Marketing automation vs CRM: What is the difference?
June 18, 2021
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We have been talking about marketing automation for quite some time now, actually, we have a few blogs posts about it that we truly recommend you to check out before continuing with this one in which we talk about what is marketing automation, how it works, and the software behind this solution.
You see, the thing with this type of software solution is that it seems very similar to another automation software known as CRM, and these concepts tend to overlap with one another.
However, marketing automation software and customer relationship management software (CRM) are nothing alike and do not aim to automate the same thing, although it might seem like it at first sight.
What is marketing automation?
To understand the differences between both automation software, we need to take a look at what each one of them really is. Again, we have a blog on the blog talking about it before that you can check out here for more information.
Marketing automation simply refers to the process behind automating your marketing strategies and tools through a specific marketing software that gives you the opportunity to integrate, automate, handle and manage all of your marketing tools in one place.
It is through this solution that community managers and marketers are able to automate repetitive, time-consuming tasks such as email campaigns, social media handles, and websites, making the overall marketing strategy faster, easier and personalized for every client.
Marketing automation aims to handle marketing tactics and platforms in the hopes to integrating the marketing strategies and making them easier, attracting more leads and converting them into clients in a more organized, quick and efficient way.
To put it simply, marketing automation is the process done to automate your marketing tools and strategies and merge them into a single platform that takes care of repetitive, yet important tasks regarding your current marketing plan. This way, companies, and marketers are able to manage different processes and multifunctional campaigns through a single software in an automate way.
How does marketing automation works?
As you might have noticed by now, marketing automation relies on marketing software. It is through this software that companies are able to integrate all of their tools, platforms, and campaigns into one.
Here at Rootstack, we work with Mautic, a relatively new, powerful, marketing automation software that acts as an integration platform that provides Community Managers and marketing experts with a better way to make more meaningful connections with their customers.
Here’s in where marketing automation a CRM software begin to look alike. You see, software like Mautic has various features that make marketing automation possible, and among those features are:
- Contact profiles and tracking
- Campaign and email workflows
- Social media integration
- Landing pages
- Reports
As you can see, marketing automation software like Mautic allows you to create contact profiles to track their activities across your multi-channel marketing strategy, allowing you to gain a 360-degree view on how your strategies are playing out according to each individual client.
However, this shouldn’t be confused with the features on a CRM and the way they behave, since they are completely different, even if they both focus on leads and clients.
What is a CRM?
In short, a CRM, or Customer Relationship Management, is automation software that focuses on acting as a platform where you can place all of your client’s data in one place.
A CRM is a tool made for the salesforce team of a company, it keeps and stores their client’s data, keeping them organized and easy to visualize for anyone with access to the platform.
Customer Relationship Management tools give companies the opportunity to track every interaction ever made with a lead or a customer, monitoring their response and creating a proper way to act in the hopes of turning those leads into clients and clients into regular buyers.
What can a CRM do for you?
Rootstack has created a product called Rootnet CRM, which is actually part of a whole suite of solutions (including a CRM, Intranet and a Service Desk software), that aims to cover all the important aspects of dealing with clients.
The way our CRM does this is by its multiple different features and module, that include but aren’t limited to:
- Accounts and contact lists
- Product/services management
- Reports and data analytics
You see, through contact lists companies are able to create accounts for each lead or already existing client to keep track of every interaction and create a sales strategy that works best in any case.
Meanwhile, with the product/services management lists companies are able to monitor every product or service currently available, change their prices, offer a description and so on. All of it while the platform itself gathers useful data and returns it to you in the form of reports.
Keep in mind, this is just some of the things our CRM can do for you, if you’d like to know more, please make sure to check out our product Rootnet CRM and our help guide.
So, what are the differences between both software?
Although marketing automation software and CRM both deals with leads and clients, and they both offer you the chance to create profiles for each one, they don’t work the same way.
On one hand, Marketing automation is aimed towards community managers and marketing experts, meanwhile, a CRM is aimed towards the salesforce team of a company.
There’s also the fact a CRM focuses on incrementing sales and making the sales funnel more effective, achieving more sales than before, meanwhile, a marketing automation software focuses on reaching out to more people and nurturing those leads.
To sum things up, a CRM and a Marketing automation software should work together, since one leads to the other (which is why so many marketing software like Mautic offer you the opportunity to integrate it with your current CRM).
If you’re looking to implement either of these solutions on your own company, remember to contact us! Here at Rootstack, we have a team of expert software developers ready to help you out.