We’re talking about total transformation – elevating your marketing strategy, scaling your business, and upgrading your systems with automation for efficiency and productivity. With huge advancements in technology and tons of ways to update how your business operates, there’s never been more opportunities for business growth.
Research shows that 2023 is actually the perfect time to start transforming your marketing and processes. According to a HubSpot marketing trends report, almost 80% of marketers say more has changed in marketing trends in the past 3 years than in the past 50 years. With the world of marketing changing around you, the businesses that are able to adapt will see the most growth in the coming year.
But the question is, where to start?
Sometimes there are so many options, it’s hard to get a handle on where your focus should be to inspire the most growth possible. That’s why we’re diving into all the ways to set your business up for major success this coming year, and beyond.
Setting goals is always a good first step on the road to business growth. Having a clear plan of where you want to go helps set you up for success, while making the actions needed more visible.
Chances are, you’ve set goals for your business before. But now, it’s time to get even smarter about them, by setting SMART goals. We’re talking about an acronym for making your goals as effective as possible. SMART stands for goals that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-based.
It’s all about the details when it comes to SMART goals. Instead of a vague or broad idea of where you want to be down the road, set goals that involve exactly what you want to achieve, who will be involved, how to make it happen, and when it will be done. The more details you can list, the better!
Being able to measure your progress will help keep you on track to accomplish each goal. Think about setting up milestones along the way that can serve as a sort of check-in. If you have a means to measure the progress of your goals, you can make any needed adjustments while working towards the end results.
While this one might seem obvious, it’s very important. It’s easy to get carried away with goal-setting by imagining the absolute best-case scenarios for your business. It’s okay to have lofty dreams without limiting what you believe you can achieve, but SMART goals need to be completely possible. Shoot for the stars, as long as you can see a clear pathway to reaching those stars in your set time frame.
Try not to jump on band-wagon goals that simply look or sound good. Keep a clear understanding of what your specific goals are – both short-term and long-term. This means you have to know your business really, really well. SMART goals need to be based on your specific business…not anyone else’s.
Taking a time-based approach to goal-setting has to do with more than just setting the end deadline. It is important to know when you want goals to be accomplished, but it’s also helpful to set smaller deadlines along the way. What monthly steps do you need to take to reach next year’s goal? Where should you be at the halfway point? Keeping tabs on your timeline with actionable steps will give you the highest possibility of success.
As we approach 2023, begin to formulate your own SMART goals for 1-year, 5-years, and even 10-years from now. This will take a bit of effort, but it will be well worth it when you can look back at the huge amount of progress you’ve made. Use 2022 performance as a guide to show you what areas of your business could improve, and then use the SMART acronym to start putting your goals into action.
About 59% of the world’s population is now active on social media, so it’s a great place to focus more energy in the coming year. Email marketing is also a growing commodity, with over 4 billion email users worldwide. With the revenue-producing possibilities of these two forms of marketing at your disposal, creating a solid strategy for 2023 can help kickstart your marketing efforts to get the best returns.
Here’s the thing: the power of social media and email marketing lies in the ability to create deep connections and lasting relationships with your audience. Allow your social media and email content to open up lines of engagement with your audience — and then, when they engage, make sure they are also heard and valued. Focus your strategy on truly understanding your potential customers’ behaviors, and desires, so your emails and social posts can actually meet their needs.
The best way to get into the heads of your audience is by implementing the right software that can track, manage, and analyze customer insights and data. Smart marketing campaigns are driven by information for targeted, specific content that is seen by people who want it.
Need a hint? It’s all in your CRM. Setting up a CRM platform (Hubspot or Zapier are excellent options) will help you manage all customer data to create the most effective marketing campaigns possible.
You can also integrate other programs into your CRM that help automate your social media and email marketing campaigns. Scheduling posts and setting up email triggers will get regular content to the right people at the right time, without putting any extra time strain on your marketing team.
Plus, scheduling isn’t the only way you can automate and extend your social media platform — you can also automate and extend your engagement. After all, connection is key. Setting up automation software that allows you to either immediately respond or to direct each question and comment to the right marketing or sales representative will help you stay on top of engagement.
TAC Tip: At the Automation Co, we can help you set up all your social media and email marketing automation software – to get the most out of your marketing strategies!
This is the year that you start prioritizing where you spend your money, and where you can absolutely cut costs. There are countless tools and programs that you could use, or are already using. But the question is…are they all contributing to your revenue or your SMART goals in some way?
The process of clearing out unnecessary programs can be simple. Just do a deep dive into all the paid programs you currently have for your business. If you’re paying for something that is not directly leading to your goals, it might be time to let it go. Saving some money here and there on unnecessary programs will free up funds for better software that will lead to producing higher quality leads, better productivity, and of course – more sales.
When was the last time you checked in with your mission and vision statements? If it’s been awhile, make it a priority! As your company grows, it’s a good idea to revisit and update what’s at the heart of it all — so ask yourself:
Have any of your company beliefs or values shifted?
If your direction has changed in a big way you might consider a rebrand, but sometimes there are just small tweaks that can better sum up where you are and where you’re headed.
Be sure to update your website copy with any new changes that represent your company’s internal growth, be sure to adjust your outward-facing messaging, and be sure that your team is well-versed on any updates. Plus, while you’re at it, make sure your website is fully optimized for speed and search, can be easily-navigated, and is very user and mobile-friendly.
It’s a total bummer when customers are nurtured and led through quality, targeted marketing campaigns, but they end up on a website that’s hard to navigate. Make sure your website and landing pages are fully prepared to inspire further action from potential customers.
Next up…delegate as much as you can. This can honestly save you so much time and effort, and it’s also exactly what will give you back countless hours to focus on more important tasks. While it might be hard to let go of the reins in some areas, it’s a crucial step in being able to grow and scale a business.
Think about the strategic and creative parts of your business, and how they might need your attention more than the operational tasks that could be delegated for optimal efficiency. Some things might be delegated to other people, while some could be delegated to automation software and systems.
See, the back end of your business needs to operate smoothly for your business to grow — and often, that means a system could work better than employees for things like data entry, administrative tasks, payroll, and other behind-the-scenes operations. Because, after all, if you are personally spending time focused on back-end operations you’ll find it difficult to keep your company progressing forward.
That’s where automation software can be a game-changer. Any repetitive, ongoing tasks can be automated to decrease human error, speed up productivity, and streamline the way your business operates. Plus, while back-end automations are helpful in keeping things running smoothly, their ability to help your company reach a new level of growth does not stop there.
Everything we’ve discussed is important to helping your business thrive. We’ve saved the best tip for last, because it really is the most important update you can make this coming year…
Automate your business!
There are different types of automation that can transform the way your business operates. We mentioned back-end tasks, but let’s not forget the front-end as well. Marketing and sales automation can help increase incoming leads while assisting teams in handling the higher volume of leads and sales. The best way for a growing company to continue in an upward direction is to bring in automation.
It’s the responsibility of the sales and marketing departments to increase revenue for a company, and there simply can’t be growth without bringing in more qualified leads and more sales — which is where automation comes into play.
Marketing efforts thrive on information — and better quality information leads to more advanced data for both attracting and retaining customers and running more effective marketing campaigns. Plus, automation allows more data to be processed, categorized, and used quickly – without putting a strain on any employees. Automated data collection is a game-changer for the sheer number of leads brought in, as well as lead scoring to know which leads have the highest chance of converting.
Remember how delegating tasks can free up your own time and energy to use where it’s needed the most? Well, automation software can take a lot of time-consuming tasks off you and your team’s hands. Once automations are set, there’s also less risk of human error since software doesn’t fatigue or get bored. It thrives on repetition!
Any growing business will put the customers first. Their experience should be a top priority when it comes to attracting and warming up leads, and guiding them to becoming customers. See, when customer service is smooth and fast, people feel valued and heard — and when marketing campaigns are effectively targeted, people actually appreciate receiving them. Automation makes the customer experience smooth and enjoyable, inspiring loyalty every step of the way.
Workflows become considerably more effective with the help of automation — and by using logic you can set up pretty much any type of workflow to run without humans even touching a button. Some examples of automated workflows are sending emails, setting reminders, scheduling tasks, and posting on social media — but that’s truly just the beginning. With automation, you can essentially automate anything else that could possibly save you time and effort.
Increasing productivity definitely helps reduce costs, and automation is the ultimate tool for productivity. In fact, just in marketing efforts alone, automation can cut overhead costs by about 12.2%. Pair that with a possible 14.5% increase in sales productivity, and you have a win-win situation for getting the most bang for your buck.
TAC Tip: Overall, automation improves the experiences of everyone involved. The sales and marketing teams function better, and the customers or clients receive a higher level of satisfaction.
Starting can sometimes feel overwhelming — but the good news is that automation is meant to make your life and your work easier and more efficient. So, once you take your first steps towards automating your business, you’ll find it is well-worth the effort you put into setting yourself up for automation success.
When it comes to starting your automation journey, follow these simple tips:
Where can you save time, cut costs, or increase revenue? Asking these questions can help you pinpoint where your automation priorities fall. Marketing and sales is usually a good place to start, because these departments contribute straight to your bottom line.
You can check out tons of ideas for getting started with automation here!
You have lots of options for automation software. We recommend Hubspot – a leading resource for all types of marketing automation, from data and lead processing to sending out quality marketing campaigns. With thousands of possible integrations, customizable workflows, a user-friendly CRM platform, and a large focus on customer satisfaction, Hubspot is an excellent choice for automation software.
Hubspot excels in automating marketing, sales, customer service, content management, and operations software. So, everything from the customer-facing front-end to the back-end operations of your business is in very good hands with Hubspot’s all-in-one connective platform.
TAC Tip: As authorized Hubspot partners, we can help you get started with Hubspot today.
Make sure everyone within your company gets the right training for working with your new software. To get the most out of your automation tools, you’ll want to get it all up and running as soon as possible and as smoothly as possible — so don’t neglect this step, and invest in help if needed.
Connect all your different tools to a central database for the most efficiency. This will help keep all teams on the same page, while making sure everything is working together towards your goals.
Here are a few of the integrations that Hubspot offers.
With the help of automation, 2023 could be a year of huge growth for your business. Once you start implementing your new tools, enjoy the benefits of decreased costs, increased revenue, freed up time and energy, and so much more.
Just remember, you’re not on this journey alone!
If you’re looking to make 2023 a year of real growth, our automation experts are ready to help you reach your goals. As a partner and authorized reseller of Hubspot, The Automation Company can help you find the right automation solutions for your business while guiding you through a smooth and effective integration process.
Big growth comes from making big moves, and starting your automation journey could be your biggest and best move yet. Together, we can make 2023 a year of major growth and success for your business.
Start your automation journey today. Click here to get started.
