Jacob Morrow
2024-12-17 10:28:38
The B2B marketing landscape is undergoing a rapid transformation. This means that businesses need to adapt to new technologies that have become available to them. More specifically, a business can now develop several digital channels to reach its target audience and foster a relationship based on trust and loyalty. This is where the B2B automation platforms prove to be an invaluable asset.
In this article, we'll explore what is B2B marketing automation, its latest trends, and how to choose the right platform for your company. Our comparison of the top B2B marketing automation tools is a great guide to get you started.
Marketing Trends in B2B Marketing Automation Platforms
Before we start going deeper into the matter, let's explain what is B2B
marketing automation in the first place. This term refers to the use of
specialized tools to automate your marketing tasks, such as managing campaigns
and analyzing performance.
However, these platforms are ideal for campaigns
developed in a B2B setting, meaning that they are targeting other businesses
and professionals, rather than individual users.
Therefore, a B2B marketing automation platform supports your communication needs for a longer sales cycle, and more complex buyer personas. This way, you can develop and measure your multi-channel campaigns more efficiently, which will bring you the desired results.
Why Do Businesses Need Marketing Automation for B2B?
As a B2B business, you might be wondering why you need to employ automation in your processes since you can complete the tasks manually. The truth is that even though you can develop a successful marketing strategy without automation, a B2B marketing automation platform is essential to all modern businesses for multiple reasons.
Here are some key reasons why marketing automation is indispensable for your B2B business:
-
Complex Sales Journeys:
If you are targeting other businesses, you might already be aware that B2B sales often involve multiple stakeholders. This means that the decision-making process takes more time compared to targeting an individual user. To successfully convert your target audience, you must first complete several stages of lead nurturing. By employing B2B marketing automation tools, you guarantee that your marketing communications will be consistent and personalized, thus helping you throughout the process. -
Increased Competition:
The Internet has changed the B2B sales landscape a lot. Nowadays, the market is rather saturated, as you need to compete with businesses from all around the world. Therefore, if you want to stand out and attract your audience's attention, you must be precise and quick. Marketing automation for B2B delivers the right message at the right time so that you always remain ahead of your competitors. -
Better Resource Management:
The B2B marketing automation tools can now handle all of your repetitive tasks that take a lot of time, but are rather unproductive. If the tool completes these tasks for you, you can focus on strategy, creativity, and innovation. -
Enhanced Analytics:
One of the biggest advantages of B2B marketing platforms is that they provide you with advanced analytics. It is a well-known truth that all businesses rely heavily on data to make decisions. If your automation platform provides these insights for you, you can incorporate them into your processes to improve your campaigns and enhance their performance.
Advantages of B2B Marketing Automation Platforms
Now that you know why you need marketing automation for B2B, we are going to see which are the advantages of the B2B automation platforms are. These tools have been specifically designed to help businesses reach other businesses and professionals through targeted and efficient communications.
Here are the main benefits of using a B2B marketing automation platform:
-
Scalability:
Mose platforms that are specialized in B2B automation are scalable. This means that they grow with your business, making it easier to handle increasing volumes of leads and campaigns. If you are experiencing rapid growth, you can rest assured that the right tool will handle all of your needs without an issue. -
Personalization at Scale:
These platforms offer you a set of personalization tools that make it easy for you to build a strong relationship with your customers. Some B2B marketing automation tools are offering advanced customer segmentation options, while others are using AI and machine learning to create personalized content for large audiences. -
Improved Lead Management:
There is also a variety of features in a B2B marketing automation platform that facilitate the management of your leads. These include lead scoring and segmentation that ensure you're targeting the right portion of your audience effectively. This way, you can improve your communications and see better results. -
Time Savings:
By automating your routine tasks, such as sending emails or other communications, you can focus on higher-value work. The platform will simply send your communications to the segments you have selected at the scheduled time, thus saving you time and effort. -
Enhanced Customer Experience:
Probably the biggest advantage of a B2B marketing automation platform is that it allows you to craft a seamless communication experience with your customers. This is the only way to improve satisfaction and loyalty, which in turn will translate into more sales.
How to Choose the Right B2B Marketing Automation Platform
Now you know why choosing the perfect marketing automation platform is a critical decision. However, a search online will bring you numerous B2B marketing automation tools. So, how do you know which will be the right fit for your business?
To help you in this task, we have picked the most significant criteria that you need to keep in mind to make an informed choice:
- Define Your Goals:
- Evaluate Features:
- Ease of Use:
- Scalability:
- Customer Support and Training:
- Budget and ROI:
- Customer Feedback:
What do you want to achieve? Are you looking to increase your lead generation, improve your customer engagement, or gain better analytics? Your objectives will be your main guide to selecting the tool that offers the features that will benefit you the most.
Take a close look at all available features in each B2B marketing automation platform. Make sure to note any features that align with your particular goals. For example, some tools offer automation of your email campaigns with personalization, others have advanced reporting and predictive analytics, and some others stand out for their integration capabilities.
The platform should be intuitive so that your team can quickly adopt it. Some platforms are complex and require extensive training, which will spend your time, effort, and resources.
No matter the size of your business, your marketing automation needs to evolve along with your growing needs. For this reason, choose a B2B marketing automation platform that can scale your business and satisfy your requirements for increased communications.
Another thing that you should look for is a platform that offers reliable customer support. Moreover, tutorials and onboarding assistance are also great for the smooth implementation of the tool and for making your team feel confident about using it.
This criterion has two levels. First, you need to check the tool's pricing and whether it fits in your marketing budget. Nevertheless, while price is an important factor, you should also take into consideration the potential return on investment, which will make up for a higher price range.
Apart from looking for features that align with what is B2B marketing automation, you should also look for other customers' feedback. Take the time to read reviews and testimonials from other users to learn about their real-world experiences with the platform.
Top 7 B2B Marketing Automation Platforms
Now you know what is B2B marketing automation and how to select the right platform for your business. In this section, we examine seven of the best B2B marketing automation tools, which offer you all the features you might need to get started.
#1 EngageLab
🔔 EngageLab is one of the most comprehensive B2B automation platforms in marketing right now as it has been designed for modern marketers who value simplicity and power. It helps businesses create, manage, and optimize campaigns across multiple channels with a set of advanced features. EngageLab stands out for its balance of simplicity and functionality. This makes it the perfect tool for businesses of all sizes.
Key Features:
- Multi-channel engagement that includes email, SMS and push notifications among others.
- Advanced analytics for real-time performance tracking.
- Global reach with a high delivery rate.
- Quick integration with user-friendly API and available SDKs in multiple development languages.
- 24/7 customer support available, including technical managers that resolve any issue that might arise.
Ideal For: Businesses seeking an easy-to-use platform that delivers robust features and analytics.
Pricing: Flexible pricing plans tailored to your business needs. Free trials are available for new users. You can see an estimation of your company's pricing by providing how many services you will need on EngageLab's pricing page .
#2 HubSpot Marketing Hub
HubSpot is a leader in inbound marketing, offering a suite of tools to attract, engage, and delight customers. Therefore, it's no surprise that it is also a dependable B2B marketing automation platform.
Key Features:
- Landing page creation and optimization.
- Powerful form builder for lead generation.
- Email automation with drag-and-drop builders.
- Social media management is all from one platform.
- Integration with HubSpot's CRM.
Ideal For: Companies that focus on inbound marketing strategies. Ideal for larger companies.
Pricing: Free plan available with limited features, paid plans that range from $15/month/seat to $3,200/month/seat depending on features.
#3 Marketo Engage (by Adobe)
Marketo Engage is known for its enterprise-grade marketing capabilities, particularly in account-based marketing (ABM). This AI-powered marketing automation platform is a great tool for building personalized campaigns for your audiences, thus being one of the top B2B automation platforms you can get.
Key Features:
- AI-powered personalization and predictive content recommendations.
- Seamless integration with Adobe products.
- Builds omnichannel engagement that includes email, web, mobile, chat, events, and webinars.
- Enhanced analytics with customizable reporting.
Ideal For: Large enterprises with complex marketing needs.
Pricing: Custom pricing tailored to enterprise requirements.
#4 Salesforce Pardot
Pardot is a B2B marketing automation platform owned by Salesforce, which specializes in marketing automation. The tool promises to be the common ground for marketing and sales teams that want to reach their target audience and generate leads.
Key Features:
- B2B analytics and ROI reporting.
- Dynamic content creation and lead scoring.
- Powerful CRM integrations.
Ideal For: Salesforce users seeking a unified marketing and sales experience.
Pricing: Starts at $1,250/company/month.
#5 ActiveCampaign
ActiveCampaign is a versatile B2B marketing automation platform focusing on email and CRM automation. It utilizes the power of AI and machine learning to help you craft personalized and targeted campaigns.
Key Features:
- Email marketing automation with advanced segmentation.
- Predictive actions based on user behavior.
- Multi-channel engagement that includes email, SMS, and ads.
- Sales engagement automation and CRM tools are available.
Ideal For: Small and medium-sized businesses seeking powerful yet affordable automation.
Pricing: Plans start at $15/month and go up to $145/month. 14-day free trial available.
#6 Mailchimp
Mailchimp is one of the most well-known email marketing and B2B automation platforms that excels at marketing automation. Right now, you can use this platform to automate the entirety of your customer journey.
Key Features:
- Pre-designed templates and email scheduling.
- Insights and analytics for campaign performance.
- Multi-channel campaign support, including ads.
Ideal For: Businesses starting with marketing automation.
Pricing: 30-day free tier available. Paid plans start at $13/month for up to 500 contacts.
#7 Drip
Drip is a tool that focuses on eCommerce businesses, and for this reason, it offers features that help you build personalized customer journeys. This is a great B2B marketing automation platform if you want to elevate your email marketing with a set of advanced automation.
Key Features:
- Automated workflows for your email marketing.
- Segmentation based on customer behavior.
- Real-time performance analytics.
Ideal For: eCommerce businesses aiming to enhance customer relationships.
Pricing: Starts at $39/month for 2500 contacts. Free trial available.
Comparison Table of the B2B Automation Platforms
| Platform | Key Features | Free Trial/ Plan | Pricing | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 💖EngageLab | Multi-channel engagement, analytics, segmentation | ✅ | Flexible pricing | All business sizes |
| HubSpot | Inbound marketing tools | ✅ | $15/month/seat to $3,200/month/seat | Large Companies |
| Marketo Engage | AI-powered ABM tools | ❌ | Custom pricing | Enterprise-level marketing |
| Pardot | CRM integration, lead scoring | ❌ | Lowest starts $1,250/company/month | Salesforce users |
| ActiveCampaign | Email and sales automation | ✅ | $15/month to $145/month | Small to medium-sized businesses |
| Mailchimp | Pre-designed templates | ✅ | Lowest starts at $13/month | Small to medium-sized businesses |
| Drip | Email automation workflows | ✅ | Lowest starts at $39/month | eCommerce businesses |
Get Started with EngageLab
These B2B automation platforms are all reliable solutions for your business. However, there is no denying that EngageLab's cutting-edge features and flexibility make it an ideal choice for all businesses. If you are ready to elevate your marketing efforts, this is the tool worth trying. Explore advanced features including a rich template library, personalisation elements, advanced segmentation and omnichannel engagement.
Discover how marketing automation can transform your B2B strategy with a free trial of EngageLab.
