Did you know that marketing automation can boost sales productivity by 14.5%? Knowing that selling a product or service is the ultimate goal of every business, this figure sounds quite promising.
Moreover, marketing automation can save you from doing all those repetitive tasks associated with social media, emails, and other aspects of online marketing.
As a logical result of technological advancements and the ever-present human drive to be more productive, marketing automation tools are becoming increasingly popular. Ideally, they can help you grow your business by doing what you hate doing and allowing you to focus on things that truly matter.
Below is a list of the best seven tools for marketing automation that you should start using today. Be aware though: it's not because you know the top marketing automation tools that you will be able to leverage their power. Working with a marketing automation specialist can help you get the most of those tools.
Moreover, marketing automation can save you from doing all those repetitive tasks associated with social media, emails, and other aspects of online marketing.
As a logical result of technological advancements and the ever-present human drive to be more productive, marketing automation tools are becoming increasingly popular. Ideally, they can help you grow your business by doing what you hate doing and allowing you to focus on things that truly matter.
Below is a list of the best seven tools for marketing automation that you should start using today. Be aware though: it's not because you know the top marketing automation tools that you will be able to leverage their power. Working with a marketing automation specialist can help you get the most of those tools.
#1 BuzzSumo – Best for Content Research
You have just picked a domain name, built your website, and now you are ready to research industry-relevant content. So, where should you start?
BuzzSumo is an online tool that enables you to learn what content is popular by topic or on any website. It helps you find out what kind of content people search for, helping you generate ideas for creating content that will outrank your competition.
BuzzSumo can help you with:
BuzzSumo is an online tool that enables you to learn what content is popular by topic or on any website. It helps you find out what kind of content people search for, helping you generate ideas for creating content that will outrank your competition.
BuzzSumo can help you with:
- Content insights
By gathering information across various social media websites, BuzzSumo gives you an insight into what your prospective customers are talking about. In addition, it analyzes where people discuss the topics of interest and how popular these topics are.- Influencer information
Influencer marketing is very hot nowadays as 49% of customers rely on influencers for product recommendations. BuzzSumo lets you discover the most popular influencers and shows who you should follow and potentially pitch in the future.- Alerts
If you want to know when relevant content is posted or updated across the web, you can set up keyword alerts. That way, you will know who published the post and have a better idea of what direction you should take when it comes to your content strategy.- Competition analysis
In internet marketing, your competition can do you much harm. Luckily, you can also learn a lot from your competition. This tool shows you what your competitors do, what works for them (or doesn’t), helping you avoid the same mistakes that they have made and saving you time and effort.
#2 Hootsuite - Best for Social Media
No matter how great it is, content cannot thrive on its own. It needs to be promoted across various social media networks on a regular basis, and that is exactly where Hootsuite enters the stage.
Hootsuite is hands down one of the most advanced social media marketing automation tools. It integrates with over 35 social media platforms, including the following:
- Instagram
- Facebook
- Twitter
- Pinterest
- YouTube
- LinkedIn
In addition, this tool allows you to use MailChimp, Flickr, and other services through different extensions and integrations.
The key features of Hootsuite include:
Hootsuite is hands down one of the most advanced social media marketing automation tools. It integrates with over 35 social media platforms, including the following:
- YouTube
In addition, this tool allows you to use MailChimp, Flickr, and other services through different extensions and integrations.
The key features of Hootsuite include:
- Automated content scheduling
The Hootsuite tool helps you keep your social presence active by scheduling posts across all of your social media accounts at a specified time. This feature helps with consistency on social media and saves you time, increasing both your reach and productivity.- Social engagement and content creation
Hootsuite aggregates relevant content that you can engage with or use as inspiration for the creation of your future content. With this tool, you are able to post pre-approved content stored in your cloud file service. Moreover, it makes searching, tagging, and viewing usage stats incredibly simple.- Analytics
In internet marketing, data is crucial. Hootsuite can help you analyze your social media campaign performance through detailed reporting and learn what works best for your audience. Also, you can measure conversions by social channel as well as separate ROI between owned and paid media.- Monitoring
This social media automation tool is great for finding and filtering conversations by keyword, hashtag, and location. This gives you insights into what customers think about your industry, competitors, and most importantly, your brand. Plus, you can do all of this in multiple languages.
#3 GMass – Best for Email Marketing
Email marketing is definitely one of the most effective ways to connect with your customers, close more sales, and increase your profit.
Therefore, email marketing automation is among the most widely used types of automation in the world of online marketing. If you use Gmail for sending out your emails, then GMass is definitely an outreach automation tool that you should try.
This useful tool allows you to:
- send mail merge campaigns with automatic follow-up emails in Gmail
- use Google Sheets columns to send a personalized mass email
- schedule and personalize your emails
- see reports on how many people opened, clicked, replied, and bounced
- use Gmail’s search feature to find messages that contain recipients to whom you want to send a message
- send emails either as new messages or as replies to the last thread with each recipient, which helps you easily improve email personalization
- send automatic follow-up emails sequentially
- break Gmail’s sending limits by auto-sending email campaigns to up to 10,000 recipients over multiple days
Email marketing is one of the easiest digital marketing channels to automate and will bring you outstanding ROI. To automate your lead generation strategy, do not hesitate to use email marketing automation.
Therefore, email marketing automation is among the most widely used types of automation in the world of online marketing. If you use Gmail for sending out your emails, then GMass is definitely an outreach automation tool that you should try.
This useful tool allows you to:
- send mail merge campaigns with automatic follow-up emails in Gmail
- use Google Sheets columns to send a personalized mass email
- schedule and personalize your emails
- see reports on how many people opened, clicked, replied, and bounced
- use Gmail’s search feature to find messages that contain recipients to whom you want to send a message
- send emails either as new messages or as replies to the last thread with each recipient, which helps you easily improve email personalization
- send automatic follow-up emails sequentially
- break Gmail’s sending limits by auto-sending email campaigns to up to 10,000 recipients over multiple days
Email marketing is one of the easiest digital marketing channels to automate and will bring you outstanding ROI. To automate your lead generation strategy, do not hesitate to use email marketing automation.
#4 Traffic Booster – Best for Google AdWords
Due to the AI technology that Traffic Booster uses, it is a perfect tool for automating your Google AdWords campaign.
This advertising automation tool will help you with Google shopping ads, dynamic remarketing, and customized search. That way, you will pay only for relevant customers, expose previous visitors to your products they have already viewed, as well as direct them to your most relevant products based on their search queries.
Traffic Booster key features include:
- smart algorithm that attracts relevant visitors and targeted leads to your online store
- automatic bid optimizer that finds the most cost-effective bid for your campaigns in real time
- driving geo-targeted traffic to your website
- dynamic keywords, ads, categories, and product pages that adjust to the search queries in real time
- machine learning that finds the most effective advertising method for your online store
This advertising automation tool will help you with Google shopping ads, dynamic remarketing, and customized search. That way, you will pay only for relevant customers, expose previous visitors to your products they have already viewed, as well as direct them to your most relevant products based on their search queries.
Traffic Booster key features include:
- smart algorithm that attracts relevant visitors and targeted leads to your online store
- automatic bid optimizer that finds the most cost-effective bid for your campaigns in real time
- driving geo-targeted traffic to your website
- dynamic keywords, ads, categories, and product pages that adjust to the search queries in real time
- machine learning that finds the most effective advertising method for your online store
#5 Pardot – Best for Sales Teams
Empowering sales and closing more deals is a dream of every sales team. Fortunately, there are some tools out there that turn your sales dreams into reality.
Pardot is a tool developed by the Salesforce team, which says enough. Giving you relevant insights from the Salesforce CRM, this software allows you to create intelligent and targeted campaigns, generating fresh leads and speeding your sales cycle.
In addition, Pardot helps you visualize and understand your campaign performance, thus offering a better picture of the customer experience. That way, you can see where you excel as well as what you can improve before launching your next campaign.
If you want to simplify your lead management process and make use of smarter lead generation, Pardot can do wonders by automating and segmenting these tasks for you. It will help you increase engagement, sell faster, and nurture your leads.
Finally, this marketing automation tool provides advanced marketing analytics to help you get the most out of your marketing and sales efforts. It allows you to explore your data, get insights into your marketing performance, and take data-driven actions quickly.
Pardot is a tool developed by the Salesforce team, which says enough. Giving you relevant insights from the Salesforce CRM, this software allows you to create intelligent and targeted campaigns, generating fresh leads and speeding your sales cycle.
In addition, Pardot helps you visualize and understand your campaign performance, thus offering a better picture of the customer experience. That way, you can see where you excel as well as what you can improve before launching your next campaign.
If you want to simplify your lead management process and make use of smarter lead generation, Pardot can do wonders by automating and segmenting these tasks for you. It will help you increase engagement, sell faster, and nurture your leads.
Finally, this marketing automation tool provides advanced marketing analytics to help you get the most out of your marketing and sales efforts. It allows you to explore your data, get insights into your marketing performance, and take data-driven actions quickly.
#6 HubSpot – Best for CRM Automation
HubSpot’s tool is quite unique on this list for the simple reason that it is free. It is a valuable CRM automation tool that manages your pipeline, giving your sales team more efficiency.
HubSpot automation tool helps you manage your pipeline with total visibility. With it, you can log activities automatically, see all information about a contact in one place, as well as chat with your prospects and customers in real time.
More specifically, this tool is great for:
- sending out personalized email sequences
- creating and measuring email templates
- getting real-time notifications
- populating contact lists automatically
- booking more meetings
HubSpot automation tool helps you manage your pipeline with total visibility. With it, you can log activities automatically, see all information about a contact in one place, as well as chat with your prospects and customers in real time.
More specifically, this tool is great for:
- sending out personalized email sequences
- creating and measuring email templates
- getting real-time notifications
- populating contact lists automatically
- booking more meetings
#7 Zapier – Best for App Connection
Finally, even though it is not a marketing automation tool per se, Zapier deserves to be on this list because it lets you connect your apps in order to automate your workflow.
The software moves information between user web apps automatically so you can focus on what really matters. In addition, Zapier gives you access to task history, import and export via Google Sheets, dashboards, connected accounts, and so forth.
It allows you to link your web pages with only a few clicks, pass information between your apps with workflows called Zaps, and build processes without any coding.
With Zapier, you can start workflows from any app by picking a trigger to start your Zap, save time by completing tasks automatically, and develop an idea into a workflow in a matter of minutes by using the simple, fill-in-the-blank setup.
Finally, Zapier easily integrates with over 1,000 apps, including:
- Gmail
- Google Drive
- Microsoft Office 365
- Twitter
- Facebook
- Instagram
- YouTube
- Slack
- Trello
- Asana
- MailChimp
These seamless integrations will allow you to implement and use Zapier without the need to install anything or modify your software.
The software moves information between user web apps automatically so you can focus on what really matters. In addition, Zapier gives you access to task history, import and export via Google Sheets, dashboards, connected accounts, and so forth.
It allows you to link your web pages with only a few clicks, pass information between your apps with workflows called Zaps, and build processes without any coding.
With Zapier, you can start workflows from any app by picking a trigger to start your Zap, save time by completing tasks automatically, and develop an idea into a workflow in a matter of minutes by using the simple, fill-in-the-blank setup.
Finally, Zapier easily integrates with over 1,000 apps, including:
- Gmail
- Google Drive
- Microsoft Office 365
- YouTube
- Slack
- Trello
- Asana
- MailChimp
These seamless integrations will allow you to implement and use Zapier without the need to install anything or modify your software.
So, how do you leverage marketing automation and grow your business with these tools?
There you go, the best seven marketing automation tools to help you accelerate and simplify your marketing activities while saving time. Thanks to marketing automation, you'll be able to shorten your sales cycle. By connecting the dots between marketing automation and lead generation, you'll increase your sales. From content research and social media to boosting your sales team’s efficiency and automating your workflow, each of these applications will have its own place in your day-to-day tasks.Automating your digital marketing strategy isn't as complicated as it seems. However, one thing you should always be aware of is that automation can do more harm than good if you overuse it. Software tools are faster than humans but they still can’t come close to humans in some aspects, especially when it comes to personalization.
Therefore, make sure to keep your marketing automation tools in check and never forget to personalize the communication with your audience. If you’re looking for more tools, I recommend you check these 2 articles about the top growth hacking tools as well as the most effective SEO tools.
Growth Hackers is a top growth marketing agency helping large businesses as well as early-stage startup automate their processes and systems. How do we do it? We use online marketing strategies, growth hacks and marketing automation tools to do so. Do you want to get traffic, leads and sales automatically? Drop Growth Hackers a line now and you'll benefit from marketing automation tomorrow.
Dave Schneider
I am the founder of LessChurn, churn reduction app. In 2012 I quit my job to travel the world, and have visited over 65 countries. In my spare time, I write about SaaS and business at DaveSchneider.me.
3 Comments
What we do need to focus on is better customer experience, personalized user journey and making the interaction models more mature and intuitive. Our focus should be on the journey of adoption of marketing automation and how it is going to play out.
Hi Dave,
Thanks a lot for your article. Will test these automation tools this week.
Hi Dave, nice list of tools to automate processes! Thank you!