Last Updated On March 16, 2023

Salesforce Marketing Cloud: Driving in a New-Age Marketing Approach

Salesforce Marketing Cloud: Driving in a New-Age Marketing Approach
By Team TIS

Competition across markets and product categories is increasing by the hour, as the economic freeze brought about by the pandemic loosens its grip across the world. Markets are looking up as trade and commerce normalize, and businesses are now increasingly dependent on sales and marketing activities and endeavors that will give them an edge over the competition.

Right at the top of marketing solutions providers on a global scale is Salesforce, whose powerful marketing tool, the Salesforce Marketing Cloud, is designed to make marketing activities simpler and more customer-friendly. Salesforce Marketing Cloud has multiple solutions and associated tools on offer that enable marketing team members to approach and interact with customers in a highly personalized atmosphere. Salesforce Marketing Cloud not only ensures better customer loyalty but also empowers teams to have a more commanding market presence across platforms.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Features

Among the diversified tools and apps that Salesforce Marketing Cloud offers, the core services are based on social media management, customer interaction, email and advertising, as well as tools dedicated to creating and increasing relationship strength.

By using Salesforce Marketing Cloud tools, businesses worldwide are able to utilize the power of Salesforce CRM’s digital business process management ecosystem. Some of the preferred Salesforce Marketing Cloud services include Social Studio, Mobile Studio, Email Studio, Journey Studio and Interaction Studio.

Importantly, by using Salesforce Marketing Cloud, businesses will be able to automate many routine business processes and operations, be it an activity as basic as email marketing, or successfully managing priority marketing campaigns being conducted across channels.

Email Marketing: The email remains among the most preferred and trusted mode of engaging with customers and clients to put together the best possible customer journeys. The vast amount of information gathered about customer behavior and preferences can be accessed and utilized by implementing Salesforce Marketing Cloud email marketing solutions.

This Salesforce Marketing Cloud service can be built and implemented as per the needs of the business, depending on the scale of marketing outreach being planned. As a comprehensive promotional campaign, it can be used to write personalized emails, including emails that are behavior-triggered. Combined with Salesforce’s artificial intelligence (AI) customer management platforms, Salesforce Marketing Cloud email marketing solutions can enable efficient in-depth marketing campaigns.

Being probably the earliest form of digital communication, emails are instrumental in building and maintaining lasting customer relationships. The high level of personalization makes it easy for businesses to build meaningful marketing campaigns. Emails sent can now take into consideration the customer’s key attributes, such as location and profile.

The Customer Journey: Implementation of Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions can not only make it easier for businesses to reach out to customers but also help them navigate the buying process easily. The use of customer relationship management (CRM) data enables marketing teams to provide better satisfaction to customers.

The CRM data is made available in real-time to marketing team members seamlessly at any location and on any device. Apart from the benefits to the organization, Salesforce Marketing Cloud tools also lighten the load on marketing teams.

Understanding customer choices: As mentioned earlier, Salesforce Marketing Cloud can make it possible to have customer-related data available in one place, which can be accessed by marketing team members as and when required. The marketing cloud dashboard feature makes this data available on screen, and marketing representatives can choose from this data and infer customer choices. This gives them the edge to create a marketing plan that engages with the customer comprehensively.

Cloud-based service: The Salesforce Marketing Cloud is a cloud-based service, which means that businesses can save on investing in hardware and related infrastructure, like servers or server space. This helps to cut down on expenditure considerably. All Salesforce Marketing Cloud services can be accessed and used from the cloud.

Nurturing leads: A successful business’s growth path is fueled by accurate and insightful leads, a fact that is well-recognized by Salesforce Marketing Cloud. Its innovative and customizable tools and services help to automate many marketing aspects. This gives sales and marketing teams the extra time to focus on marketing strategies and approaches. Marketing cloud features also give a detailed overview of customer behavior.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud services can provide important customer-related information, such as the device, platform and location from which the customer has accessed the business’s website. It analyzes their personal interests and provides a personalized customer experience by automating several sales and marketing activities.

Anticipating the customer: For customers, the purchase journey may be a long and meticulous one, involving several online sessions of comparing similar products made by different brands. Here is where the personalized service provided by Salesforce Marketing Cloud makes its presence known.

The online comparisons and searches by customers for products can be used for trigger-based marketing messages. These can be personalized messages and can be triggered by online customer behavior on popular social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions also provide key information to businesses, such as which messages and emails have been read by the customer. This allows for better insight and CRM data.

The marketing algorithm learns from customer activity to refine the customer’s preferences, which enables businesses to have the right approach for the right customer, thus creating a personalized customer journey.

Marketing Campaigns: Irrespective of the size of the business, a marketing campaign comprises multiple components, and keeping track of them at all stages is essential. Campaigns built using Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions have specialized features, like grouped contact information, mobile information and grouped emails. By grouping campaign components, it is easier to plan and execute marketing campaigns.

It also helps to measure the success of the marketing campaign, by each component and overall performance.

Mobile Studio: Once the marketing campaign has been formulated, its various components can be put to work. By using Mobile Studio, the campaign can be taken to the customer through the mediums of mobile messaging and push messaging. The push messages can be sent through the Salesforce Marketing Cloud mobile app to subscribers, while text messages can be sent to the personal cellphone numbers of customers.

Social Studio: Customers can be also reached on social media platforms, by posting status updates on Facebook and Twitter. The Salesforce Marketing Cloud Social Studio service automates social media updates and posts from the business’s social media accounts.

Email Studio: Email marketing solutions can be used to send regular, personalized emails, and triggered emails. The latter is sent automatically when customers access the business site or online marketing promotions.

Web Studio: Multiple website pages for the marketing campaign can be managed through a single platform or landing page, and Salesforce Marketing Cloud will host all website pages. This is among the benefits of real-time data integration on the Salesforce platform.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Implementation

While using any Salesforce Marketing Cloud solution is a great step forward for businesses when it comes to formulating marketing strategies, implementing the marketing cloud successfully needs the services of experts. Finding the right Salesforce Marketing Cloud implementation partner is important when it comes to implementing a new process system.

This is because the Salesforce Marketing Cloud Services team will be partnering with the business’s marketing team to get the Salesforce system successfully implemented as per the business’s needs. The Marketing Cloud Services team will coordinate with the organization’s tech team and IT department for smooth implementation.

The right data: The CRM data that businesses end up collecting over time can be voluminous. Not only will it pose a storage problem, but it will also mostly become disorganized. The Salesforce Marketing Cloud Services team will help the IT department sort the data to be easily accessible before it implements the Salesforce Marketing Cloud. The team will also help the business’s marketing team to concentrate on collecting the right data, going forward.

Achieving goals: Salesforce Marketing Cloud implementation partners help organizations to achieve business goals. They work with various departments of the organization to improve the customer journey by speeding up automation progress, ensuring better adoption of new technology and systems, decrease the time taken for deployment and the analysis and reporting of customer-related data. As a Salesforce Marketing Cloud implementation expert, the implementation partner will be able to adapt the system for new business goals, if and when necessary.

Salesforce Certified Marketing Cloud Consultants

A Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultant is key to getting the most out of the organization’s investment by fine-tuning marketing campaigns through the successful implementation of Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions. The consultant will endeavor to improve:

  • Lead generation and identifying potential leads.
  • Track customer behavior and provide reviews and feedback on customer needs.
  • Collect and organize customer-related information across various consumer touchpoints across all engagement channels and platforms.
  • Bring down the turnaround time required to start campaigns by organizing messages written in advance, collecting formats and automated templates.
  • Provide timely and accurate reporting and analysis of events that might impact customer behavior, while focusing on the marketing ecosystem by keeping track of activities and events.

Hiring the right consultant: The first thing that businesses looking to hire a Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultant need to do is identify the marketing cloud skillset that is most suited to their in-house teams. As there are many implementations of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions based on different needs of businesses in various sectors of the economy, skillsets among consultants are also diverse. The consultant must necessarily be an addition to the core competencies of the in-house departments and teams.

Different usage: The Salesforce Marketing Cloud provides a vast array of features, studios and other components, to serve the needs of different businesses. There are also many ways of implementing automation solutions and data integration.

Existing teams: There are bound to be significant differences in the in-house competencies and skills in different business organizations, so the consultant for marketing automation will be required to have a thorough understanding of project management. The Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultant will also have to be proficient in several currently relevant programming languages, implementing data models and Salesforce integration.

Key qualities: Since the consultant or consultant firm partnering with the business will have to complement the in-house teams and integrate with the company culture, they need to be reliable, easy to work with, and have a presentable demeanor as they are in a client-facing role. Consultants will also need several years of experience in implementing Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions, and wide experience in digital marketing.

A Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultant will be taking the lead in Marketing Cloud implementations. The consultant may be involved across the whole project in all its stages, including the presale stage as well. However, consultants are mostly focused on ensuring delivery. They are also well-versed in Salesforce Marketing Cloud best practices and can advise teams on how to adhere to them while implementing marketing strategies.

Depending on the experience and skillset requirement of the business organization, the Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultant could be asked to perform a variety of delivery roles. These would mainly include:

  • Proficiency in more than one of the six main programming languages used in Salesforce Marketing Cloud, such as AMP Script, HTML and CSS, and SQL.
  • Designing solutions for crucial issues faced by the business’s teams are an integral part of the work done by Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultants. They are also instrumental in identifying marketing and sales leads.
  • Training and onboarding employees and other users for quicker adoption of the new system based on the Salesforce Marketing Cloud.
  • Working with Email Studio to design and deliver solutions.
  • Implementing Salesforce CRM including Salesforce Sales Cloud and Salesforce Cloud Services.
  • All implementation-related activities of Salesforce Marketing Cloud, including data migration, Marketing Cloud Connect, configuration and integrations required to ensure smooth working of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud features.
  • Ensuring that the client and other stakeholders get regular updates on various aspects of projects and the progress, as well as new concepts.
  • Implementing marketing automation solutions and ensuring that they are tracked for the rate of progress so that marketing teams can meet deadlines.
  • Thorough knowledge of all aspects of all market conversion metrics, such as digital marketing Key Performance Indicators (KPI), email marketing, etc.
  • Expertise in analysis and reporting through email activities using Email Studio
  • Conceptualize, design and implement automated marketing campaigns on Mobile Studio, Journey Builder and Email Studio, and advise clients on how to optimize further.
  • Experience in using Email Studio reports and Journey Builder for reporting and analyzing email activity.
  • Proficiency in Einstein AI and Analytics Builder.
  • Integration of third-party applications and other data sources with Salesforce Marketing Cloud by designing and building timely solutions

The Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultant is also required to be well-versed in Google Analytics, possess a deep understanding of establishing data models, the APIs and understand the specific needs of the client to be able to build a custom preference center.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud Developers

When it comes to developing solutions within the Salesforce Marketing Cloud, businesses need the services of Salesforce Marketing Cloud Developers. These Salesforce Certified developers bring with them a deep knowledge of managing subscribers across various customer engagement channels.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud developers are skilled in modifying data as per need in a fast-paced environment, as well as system settings in the Salesforce Marketing Cloud. They are also adept in troubleshooting and have proficiency in several programming languages relevant to the system.

They will necessarily have experience working as full-stack developers for the Salesforce Marketing Cloud. This skillset will enable them to create scripting languages, website landing pages and landing sites as well as email and social media messaging.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud developers are well-versed in reporting and analytics of CRM data.

Various Developer Roles

Salesforce Certified Marketing Cloud Administrator: Armed with in-depth knowledge of the Salesforce Marketing Cloud, the Salesforce Certified Marketing Cloud Administrator will expertly configure and troubleshoot the features that are on offer for end users with the options that are provided by the Salesforce Marketing Cloud. The Marketing Cloud Administrator is also conversant with digital marketing best practices and ensures that all administrative activities are in accordance with such practices.

Platform Developer I: Certified Platform Developer I developers make use of the programming options available on Lightning Platform, with extensions based on Apex and VisualForce. This gives them comprehensive insight and enables them to develop and implement interfaces and business logic as per needs. The ability to customize these components allows businesses to be more customer-centric.

Marketing Cloud Email Specialist: The Salesforce Marketing Cloud Email Specialist is an important member of any business organization’s marketing campaign team, and this developer role is valuable even in the prelaunch phase. The Salesforce Marketing Cloud Email Specialist uses the Salesforce Marketing Cloud tools available to offer a range of services to the client.

This can include data management, subscriber management, message design, as well as integration with the email application provided by Salesforce Marketing Cloud. The specialist will also possess up-to-date knowledge of the best practices in email marketing, and will advise the business organization to adhere to the same at all stages of the marketing campaign.

Pardot Consultant: The Salesforce Pardot Consultant is skilled to work in a customer-facing role, and the job involves having experience in implementing solutions using Pardot. The Salesforce Pardot Consultant will contribute to the success of a business’s marketing endeavors by designing and implementing Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions as per the client’s requirement.

Pardot Specialist: Taking the use of Pardot further, the Salesforce Pardot Specialist will drive business success through marketing workflows on Salesforce Marketing Cloud, which the Salesforce Pardot Specialist will build, and implement through the Pardot platform.

Overall, the Salesforce Marketing Cloud Developer should possess the experience and skillset required to test marketing campaigns minutely, before it is integrated with the client’s production ecosystem.

Time is money, and Marketing Cloud developers need to adhere strictly to deadlines and deliver solutions in a timely manner. One of the ways they achieve this is by creating dashboards for communication with various teams, and updating them in real-time on the progress of the campaign and performance of the marketing strategy.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud developers are conversant with building email templates for targeted campaigns using the Salesforce Content Builder. They have relevant knowledge of the best practices prevalent in various components of the marketing drive and work closely with the client to successfully implement Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions.

Their in-depth understanding of the marketing ecosystem and the specific needs of the client enables them to translate and interpret analytics and metrics in a manner that can be easily accessed and acted upon by the marketing teams. This analysis can be a forecast for the near future as well, based on comprehensive CRM data, which can shape campaign strategy in advance and lead to better campaign performance.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud developers can spark interest in their client’s products and services by building and implementing automated marketing campaigns. The developer uses skills in constructing email and text message templates to reach prospective customers on their personal devices.

Salesforce Marketing Cloud: A Formidable Business Partner

When it comes to handholding and guiding customers on their journey with a brand, it is clear that Salesforce Marketing Cloud developers and Salesforce Marketing Cloud consultants are global leaders.

By migrating to the Marketing Cloud ecosystem, businesses are able to get more out of their marketing teams and formulate better campaigns. The ease of having all options and customer-related in-depth data at their fingertips empowers marketing executives and their teams to achieve goals with greater success.

With Salesforce Marketing Cloud solutions, businesses are empowered to become more and more customer-centric, as its features and solutions give them a panoramic view of individual customers and their likes and dislikes. This helps companies build lasting relationships between their brands and consumers, and makes for a comfortable customer journey.

And before it seems that this is a one-size-fits-all deal, there is something for every type of client. Subscriptions to Salesforce Marketing Cloud services come in differently-priced packages, giving clients the option to choose the best one that fits their requirements.

By Team TIS
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