On every episode of the Rebel Instinct, our team sits down with rebels from across the marketing landscape to share stories about bold moves they’ve taken as marketers. Subscribe for more.

Galen Ettlin:
Welcome to the Rebel Instinct Podcast everybody. I am your host, Galen Ettlin with Act-On Software, and our guest today is Esther Flammer, CMO for Wrike, which is a work management platform. Esther is an award-winning marketer with 20 years of experience spanning B2B tech and nonprofits alike. And I know it’s not everything Esther, but I got to welcome and applaud the fellow summa cum laudes in the building. Thank you so much for being here.

Esther Flammer:
Thank you. Happy to be here and happy to be on the podcast.

Galen Ettlin:
Yes. I have so much I want to talk to you about, so I’m just going to jump right into it. I want to start with where you are right now. I know Wrike is pretty big. It’s a really cool platform. Act-On is actually a client. We use it for our project management. Tell me a little bit about your journey to heading up the marketing efforts there. Probably an exciting rollercoaster the last couple of years.

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, absolutely. I’ve been in marketing for about 20 years. Most of my experience has been in high growth SaaS companies. I love to build foundations and revenue generating programs that can scale basically. And so the last few companies really built out kind of a lot of the, I would say the infrastructure, the frameworks, the campaigns, the programs, building revenue, generating engines and customer lifecycle programs that allowed for high growth within those companies and eventually acquisitions. And then when I joined Wrike, you’re right, it has been quite a roller coaster. I joined shortly after the acquisition by Citrix, so Wrike became part of the Citrix family, and then last year Citrix actually was acquired and was taken private and we spun off essentially and became a separate entity at the end of last year. So it’s been quite the rollercoaster, but we’ve been really focused on driving, again, high growth, taking market share within a really competitive industry. So it’s been a fun but wild ride.

Galen Ettlin:
So yeah, like you said, lots of transition and a lot of companies, especially in tech are experiencing those transitions because of the economy, job changes, the acquisitions as you have gone through, as someone in leadership working through and navigating some of that right now, what is one of your big takeaways for success when trying to get that high growth?

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, good question. It’s not really been new. I know it’s kind of a crazy market right now, but especially at high growth companies, change is inevitable and there’s acquisitions and there’s mergers and there’s spinoffs and there’s just constant pivots on business strategy. So I guess a couple of my secrets that have allowed for me to navigate a lot of change and just varying environments, for me it’s about very quickly establishing a reputation and building value within your organization. And so for me, I have built out my career by focusing on looking at building solutions for major gaps in the organization. What are those core problems that are holding the business back that are not allowing the business to move forward that maybe have never been built? And then how do you tie all of your work to those business drivers and then at the same time grow in the breadth and depth of your experience and skillset? It allows for you to be able to prove value to the organization to make an impact and to honestly have a level of marketability and job security because you’ve shown a lot of, you’ve proven a lot of that value, but also you’re able to adapt in very quickly changing environments. And so that’s how I’ve really built out a lot of my career and that would be, I guess a top tip on how to navigate this specific crazy market that we’re in.

Galen Ettlin:
Connecting to that a little bit, company tech stacks are also pretty tall these days. A lot of competition out there on the market for any various service, and I know marketing budgets are often slashed in tough times like these. How do you and your teams work to stand out to both win new business and maintain existing customer loyalty so that you stay on the roster through this?

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, this is top of mind. I would say tech consolidation for sure is top of mind for literally every business leader out there who’s trying to potentially look at how do we save some budget and put it elsewhere, which then makes it top of mind for every marketer in tech. In a down market, you typically tend to see companies that shift their focus from new customer acquisition, which is really, really costly, sometimes hard to scale, and obviously that cost of acquisition continues to go up and they start to shift more towards our customer base, which is how do you get better net retention? How do you retain and expand the customers that you already have that are happy that are adopting and that could potentially buy more? And that’s absolutely a trend that we’re seeing in the industry. I would say that a couple of things that as I think through kind of customer loyalty, as I think through how to balance new business acquisition with customer expansion, there’s a couple of things that we’ve been doing at Wrike.
So number one, we focus a lot on positioning and differentiation. So that messaging strategy, which is as a work management platform, we’re actually very well positioned when budgets are slashed because when you have less budget and resources, you want to maximize every single dollar. You want to maximize every single person on your team. And so focused alignment and execution is absolutely critical to be able to do more with less. And so we’re focusing a lot on really driving home the value of not only our platform for new customers, but also existing customers and really focusing on how is our platform helping deliver business outcomes, helping your business stay stable in an unstable environment or continue to grow even in a down market. And then that differentiation piece and a really competitive market is important because we’re the only platform that can help you scale and align those teams.

When ROI is key, so that’s one thing is really that messaging, the positioning, the differentiation. A second key piece for us is just being smarter about company or customer acquisition. And so when you think about who you have limited dollars, limited resources, you have to be very selective about who are you trying to target and what are the types of customers and prospects that are most important for the business. And so for us, it’s not necessarily about volume, even though that’s that’s important, but for us, we actually can do a level of predictive expected lifetime value of these are the types of customers, these are the types of companies, the types of buyers where we know not only will they buy, but they will potentially expand. And so that’s where we target a lot of our advertising dollars and a lot of our new business acquisitions, just being smarter with the acquisition dollars that you have.

Then the third is really around, again, the customer loyalty piece. I would say the companies that have always invested in really great customer experience and customer lifecycle obviously have a leg up in a downmarket when everyone started starting to turn their attention over to their existing base, but really thinking again strategically about where are they in the customer lifecycle, how do we get them to see value as quickly as possible within the platform? How do we get them adopting, integrating, and really loving the product? And then how do you start to build out really, really explicit paths for them on here’s kind of your upgrade path, here’s your upsell path, here’s your cross-sell path of here’s kind of the next best thing that you should be doing to actually get more value out of the product that you have. And so those are just some of the things that we’re doing to make sure that we can continue to grow even when times are hard and budgets are being slashed.

Galen Ettlin:
You’ve been talking about how marketers are really trying to prove and demonstrate value right now. How do you feel marketers can strategically steer organizations toward revenue based on those industry insights?

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, absolutely. I think one reason why I love being in marketing is because to me, marketing is at the center of business strategy. Companies cannot thrive and survive and grow unless they understand the market that they’re in, understand how do they shape the market, where should they be going after, what are the markets that they can dominate that they can be differentiated in? And then how do you actually then go and deliver on a go-to-market strategy? So I think marketing is huge and should be part of pretty much every discussion in every functional group and every core, I would say overall strategy for the business, whether it’s what does product development look like, where should we be innovating next? What’s the next market we should be going after? Is there a new market that we should maybe be disrupting or maybe there’s a level of product innovation that we could start to build out that would disrupt our current market.

There’s obviously the go-to-market with sales, which is how do we better deliver the right buyers? How do we go after the right buyers and what’s the right approach? The messaging strategy, the channel mix, sales enablement and what we should put in the sales toolkit, it should all be aligned. Customer strategy is another one where, again, marketing should be at the core of a lot of what’s happening within those customer cohorts. Where are they in their customer lifecycle? What’s the next best product or next thing that they should be doing? How do we showcase value? There’s hr, how do we continue to market ourselves as an employee brand to capture the best talent out there? So there’s so many aspects. I think that marketing can help drive strategically of an organization, and it’s, again, it’s what I love about being marketing, that it’s not just like, here’s the leads, here’s the brand, but it’s actually everything that really moves the business forward.

Galen Ettlin:
And what you’re saying, I’m hearing a lot of sales driven, results driven marketing campaigns, and I think that brings us to a good question of how sales and marketing get along and can really collaborate to bring those deals across the finish line. And I know in a lot of companies that’s the age old give and take. It’s hard to get sales and marketing often on the same page and delivering that same message and getting the results that ultimately you both need and want to achieve to prove that value in your job. What is your approach to cross-functionality and how those two separate teams can better do that business together?

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, I think it starts with being aligned to the same targets and goals. You have to incentivize people in the same way. And sales is a department that is very used to incentives. I mean, pretty much most of their comp is based off of quota, and if marketing is not aligned to the same targets, that’s where the misalignment starts. If marketing is like, well, we just care about leads, we’re always in green, we’ve delivered the leads, we’re good, we’re getting paid, our jobs are safe, we’re celebrating, and meanwhile sales targets are not being hit or overall company bookings are not being hit. That’s a huge misalignment. So I think a lot of it honestly starts with making sure that you have the same goals as a company. Actually marketing being tied to bookings, essentially bookings and revenue, but also pipeline. I care way more about pipeline of what’s actually happening from the leads that we’re generating.

Are we actually creating predictable pipeline and making sure that that can close into revenue? Those are a lot of the conversations I have both with marketing and with sales and just aligning goals. We’ll get sales very much aligned to what marketing is doing. I think the other piece that we always talk about is kind of taking it back to ROI and being able to, again, showcase that we’re driving bookings and driving pipeline from the campaigns that we’re doing. And then you get better alignment with sales of if you want us to invest more in these field events, if you want us to invest more in a b m or in the advertising that’s driving a lot of these leads that you love and that is essentially filling your book of business, then you need to work with us and here’s the ask. So those are just some of the things that I think are really critical to sales and marketing alignment.

Galen Ettlin:
Taking a step back and looking at your success personally, you’ve accomplished a lot heading up marketing for a multi-billion dollar tech company. That’s no small feat, and I think a lot of people are really trying to figure out how can I align myself to reach that peak, that level, not a peak. I’m sure you’re going to do even more, but for those marketers out there listening, they want to know the secret sauce. What was maybe a defining moment in your journey toward these marketing leadership positions?

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, it’s a good question and it was absolutely a journey. It’s been a journey and I’m still on that journey because I’m still growing and learning. But I think as I think through back at my journey, and I mentioned this a little bit earlier, where finding your sweet spot, finding specifically some of those core competencies and those unique skills that you bring to the table and that is your unique perspective and the solutions that you drive from them, and then actually the output of delivering on results, the more that you can hone that and own it and build that brand, not just for yourself of this is my sweet spot and this is where I really thrive, is building these foundations and really connecting the dots to larger business strategy, but then starting to build, I would say a reputation or your own brand within your organization with your team of being that person that can go in and fill in a gap and be able to build solutions that can drive business growth.

Those are things that really make you valuable and it also gives you that ability to be able to add on more experience and that breadth of experience that is really critical as you continue to drive forward in your career. So for example, we didn’t have customer marketing at one of my early companies and it was a gap that the company just hadn’t really thought through it. And so me thinking through what is the customer lifecycle? How can we build out a longer standing kind of the longevity program that can essentially onboard everyone but get to, again, showcasing value, showcasing tips and tricks to get better adoption, but also showing those customers where they can start to drive the value from that product and potentially uplevel themselves or uplevel themselves in their career and starting to build out those types of programs. It allowed for me to expand my skillset and it allowed for me to think more in a customer’s shoes of what would they care about and how do I help them in their careers or in their day-to-day responsibility.

And then being able to apply that, whether that’s partner marketing and thinking through from a partner standpoint of how do we engage our partners or grow or acquire more partners or grow and acquire more business through our partners, or whether that’s demand gen of I’m trying to get in front of new prospects or whether that’s product marketing, just really thinking through some of that approach to how do I drive value for them? What would they care about and how do I start to bring a message of what we can do for them and help them better understand the product better, understand how they can do better in their roles. So those are things that I think are really critical that have been critical for me in terms of expanding my breadth and depth of just general marketing that I’ve also utilized as I’ve gone up in my career as well.

Galen Ettlin:
This may be along those lines, but we always like to ask this question of people on the Rebel Instinct podcast. What would you say is one of the most out of the box projects that you worked on or something that you are really proud of and how did it perform?

Esther Flammer:
I mean, again, that’s one reason why I think we’re in marketing is because the art and the science of it, and I guess some of the innovations and fun campaign ideas that have happened over the years, there’s plenty, but at one of my last companies, we supported basically our target audience was essentially Salesforce users. And so one of our biggest events of the whole year was around Dreamforce, and it was actually in 2020 when everything went virtual, and instead of doing our multimillion dollar headquarters outside of Moscone and doing a silent disco that we were very well-known for, because we had done it for the three or four years that I’d been there, it was the party of the year, we actually did the virtual element of it, and we did a virtual 5K as part of our Dreamforce road to Dreamforce and driving a lot of the buzz around our event alongside Dreamforce, and that was just super fun.

I feel like the pandemic and having to switch everything to virtual made everyone actually a little bit more creative and really, I feel like it was kind of a shining moment for marketers on what can we do when we don’t have an in-person experience? And it was actually super cool. We went from driving a big party in person to doing actually a 5K event that people could do wherever they were. They could go on a walk outside and still be essentially six feet apart from other people, but we made it super fun where people could win awards and they could kind of cheer each other on During that. We had dance parties in between, and so it was very out of the box where I feel like a B2B tech marketer

Galen Ettlin:
Way to flex those creative muscles when you really needed to in a way that was safe as well. So that’s really fun. Well, for you, Esther, how are you a rebel in your non-work life?

Esther Flammer:
I feel like people, when they hear what we do with our family, people are like, I feel like people probably think it’s pretty rebellious, but we’ve been traveling with our kids internationally since they were babies. So when my first son was one, we did a one month trip to Asia, so we spent a month in Asia, in Korea, Japan, with a stop in Hawaii and took him on that 14 hour flight, which was pretty crazy. But we really love traveling and we love to take our kids. When our kids were, gosh, I’m thinking I think four, two and four, no, sorry, four and six, we rented a camper van and went all around New Zealand. We love to explore the world with our kids even when they’re two young to travel according to probably most standards, but they’ve grown up going to really, really cool places and having really fun experiences. So I guess that’s a way that I rebel.

Galen Ettlin:
That’s great. And it’s what a cool opportunity for them too, to grow up feeling like that’s normal. I get to see the world and learn about everything outside my bubble.

Esther Flammer:
Yeah.

Galen Ettlin:
Well, speaking of other places, other cultures, our culture, whatever you want, what rebel do you feel needs to be celebrated and why?

Esther Flammer:
Where we are as a world and a society today is there is more of a push for work-life balance for people where people want to, I think especially with remote work, hybrid work, being able to work from everywhere, there’s absolutely a push for work is not everything I say a lot of times to my team, we’re not saving lives here. It’s important. And you had mentioned a give and take earlier with sales and marketing. I think everything is a give and take. I think work-life balances is a give and take, and I think the relationship with your company is very much a give and a take where again, I’ve built out a lot of value for my company and I give a lot to my company and I’m an asset, and a lot of our people are our employees. They’re assets to the company and they give a lot.

And so I think that it’s fair to take some as well, but again, it needs to be a balance. You can’t be all about taking of like, I’m just going to work whenever I want and not really sign in and not be available or let my team down. You can’t just take, because then you probably won’t have a job anymore. But if you are really producing and you are a business critical person and you’re really showcasing the value, and again, driving and tying to business outcomes, I think it’s fair for you to set boundaries around. I’m going to take PTO and I’m going to try and be off the grid here, right? So I’m going to set things up. I’m not going to leave my team hanging. I’m going to deliver on everything that I need to before I go, but I am, I’m going to go unplug. So I do love that rebellious, and it’s sad that that’s rebellious.

Galen Ettlin:
I hear ya.

Esther Flammer:
But I think, again, when there’s that give and take, I think that that can absolutely work for both the company and for the employee.

Galen Ettlin:
We, I think could all take a leaf from your ‘put more stamps on the passport’ advice.

Esther Flammer:
Take your kids. Take your kids.

Galen Ettlin:
There you go. Yeah, don’t hold back. Just do it.

Esther Flammer:
Yes.

Galen Ettlin:
It’s time for a fun segment we like to call ‘Honey, I don’t think so.’ I’m going to give you 60 seconds for you to tell me something that’s annoying you lately that needs to stop in the marketing or MarTech space. So whenever you’re ready, let me know.

Esther Flammer:
And I was thinking about this. I get way too many emails and I can never find the unsubscribe button, or I feel like it doesn’t work half the time, or I never know if I’m unsubscribed, but I just think email is a channel. There needs to be a strategy and it needs to be utilized in a really thoughtful and intentional way. I think especially now, it’s hugely overused, especially because budgets are tight and it’s a free channel, but the pressure is on. People are starting to try and I think prioritize activity over strategy, and email is just one of those where it’s too much. And I get that you have goals to hit, but if you’re not being thoughtful and intentional and really showcasing the value of why am I reaching out? What does this look like? It’s just going to be a one-sided conversation. You’re going to get unsubscribed. You’re not going to engage with your audience. So that’s my thing. That’s annoying me. I think I get too many and I just ignore email now. So that’s I think my soapbox.

Galen Ettlin:
Amen. I’m there with you, and we’re a marketing automation company that specializes in email, but it really comes down to deliverability and making sure it’s something that’s worth someone’s time and what they actually need or want. Right? Otherwise, it’s just clutter.

Esther Flammer:
Agreed.

Galen Ettlin:
We’re there with you.

Esther Flammer:
More to delete.

Galen Ettlin:
Exactly. Well, Esther, thank you so much for joining us here today on the Rebel Instinct Podcast. It has been a joy. Where can people find you?

Esther Flammer:
So they can find me on LinkedIn. That’s probably the best. And our company is wrike.com.

Galen Ettlin:
Excellent. Well, thanks again.

Esther Flammer:
Yeah, thanks, Galen.

Galen Ettlin:
Thanks everyone for listening to the Rebel Instinct Podcast. Be sure to follow Act-On Software for updates and upcoming episodes, and remember to always act on your rebel instinct. Until next time.

Check out the next episode of the Rebel Instinct Podcast, featuring Tejas Manohar, co-founder and co-CEO of Hightouch.

Marketing has also transformed over the past several years. Customers don’t just prefer personalized experiences – they demand them. And if you miss the mark on personalization, a customer will delete your marketing emails, keep scrolling online, and ultimately lose interest in your company and products. So it’s no surprise marketers are spending more on technology to support this increased demand around personalization. But this technology depends on data, and having more of it requires greater security. 

As you shop for technology, you might have heard about ISO 27001. But what is it? 

ISO 27001 is an accreditation that shows a company has a strict set of standards for securely handling customer data. As you consider what it means for your marketing department, here are a few things to consider.

Helps Keep Customer Data Confidential and Private 

With the rise in security breaches, customers care more than ever about the safety of their data. If a customer hands you personal information, they want to know they won’t regret it later. The challenge is that customer confidence around data security is already pretty low, with 70% saying they don’t think businesses do enough to secure personal information and that it’s likely been compromised without their knowledge. With trust levels already so low, it falls on marketing to rebuild that trust. 

Many governments have already stepped up to help, with Europe creating the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and California creating the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). But in addition to meeting relevant regulatory requirements, marketers can choose technology partners that have undergone optional ISO 27001 certification to strengthen their security. 

Supports Personalization and Improved ROI

Customers are getting pickier about how they expect to be treated. Send a customer the same email they positively responded to a decade ago; today, that person will skim and delete it without a second thought. Customers want more, so marketers are responding to the call. 

Over half of marketers say that personalization is their top priority. At the root of this priority is giving customers a better experience, according to 88% of marketers. Audience segmentation is required to do this successfully, helping you speak to people in a way that makes them feel known. But it’s impossible to personalize without data, so you must convince prospects and customers that it’s safe to share it. 

Working with partners that have adopted recognized security standards, such as ISO 27001, tells customers your business does things the right way. As security becomes more important to customers, businesses that can’t prove strict security measures will quickly be taken out of the running. 

Helps Build Brand Loyalty 

Nothing erodes brand loyalty faster than a data breach. Once trust is broken through a breach, it’s difficult – if not impossible – to rebuild it. A recent report found that nearly half of the organizations surveyed suffered reputation damage due to data breaches, and almost one-fifth struggled with reputation and brand damage due to a third-party security breach. And the cost of breaches is rising fast, reaching a 17-year high of $4.24 million in 2021. 

Working with ISO 27001 certified partners helps reduce security breach risk through ongoing work to spot and fix security weaknesses. ISO 27001 certification means your partner is working to evolve security policy, objectives, risk assessments and more to keep customer data safe. 

This extra due diligence supports brand loyalty. Customers who have successfully shared data with you in the past will feel more comfortable doing so in the future. Sure, they could make a switch to a competitor, but if they’re concerned about data security, this factor weighs heavily on the decision. 

Supports a Competitive Advantage 

Does it feel like marketing is getting more competitive? You’re not imagining it; the statistics support that competition is, in fact, getting more difficult. Eighty-seven percent of companies report that their market has become more competitive in the past few years, and 49% say it’s become much more competitive. 

So what can marketers do? 

It comes down to your ability to personalize, meeting customers exactly where they are on the customer journey. And, of course, to do that, you need data. Getting that data requires you to prove trustworthiness, and this trust gives you a competitive advantage. 

Keeping your company’s name out of the headlines by upping data security is a good first step to getting an edge on the competition. Then you need to communicate to customers what you’re doing to stay more secure so they trust you. 

With customer data in hand, you can do a better job of personalizing, which is where the big payoffs start to happen. Talking to your customers in a way that feels like you “get them” gives you a vote of confidence, so they open more emails, download more content, and speak to your salespeople. According to McKinsey & Company, personalization drives performance and better outcomes. The fastest-growing companies drive 40% more of their revenue from personalization than their slower-growing counterparts.

Marketing Automation and ISO 27001

You might already use marketing automation, and if so, you know how powerful it can be to building a business and growing revenue. Marketing automation helps you segment customers fast, send more relevant messages, create trigger emails and reach out at a time that feels serendipitous to customers. But back to security … how can you ensure that your marketing automation technology is secure? It’s a great question and one that more marketing teams are asking. And it comes down to data. 

Data is one of your marketing team’s biggest assets, and it’s part of your job to protect it. One way to do that better is to work with a marketing automation partner with international certification, such as ISO 27001. A partner with this certification gives you confidence that: 

1. Security processes are continuously reviewed. Ongoing review is part of the ISO 27001 framework. Feel certain that processes are under ongoing scrutiny. 
2. The risk of exposure is minimized. ISO 27001 certification requires vendors to undergo a rigorous process, ensuring that data is handled securely at every turn. The framework is designed to reduce security risk and costly exposure. 
3. Customer confidence is built. You can build trust, confidence and loyalty by showing customers that you’re serious about security – it’s a top priority. 

Meeting ISO 27001 requirements isn’t a one-time process. It’s a constant commitment to security, the security framework and protecting one of your team’s most valuable assets – customer data. The framework makes sure that you never let your guard down, and with this assurance, you can feel confident that you have what you need to build and keep customer trust. 

Digital Markets Act  

After being submitted in 2020, the Digital Markets Act (DMA) proposal was overwhelmingly adopted by the European Parliament’s Committee on the Internal Market and Consumer Protection (IMCO) in November 2021. The next step will be a vote by the European Parliament and Council to approve the legislation, with the earliest date that the DMA is anticipated to come into force being 2023.   

The Digital Markets Act aims to reclassify certain technology companies (think Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon) as “gatekeepers” and place additional regulations on some of the ways they do business. 

The goal of the DMA is to reduce the harm of concentrated digital markets by creating a more level playing field. This regulation should make it easier for smaller businesses to enter the market, in part by limiting the influence of Big Tech. It’s hoped that this will be achieved by disallowing Big Tech companies to use their platforms to rank their services or products higher than their smaller, third-party competitors.

To be classified as a gatekeeper, a tech company’s Core Platform Services (CPS) must have at least 45 million monthly active users, be important in businesses’ attempts to reach end-users, and have entrenched and durable control of these gateways, either at present or in the near future. Their annual EEA turnover must be equal to or above €6.5 billion for the last three financial years, or their market capitalization has been calculated at €65 billion. Gatekeepers should also be providing CPS across at least three Member States.   

Which Sectors Are Covered?  

The DMA will cover activities across eight sectors or CPS. These are:

1. Online search engines 
2. Online intermediation services
3. Social networks 
4. Video sharing platforms 
5. Communication platforms 
6. Operating systems 
7. Cloud services 
8. Advertising services

Obligations for Gatekeepers 

The DMA sets out a range of obligations that gatekeepers must abide by, namely:

• Notifying the European Commission within three months, if they believe they meet the definition of a gatekeeper
• Notifying the European Commission if they plan a merger or acquisition of another digital service provider or CPS 
• Guaranteeing freedom for users, to cover pricing, freedom to uninstall pre-installed software, product promotion outside of the platform, and the free use of third-party software  
• Offering businesses and end-users the option of data portability within GDPR  
• Transparency around online adverts, non-discriminatory search engine ranking, and the profiling of consumers 
• Free access for business users to their data generated within the platform 
• Non-discriminatory and fair access for business users to app stores
• Allowing business users to access hardware and software features 

There are additional obligations around what a gatekeeper cannot do, namely:

• Combining personal data from different CPS without first obtaining GDPR consent
• Requiring business users to use their identification service alone 
• Stipulating mandatory subscription or registry with other CPS as a condition of access
• Using data generated by business users but isn’t publicly available when competing with those business users
• Artificially ranking their services and products higher than those of other third parties
• The ranking methods used must be non-discriminatory and fair 
• Restrict end-users from switching to another software application or service 

Given the swiftly changing nature of the digital market, the DMA also embeds the ability to update these obligations as and when necessary dynamically.

Fines for Non-Compliance 

The DMA will give the European Commission broad investigative powers, combined with the ability to levy fines for non-compliance. Initial fines are currently suggested at 10% of a company’s worldwide annual turnover. Periodic penalties also have the potential to be applied at 5% of a company’s average daily turnover. 

Where systematic infringements are uncovered, additional fines or non-financial remedies may be imposed. These will be proportionate to each offense. Non-financial fines will be kept as a last resort but may include changes to a company’s structure, for example, the divestiture of parts or all of a business. 

Digital Services Act

While the DMA targets the lack of competition in digital markets, the DSA focuses on transparency and consumer protection, applying to any business offering its services to users in the EU. 

The DSA aims to modernize and create an EU-wide uniform framework on handling illegal or potentially harmful content online, the liability of online intermediaries for third-party content, protecting users’ fundamental rights online, and bridging the information misconceptions between online intermediaries and their users.

Which Sectors Are Covered?

The DSA will impact online intermediary services, including:

• Intermediary services – including internet access providers, network infrastructure, and domain name registrars 
• Hosting services – cloud and Web Hosting services (which can include online platforms) 
• Online platforms – app stores, marketplaces, social media platforms, and more
• Extensive platforms – any of the above that reach over 10% of European consumers 

The DSA will cover online intermediary services offering their services within the European Single Market, no matter where in the world they’re located. Micro and small enterprises are currently excluded as the obligations are considered to represent a disproportionate burden.   

Obligations Under the DSA 

New obligations for digital service providers will be set on a sliding scale, with smaller providers such as intermediary services being subject to fewer obligations than their larger counterparts. These obligations include:

• Designing and implementing specific processes for users to request that illegal content be removed
• Allowing users to defend their actions if they believe their content has been unfairly removed
• Full cooperation with the Member States with regards to removing illegal content and identifying specific users connected to that content  
• Offering a single point of contact and a designated legal representative 
• Providing details of their content moderation processes, including algorithmic decisions 
• Openly publishing details of removal requests from third parties or removals due to voluntary monitoring 

New obligations that apply specifically to online platforms include:

• Creating internal handling systems to manage both the removal of illegal content and the suspension or termination of services (including user accounts)
• Full cooperation with dispute resolution services, including mediation 
• Preferential responses to items flagged by trusted users
• Temporary suspension of users repeatedly posting illegal content 
• Allowing full traceability of 
• Identifying adverts posted on the platform, including the parameters used to determine which users receive which adverts

Online platforms that are also classed as gatekeepers will be subject to some additional obligations, including annual audits, risk analysis, mitigation measures, defining the parameters used within their recommender systems, and the appointment of a compliance officer. 

Fines for Non-Compliance 

In the case of the DSA, penalties for non-compliance have been suggested at up to 6% of worldwide annual turnover. 

European Digital Regulations Aim to Make the Internet a Safer Place 

Together, the DMA and DSA are forging a path to create a safer digital space in Europe, where users’ fundamental rights are protected. These acts are also designed to help establish a level playing field for businesses, no matter their size or market share. 

While the EU Member States have generally welcomed these acts, there is still a mountain to climb before they’re officially put into action. But given the wide-reaching implications — 

It’s important to be informed and aware when strategizing your SMS marketing efforts across the EU.

Automated SMS marketing has arrived! 

Act-On customers now have convenient, easy-to-use access to the most engaging digital marketing channel in existence with our brand new automated SMS marketing feature. Marketers are always looking for new ways to connect with their audience, and now Act-On customers can leverage this channel to supplement and augment their communication strategies.

Get the Best Automated SMS Marketing Experience With Act-On

Our automated SMS marketing feature is not a bolt-on solution to add to a Franken-stack. This feature is a built-in solution that provides a seamless experience, powerful segmentation, and in-depth reporting. 

Unlike any other vendor, Act-On allows you to schedule SMS messaging within your automated programs, complementing and amplifying your existing outbound communications strategy. You can also send unscheduled behaviorally triggered SMS messages when the iron is hot. Again, no other marketing automation vendor empowers marketers to leverage situational SMS marketing in real-time. 

Our solution is as intuitive as it is easy-to-use, giving marketers the ability to compose and preview messages in mobile form factors, shorten links, track links, capture behaviors and responses, and generate granular or comprehensive reporting for strategic SMS marketing development. You can even toggle back and forth between your automated email programs and your automated SMS marketing, allowing you to deliver the perfect message on the proper channel when it matters most.

“Our industry-leading SMS automated marketing product is all about improving customer experience and allowing marketers to send messages to customers about things important to their day-to-day lives,” said David Greenberg, chief marketing and product officer at Act-On. “With this new solution we aren’t simply checking a box and allowing our customers to send mobile alerts or spam. We are providing growth-minded marketers the keys to an entirely new automation strategy to reach their audiences.” 

Why You Should Include SMS in Your Marketing Arsenal

When you absolutely must connect with your target audience, automated SMS marketing is tough to beat. Automated SMS marketing represents a highly integrated channel that supports all of your messaging workflows, bridges communication gaps, and helps you build and improve relationships. With engagement rates above 90%, SMS gives marketers the opportunity to deliver timely, direct, and relevant communications with willing recipients. 

Marketers are always seeking new personalized communication methods that go beyond traditional digital channels like email, social, and web. Automated SMS marketing can serve as that new tactic to help you deliver relevant, data-driven messages no matter where your audience is in their buying journey — and the numbers don’t lie.

• Analysts report open rates of better than 95%
• Over 90% of SMS communications are read within three minutes of receipt
• Greater than 40% click-through rates
• 97% of adults text weekly 
• Americans are twice as likely to text than call

And SMS marketing communications can reach your recipients even when they don’t have an internet connection, giving you nearly constant access to your target audience!

Automated SMS Marketing Use Cases

SMS marketing has unlimited potential for B2B and B2C applications across every industry. Proven effective use cases include:

Reinforcing a Positive Customer Experience — Customer comms that build trust and loyalty 

• After hotel check-ins, send confirmations with floor plans, schedules (for events/restaurants), in-hotel and local restaurants, and other local info 
• Newly purchased product info and links to learn more or view associated and recommended items 
• Engage customers in fun promotions, games, and sweepstakes 
• Send follow-up survey to gauge your performance and improve over time

Alerts and Notifications — Deliver helpful information in real-time for the best possible experience 

• In-venue notifications in the moment… “Go to Gate E for the shortest line” 
• Critical system outages 
• Appointment/event notifications

Promotional Opportunities — Profile and behavioral triggered opportunities 

• Product promotions and releases, relevant coupons, flash sales 
• Available job positions 
• Promotions based on purchase history

This list only scratches the surface of what’s possible with SMS. To learn more about the most innovative automated SMS marketing use cases, please click here to speak with one of our marketing automation experts.

SMS Best Practices to Ensure Success

SMS offers a lot of opportunities, but there are important rules and guidelines that are important to understand and follow — both at the regulatory level and in terms of customer expectations and best practices.

Current regulations dictate:

• Express written consent to receive SMS automated marketing prior to receiving the first message
• Predefining SMS messaging topics, messaging triggers, and frequency
• Potential fees associated with any text messaging 
• Confirming enrollment and sharing data privacy and opt-out details 

In addition to the legal guidelines involved, here are a few best practices for SMS marketing to follow:

• Providing clear examples of the type of content recipients should expect
• Clearly informing recipients before changing the messaging types and criteria
• Sending SMS only within business hours, and never sending business-related content on holidays
• Providing occasional opt-out opportunities at regular intervals

There are also expectations for what not to do to ensure positive experiences and results. These are essentially based on being a good SMS citizen: 

• Many consumers are gradually adapting to SMS as a marketing channel, so tread carefully and don’t overdo it
• SMS carriers and your customers may block you if you abuse the channel, so establish a regular cadence and ramp up slowly
• Your customers may be upset if you reach out with irrelevant or poorly timed messages, so personalize your communications and content based on interests and engagement

Reach Out Today to Learn More About Act-On Automated SMS Marketing!

Automated SMS marketing from Act-On is the future of personalizing the customer experience. This new channel opens up a world of possibilities, empowering you to deepen relationships and drive new and repeat business. When paired with marketing automation as part of a full-scale omnichannel digital strategy, SMS can broaden your reach and extend existing relationships!

To learn more about our new automated SMS marketing feature, please book a demo with one of our marketing automation experts today. Or, if you’d rather experience the Act-On growth marketing automation platform at your own pace, we’d love for you to take our interactive product tour. Regardless of your marketing journey, we’re excited to hear from you soon and help you explore the next great marketing channel with Act-On.

Over the last ten months, we have enjoyed a steady pace of product innovation — which includes our new Automated Journey Builder, Transactional Event-Triggered Emailing, and Zoom Webinar integration. With this funding, we are reaffirming our commitment to our customers and have a clear roadmap for the future.

There are so many people who have been instrumental in this process, but first and foremost, I want to thank all of our existing customers. We would not be in this position without your support, and we hope you are as thrilled about this news as we are. Our mission is to help you achieve your goals, and this financing will help us make the Act-On you know and love that much more powerful and accessible. You will be hearing more from us in the coming days and weeks, but feel free to reach out to learn more.

I would also like to share my appreciation to our amazing board members and investors for their trust, perspective, and due diligence in orchestrating this funding — including:

• U.S. Venture Partners (USVP)
• Technology Crossover Ventures (TCV)
• Norwest Venture Partners
• Voyager Capital
• Beedie Capital
• Raghu Raghavan, our founder

Thank you again for your belief in our company, our brand, and our platform. We’re looking forward to leveraging this generous investment and continuing Act-On’s rich tradition of excellence. 

Finally, to all of our employees, I am truly grateful to all of you for the hard work, commitment, and creativity you exhibit each and every day. You are the lifeblood of this organization, and I speak for the entire executive team when I say how honored I am to work with such an accomplished group of professionals as we continue to build the best marketing automation solution on the market! 

Act-On is known for helping marketers deliver amazing experiences across the customer lifecycle, and this investment gives all of us the ability to help our customers continue to grow their own way. This funding will generate Act-On’s customer and revenue growth by continuing our strong product innovation and expanding our go-to-market activities. As we continue to improve our platform, we are reinforcing our commitment to our customers and solidifying our status as the best growth marketing automation platform on the market.

In addition to specific product enhancements, we will be using this funding to strengthen our partner ecosystems with new integrations, new providers, and new channel relationships. And since modern marketers are laser-focused on authentic brand experiences that extend the customer lifecycle, we will be developing more valuable post-sales experiences for our customers to help them drive better product adoption and genuine brand loyalty. 

To further maximize the value of this significant investment, we are looking to attract great talent to work on these exciting projects — whether in our headquarters in Portland or elsewhere. We’re excited to continue to build our team and have already posted more than 20 new positions. We are especially focused on continuing to build our product and engineering resources and are looking to speak with enthusiastic and qualified professionals in these fields. If you or someone you know might be interested, please review our available positions here.

If you would like to learn more about how this funding impacts our upcoming product roadmap and platform innovation, please click here to speak with one of our growth marketing automation experts.

For additional press inquiries, please contact Dana Stein at act-on@matternow.com. We would be happy to delve deeper into the particulars of this exciting announcement.

In June, we have some exciting announcements about how we’re making our platform easier to use, more powerful, and more effective for our customers.

Here’s a Little Hint

At Act-On, our team envisions a world where the value of marketing is clear and celebrated. Our mission is to bring the power of technology to marketers of all skillsets and experience levels who aspire to engage with their audiences authentically across the entire customer lifecycle — and beyond!

As customer behaviors and expectations continue to dictate the landscape and with business expectations always on the rise, marketers need tools that help them evolve their strategies and deliver highly personalized customer experiences in new and exciting ways.

What Do Marketers Want?

Marketers want solutions that allow them to engage with modern consumers, adapt and optimize according to behavioral data, and react with agility to optimize in real-time. They want the ability to exceed expectations, deliver high-impact results, and get the job done effectively and efficiently. And they want tools that enable greater collaboration and help them hone their skills as professionals.

Sheesh… We’ve already said too much. 

Sign up today to receive weekly updates with valuable information and be the first to know when we unveil the big reveal next month.

We can’t wait to share it with you… We know you’re going to love it!

On January 1, the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) went into effect, giving California residents significantly more control over how companies collect and use their personal data. Meanwhile, businesses are now required to be far more transparent about how they’re collecting, sharing, and using consumer data and information — and are prohibited from selling customer data without their consent. If they fail to do so, they could be subject to crippling penalties.

Whether you’re a California resident or a company that does business with California consumers, this new law likely applies to you. Despite this legislation being passed in 2018, a poll conducted in August of 2019 found that 56% of businesses felt they would not be fully prepared for these new rules and regulations. So, we wanted to write this blog to give you the information and resources you need to be compliant with the CCPA, avoid substantial fines, and execute more successful inbound and outbound marketing campaigns.

Just as the CCPA is following in the footsteps of Europe’s recent GDPR legislation, many other American states will likely follow California’s lead and implement new laws of their own. So, even if your business is not currently impacted by this new legislation,  it’s important that your company adapts to the evolving landscape early on. 

Please keep reading to learn more about the CCPA, how it affects both consumers and businesses operating in California and with California residents, and what you can do to ensure marketing compliance.

Does the CCPA Apply to Me?

If you do business in California, there’s a good chance the CCPA applies to you. The CCPA applies to any business with consumers in California, any business that collects personal information from California residents, and any business that does one or more of the following:

• Achieves an annual gross revenue in excess of $25 million
• Buys, sells, or shares the personal information of more than 50,000 California residents, households, or devices
• Generates 50% of more of its income from selling consumers’ personal information

Please note that, according to the CCPA, a business is any “sole proprietorship, partnership, limited liability company, corporation, association, or other legal entity that is organized or operated for the profit or financial benefit of its shareholders or other owners.” Therefore, nonprofits and government agencies are currently exempt from CCPA provisions. But, regardless of your company’s size or structure, you’re required to comply with the CCPA if you meet the qualifications above.

If you have additional questions about whether the CCPA applies to you or your business, please follow this link to get in touch with Act-On’s Professional Services team.

 What Are the Key Elements of the CCPA?

The CCPA aims to protect how our data is collected and prevent it from being shared with or sold to third-parties. To do so, companies will now be required to:

1. Provide more stringent and prominent privacy policies on digital properties and emails
2. Include a link on the homepage of their website for consumers to opt-out of having their personal data sold

However, the CCPA is far more detailed than the two bullets above. Let’s explore some of the specifics as they relate to individuals and businesses.

CCPA for Individuals 

1. Right to Request Deletion

Consumers have the “right to deletion,” and businesses are required to direct any service provider to delete the individual’s personal information upon request. 

Act-On helps by providing an “Erase Contact” tool built into our platform for users to permanently delete contacts from all of their records. 

2. Right to Access

California residents have the right to access any personal data collected within the last 12 months. Businesses are required to respond to requests within 45 days. 

Act-On helps by providing an easy way to download a contact’s timeline related to all actions and messages received. 

3. Right to Stop Processing

Companies must provide a link on their website homepage for individuals to opt-out of all communications. 

Act-On helps by enabling standard opt-out procedures to stop all communications. 

4. Right to Stop Third-Party Transfer 

Businesses must have a link on their home page titled “Do Not Sell My Personal Information” allowing individuals to opt-out from businesses selling their personal information. 

Act-On helps by not providing information to third parties outside of what is stored in the privacy policy. 

CCPA for Businesses

1. Privacy Policy

Businesses are required to have a common-language privacy policy that explains all of the rights that customers have and the ways for California citizens to opt-out. 

2. Website Policy 

Businesses are required to include language on their website and/or mobile application that explicitly states the following (either/or):

• “Do not sell my personal information”
• “Do not sell my info” 

3. Record-Keeping Training 

Businesses are required to train all employees on logging all requests related to the CCPA for the past 24 months. 

4. Verifications

Businesses are required to verify that the individual requesting an action is who they say they are.

There are a few caveats to when and why a company is within their rights to maintain its consumers’ personal information. Businesses are allowed to keep their customers’ personal data if the information is necessary:

• To fix errors
• For the company to exercise their free speech or protect other consumers’ right to free speech
• For the public interest
• To comply with laws and policies

What Are the Penalties for CCPA Non-Compliance?

In order to properly enforce this new legislation, the penalties for non-compliance with the CCPA are severe. All violators are subject to significant fines, loss of reputation, and potentially fewer customers and revenue.

There are three separate ways in which these penalties will be enforced.

1. Private Enforcement: If a business knowingly and willfully sells a consumer’s data without their consent, the consumer can file a lawsuit for damages between $1,000 and $3,000. Bear in mind, these suits are for privacy losses, so there’s no requirement to show loss of property or money to be compensated.
2. Government Enforcement: If a business does not comply with CCPA guidelines within 30 days, the State’s Attorney General’s Office is expected to file suit. If another 30 days of non-compliance pass following this initial notification, the business is subject to a $7,500 fine for each infraction.
3. Consumer Enforcement: Consumers who are the victims of a security breach are eligible to receive between $100 and $750 per incident — and potentially more if a court deems additional relief is appropriate. Depending on the scope of the potential breach, businesses could easily be fined millions of dollars.

Maintain CCPA Compliance With Act-On

At Act-On, we’re dedicated to helping all of our customers maintain compliance with all data privacy laws and legislation. While we are not in a position to legally advise you regarding your CCPA obligations, we are willing to provide insight into how to adapt your approach to the CCPA using our platform and services. Still, CCPA compliance is a shared responsibility, so you should understand the obligations your business faces.

Our customers leverage the Act-On platform to meet their CCPA requirements through:

• Capturing consent for web tracking
• Capturing consent through double opt-ins for outbound communications
• Managing withdrawals and opt-outs through CRM integration

Additionally, our contact report functionality allows all of our users to print a PDF that contains all activity information for every contact on their list.

If you’re interested in learning more about the CCPA, please contact one of our knowledgeable marketing automation experts to schedule a demo of how our platform helps marketers remain compliant and deliver successful marketing campaigns.

The numbers speak for themselves. 

• Brand messages have a 561% higher reach when shared by an employee rather than company accounts
• Collectively, employees’ social networks are 10 times larger than corporates’
• Employee posts generate 800% more engagement than corporate posts — and convert 700% more leads

Now, before you start barking at your co-workers to start sharing every single piece of branded content, gather key stakeholders to develop the purpose and strategy behind this new initiative. Today, we’re going to learn how to do just that in order to create an effective social media employee advocacy program that:

1. Excites and activates your employees
2. Builds credibility and authenticity for both employees and the organization

Let’s learn how!

What Is Social Media Employee Advocacy?

Social media employee advocacy is when a company empowers their workers to promote their brand on social media while also positioning themselves as thought leaders within their peer group and industry. Typically, employee advocates will post things to their social media accounts like:

• Company, team, customer, or individual recognition (awards, features, mentions)
• Workplace culture and team involvement (i.e. volunteering,  office celebration)
• Event attendance or exhibition
• Customer spotlights
• Service or product announcement/update
• Relevant thought leadership — whether from the company blog, industry influencer, customer use case, etc.
• Career opportunities at the company

When employees share news, insights, and shout-outs related to their company, they’re not only cultivating brand awareness on behalf of their employer, they’re also nurturing credibility based on who they are as professionals. (This is especially important for sales professionals — more on that shortly.)

Employee advocacy on social media represents authentic engagement, interest, and professional development in their expertise — not a promotional sounding board for the business. We are all invested in our careers, and part of establishing our personal brand is how we present ourselves on social media. Employee advocacy should amplify this and empower individuals to act as knowledgeable and engaged professionals rather than forcing people to mindlessly copy and paste sales pitches that only serve the company. When done right, social media employee advocacy is a win-win for employees and organizations alike. The employee is able to bolster their personal brand as a professional while the company gains cost-effective brand awareness to fresh audiences, which leads to increased site traffic, conversions, revenue, and even new talent acquisition!

How to Kickstart Your Employee Advocacy Program

Implementing an employee advocacy program is a marathon — not a sprint. Like I mentioned above, establishing a strategy and purpose early on is essential for gaining maximum interest and involvement. So, without further ado, here’s a 4-step guide for launching your employee advocacy program:

1. Figure out your goals and objectives for your social media employee advocacy program — and be specific. What metrics are you measuring? What do you want to accomplish (other than something vague like “get more brand awareness”)? How does this play into your overall social media strategy? You’ll want to have a clear understanding of what you and the company expect for this employee advocacy program before jumping into launch-mode.
2. Become familiar with the social media tool you’ll be using to promote employee advocacy so that you can help onboard your peers. Take advantage of any training resources at your disposal, and work with your account manager/customer success representative to get the most out of its functionality. This will help you communicate how-to’s and also recognize any limitations within the platform.
3. Determine which department will have the greatest impact and benefit the most as social media employee advocates (*HINT: It’s Sales), train them how to use the software, and develop a regular sharing cadence. Once this team is fully onboarded and participating, move to other impactful departments, such as your leadership and marketing teams.

(Why Sales? Because their role and methodology has completely transformed within the past decade. While technology obviously plays a major role in closing the deal, authentic connections remain the biggest factor in any business relationship. Engaging on social with a salesperson is fun and personal than a cold call, and it creates a foundation for those initial sales calls because the prospect will now recognize the name and brand. It’s no surprise that sales professionals who use social media in their daily activities achieve 78% more sales than those who don’t, right?)

4. Create social media content that is authentic and valuable for customers and employees alike. Your staff wants to grow as professionals and become recognized as experts in their field, and sharing useful insights with their industry peers and colleagues helps them do both. 

As you write your social copy, try to gain a little perspective. Account managers want to celebrate customer success rather than tout how your company helped them achieve those wins. Engineering departments are proud of achieving great positioning in product reports and are eager to share their accomplishments. Sales loves to serve as a credible and educational resource for hot leads, which means they might want to share engaging thought leadership content. Social posts that resonate with more employees will prompt more shares, clicks, engagement, and, ultimately, revenue.

The Do’s and One Big Don’t of Employee Advocacy

Do incorporate the employee advocacy program into onboarding for all new team members. This includes setting them up to use the platform successfully and reviewing company policies as they relate to social media.

Do use a social media tool with a good employee advocacy feature (like Act-On’s Social Media Advocacy Tool)

Do occasionally encourage friendly competition — especially if there’s a certain event, go-to-market, or piece of content to emphasize. 

Do create content that appeals to different departments outside of Marketing and Sales. If you aren’t sure what they like to share and engage with, ask!

Do set up notification emails for your employee advocates to alert them whenever you post new messages. (Bonus if they can directly share the post from the email!)

Don’t require employees to post to social media. Employee social media accounts are their own, and they should be able to decide if and what they want to share. Some people aren’t active on social media and others are particular about keeping work and personal completely separate — and that’s okay. Encourage your employees to participate, but never make it mandatory.

Improve Your Social Media Employee Advocacy With Act-On’s Advanced Social Media Module

Social media can be a tough nut to crack, especially for smaller B2B companies, which is why employee advocacy is such an important part of any successful social media strategy. If you’re ready to take your social media marketing game to the next level, you should reach out to one of our digital marketing experts to learn more about Act-On’s Advanced Social Media Module.

For your insurance company to thrive in this competitive environment, you have to offer customers excellent pricing and convince them that your offerings provide the most protection and value. Doing that becomes even harder when you consider that insurance is often something that many customers invest in because they are required to — not because they want to. 

While securing more new customers can definitely help insurance companies grow revenue, tapping into your current customer base can be just as impactful to your bottom line. 

Your customers’ lives are changing every day, and with that comes the need for more and different types of coverage. For example, a married couple currently investing in auto insurance may need coverage for their teen driver at a later time. Or, a customer who is currently renting but plans to buy a house in a few years might benefit from learning about homeowner’s insurance options. No matter what type of insurance you sell, there’s always an opportunity to offer your existing customer base something new. 

Of course, targeting customers in this way is easier said than done when you’re struggling just to get today’s emails created, approved, and to the inbox. What many insurance marketers fail to realize, however, is that marketing technology has significantly evolved and improved in a way that could help them stay one step ahead of their customers (instead of trying to keep up with them). Today, marketing automation can not only help us execute our marketing efforts efficiently and at scale, but it can also enable us to gather useful insights, track customer behavior, and deliver more customized messaging to attract great prospects, close more deals, and measure our progress to improve over time.

Interested in learning more about how marketing automation can help you retain current customers and identify and activate opportunities for growth? Keep reading to learn critical tips on how insurance marketers can leverage marketing automation to build customer loyalty and drive ROI.

Build Long-Lasting Relationships Through Nurture Campaigns

One of the biggest mistakes you can make as an insurance marketer is to let your customers forget who you are until they absolutely need you or the time to renew their policy comes around. If your goal is to promote retention and growth, you have to inspire trust and confidence in your customers far before these events happen. To do so, you have to reach out to them on a regular basis with content that they will find useful and will encourage them to see the value of continuing to do business with you in the future. 

Emailing customers once a month (or even quarterly) gives you an opportunity to check in to see how they’re doing, remind them of the benefits attached to their policy, and reassure them that you’ll be there to help if and when they need new or additional coverage. This is also a great opportunity to make your brand memorable by showing them what makes you stand out from your competitors. The more targeted you get with these types of communications, the better chance you’ll have of driving engagement and seeing results.

While targeting customers based on their current policy, interests, and needs may seem like a huge load to tackle, marketing automation makes this process simple through automated nurture campaigns and list segmentation. These capabilities enable you to automatically group customers based on a variety of factors and enter them into relevant campaigns that match their needs and interests. Delivering content and news that is relevant to them will motivate them to take notice, engage with your brand, and promote loyalty. 

Evaluate Customer Satisfaction Through Lead Scoring

I hate to break it to you, but if a customer is unhappy once the time to renew comes around, chances are any attempts you make to keep their business are likely a lost cause. The best way to prevent this from happening is by remedying the situation before customers completely lose trust in you and decide to leave you for a competitor. Unfortunately, many insurance companies lose several customers a year without even knowing they were unhappy or having the opportunity to do something about it. 

With marketing automation, that no longer has to be the case. Features such as lead scoring can help you keep track of customer behavior and engagement to better gauge their sentiment. In this model, customers who regularly open your emails, log into their portal, give you high ratings, and perform any other positive actions, will accrue points that indicate their level of satisfaction. In turn, customers who give you low ratings and rarely engage with any type of communication will receive a lower score, which will indicate that it’s time to take action to remedy the situation 

Leveraging lead scoring to evaluate the overall satisfaction of each policyholder helps you be more proactive with your marketing efforts. You can continue to engage customers who are happy and show the ones who aren’t as satisfied a little more love in order to win them over. You can also use this information to anticipate renewals and improve your ability to forecast future profits for your organization. 

Anticipate What Your Customers Want and Need to Deliver Personalized Recommendations

A huge advantage of marketing automation is that it grants you access to a wide array of insights that enable you to get to know your current customers on a more personal level, improving your ability to deliver what they want and anticipate what they need. These insights can help you provide relevant content that match their current needs and can also empower you to kick things up a notch by identifying opportunities to up-sell and cross-sell. 

Doing this is as simple as offering your current customers opportunities to engage with content that will help you determine whether they could benefit from another one of your insurance products in the future. For example, if a customer clicks on an article on your blog entitled “10 Things to Look for When Buying a Home” and downloads an eBook called “A 5-Step Guide for Purchasing Your First Home,” you can deduce that they’ll probably take the leap into homeownership within the next year or two. 

In anticipation of this, you can begin marketing related products to them before they even know they need them. Enter customers into a related nurturing campaign that will gradually encourage them to increase their coverage and inform them of any additional products that will benefit them in the future. This way, you’ll be top-of-mind when they’re finally ready to make a purchasing decision. 

Make Sure to Choose a Vendor That Sets You Up for Success

Although we’ve outlined the many benefits of marketing automation, we haven’t touched upon the reason why many insurance marketers aren’t willing to make the investment — change is hard, and new technology isn’t always intuitive. That’s why choosing a vendor that provides you a platform that is easy to use and the resources you need to reap the full benefits of marketing automation is essential to your success. 

At Act-On, we completely understand this immense barrier keeping many insurers from taking the leap into the world of marketing automation. That is why we’re dedicated to making marketing automation accessible to teams of all sizes through a platform that is easy to use, top-notch customer support, and strategic guidance with Marketing as a Service solutions like Act-On Accelerate.

If you’d like to learn more about how marketing automation can help you build insurance customer loyalty, we invite you to download our eBook, Optimize the Customer Journey for Improved Retention and Growth (also linked below). In this helpful resource, you’ll learn strategies for engaging your current customer base and how to use marketing automation to improve and increase your marketing efforts so much easier. 

Your employees will ultimately help you get to where you want to be, so encouraging them to commit to your cause and remain loyal to your organization plays a huge role in motivating them to go above and beyond to get you the results you want. In fact, a study by Gallup found that teams with high engagement demonstrate a 21% increase in profitability (1). Plus, keeping your employees satisfied often leads to unintended benefits such as high employee retention, which will save you money in the long run.

An uninspiring workplace, in turn, can negatively impact your reputation in the community, lead to poor employee performance, and decrease your bottom line. Furthermore, if your prospective customers get word of your poor company culture, this can cause concern about your employee retention rates and your ability to deliver a great product or service in the future.

Still not convinced that developing strong values and a positive work environment can have a huge impact on your overall success? These tips will encourage employee engagement and satisfaction — and get you the type of results you crave. 

Survey Employees to Learn What Matters to Them

An easy way to figure out what your employees value and how they perceive your brand is by simply asking them. Send out an initial survey form asking your employees to identify 3-5 values that are important to them in their current role. Using these responses, pick out the top 20 keywords/themes and send out a second survey to further narrow down your list.

After you’ve gathered employee responses from your second survey, have your leadership team or an appointed committee meet to analyze and interpret these results. From this list, pick 4-5 keywords or themes that will represent your company values and develop a strategy of how you will implement them into your work moving forward. 

Ask Your Employees for Feedback

Transforming your workplace and cultivating strong company values isn’t something that will happen overnight. Occasionally, you might wonder if your efforts are having any impact at all. The reality is that some of the strategies you implement to promote this change will work better than others, and it’s up to you to figure out where it’s best to invest your time and effort.

A quick and easy way to determine what is resonating with your employees is by asking them to give you feedback through an NPS survey. At Act-On, we use AskNicely to survey both employees and customers about how we’re doing and how we can improve. Asking our employees to rate and provide feedback shows them that we care about meeting them where they’re at, and the insights they provide give us a better idea of how we can do that. 

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Identify How Each Department Contributes to Your Mission and Vision

Naming a few values that you feel apply to the work of your organization is not enough to promote a healthy and thriving work environment. If you truly want to gain buy-in for your new values, you have to encourage your employees to play a part in helping you realize those goals.

To do this, we suggest encouraging each of your teams to set apart some time to discuss how they see your company values reflected in their work, as well as what changes they think they can make to further promote them. From time to time, ask them to evaluate how they’re doing in terms of applying those concepts to their work and identify any areas for improvement. This practice will encourage your employees to feel connected to your company values and make them accountable for doing their part in promoting them across the organization.

Keep the Momentum Going with a Strong Internal Communications Strategy

One of the biggest contributors to dissatisfied, disconnected employees is that they feel as if they’re working in the silos. If you want to ensure your employees are happy and engaged, practicing good communication and keeping them in the know is crucial.

An easy way to do that is by implementing a monthly newsletter featuring company news and topics channeling organizational values that are of interest to your employees. If you use Act-On’s marketing automation, you can take your efforts a step further to track engagement and perform A/B testing to see what kind of content is resonating best with your employees — and then optimize your efforts accordingly.

The practical tips above will help remind your employees what you company culture is all about, why they should be proud to be part of your organization, and improve overall engagement. Let us know if you plan to implement any of these practices at your organization or if you have any activities that have served you well in the past.