity history that offers a 360 view of your leads. If you’re considering inbound and outbound marketing, and email marketing is just outbound. Whereas, a marketing automation platform will assist you to build and manage search-optimized landing pages, blog posts, social media marketing, and integrate them into your outbound program.
The Key Differences between Marketing Automation and Email Marketing
- Complexity
- Sales cycle
- Assets
- B2B vs. B2C
- Behavior Tracking
Complexity
If you’re running a small setup with a limited budget, you might not want to build compound marketing campaigns. When you understand your customer requirements, you prepare content to meet potential customers’ profiles and track your efforts to run effective email marketing campaigns.
Marketing automation campaigns are complex than email marketing because they involve different techniques. To achieve the desired results you’re required to manage all the parts at once. It helps driving improves results, but it is only worth it if you have skills, time, and money.
If you’re a beginner, you have a small marketing team. If they are incapable to track customer behavior and get insights from optimized campaigns, you should consider email marketing. It’s the right decision to build personalized campaigns that provide relevant information.
Sales Cycle
The method you follow to market apparel differs from the way you market electronic gadgets. Apparels are an impulse purchase, and you will buy many over a lifetime. Whereas, it takes time to buy electronic gadgets. The sales cycle is different for all products, and each requires a specific approach.
Marketing automation is best for a longer cycle where customers interact with your business over various touchpoints. Customers require more information and time to make a purchase. Whereas, email marketing is ideal for quick decisions and lower-value products. Customers can obtain all the information through email.
Assets
When you’re creating and handling email campaigns, all you need to worry about the content quality and structure. How to write an effective email marketing campaign, what should be the graphical considerations, and other elements are essential to lookup.
When it comes to marketing automation, you need to build and manage landing pages, social media posts, images, and ad campaigns. It also requires more time, super-savvy content, and technical skills. It helps your interactions with customers in different ways. You need to ensure that all assets which reflect your brand image should be seamless.
B2B vs. B2C Capabilities
Marketing automation is not only ideal for longer cycles, but you can implement it on B2B companies. It is effective for businesses that have dedicated sales teams. If you’re a marketer and working for a B2C company, you will be the one selling to customers. You manage all the emails and encourage customers to purchase by directing them to a website or store.
You might have some interactions with customers, and you won’t be directly involved in the sales procedure. Here comes email marketing as a quick way to get the information in front of potential clients to make a purchase. In this tech era, we are not limited to the newsletter and transactional emails. The advanced marketing system allows you to create different email marketing content such as customer feedback, flash sale messages, and loyalty offers.
B2B companies have expert sales teams who deal with different points of contact. The salespersons interact with prospects many times during the sales cycle. Therefore, a marketing automation system is necessary to keep track.
Behavior Tracking
Email marketing tracks how your email campaigns are working. It offers insight into what makes a campaign successful and how to improve the campaigns. You can personalize content as per the information, such as the type of email a recipient opens, but you may not know what other points of contact they have with your organization.
It’s imperative to keep in mind that a customer buying journey is not limited to one channel. Marketing automation systems enable you to track customer behavior across different channels. You can design target campaigns obtained from the insight of which channel customers prefer. It may include your website, social media platforms, iPad, and ads you’re running. It also triggers emails or marketing messages. For an instance, if a customer has just purchased an item, you can send a message with a customer survey.
Choose the Tool that Suits Your Business Needs
Marketing automation vs. email marketing, both come in all sizes and shapes. From a simple email tool to a full-service marketing automation system, it helps your business manage multimillion-dollar marketing campaigns. You can consider email marketing if you’re planning to create automated email campaigns. You can use it in conjunction with other available marketing software. You can also opt for an email customer relationship management solution that helps you to know your customers. On other hand, you can choose a system that performs it all.
When it comes to marketing automation vs. email marketing, first of all, you need to consider business needs. Here are some points to consider when choosing a solution:
- Budget
- The time you invest in building marketing campaigns
- Marketing objectives
- Length of the company sales cycle
- Marketing channels
After considering these factors, you can start your search for a solution. If your sales cycle is simple and your lead requires one or two touches, email marketing is an ideal tool. And, if you’re ready to start nurturing and qualifying leads, marketing automation can be helpful.
