Thank you for taking the time to open this email message and click to our website to read the full article.

But, you shouldn’t have. Now we can track how you engage with our articles and videos whether by email, website visit, social media, and more.

And we can act on this information, if we choose. We promise, though, we won’t be a pain.

Intelligence About You

We will know when you open or click on any link in future email alerts.

We will know when you visit our website, which pages you visit, and how much time you spend there, even when your visit has nothing to do with an email alert. If you visit our website due to a Google search, we will know it.

We will know when you take our growth assessment that helps you better understand your firm’s strengths, challenges and opportunities for stronger growth.

We will know when you download a report, white paper or watch a video posted on our website.

And we will know when you engage with our LinkedIn or Twitter postings.

Email Marketing on Steroids

How do we know all this? Technology. Specifically, your click left a cookie on your computer or mobile device, which your web browser then provided to our marketing automation platform automatically, and will repeat every time you interact with our content.

Sure, we can track the typical vanity metrics (i.e. 35 percent open rate and 7 percent click-through rate) like with typical email marketing software such as Constant Contact, MailChimp or Vertical Response. More importantly though, we also know WHO is engaging with our content often – or not – whether through email, website or social media.

We can also set up daily or real time notifications, letting us know who visited our website, specific website pages, or signed up for our newsletter, for example, so we can very quickly know about important website activity.

Those who engage the most are considered warm leads to act on.

So, we know WHO is engaging, HOW you are engaging, across emails, website and social media and HOW OFTEN. This data allows us to take smarter action.

Actionable Analytics

With every engagement, the program assigns a score. The more you engage, the higher your score. The higher your score, the higher you rise on our radar. If your score rises significantly over a 90-day period, for example, it’s likely you will soon call us for information. You also may be more receptive to receiving a phone call from us.

However, if your score drops over a 90-day period, we get concerned. For example, if you are a client who had a pattern of regularly opening our emails and visiting our website, and then you stopped, it may mean you are thinking of leaving. We will likely call you to find out what’s going on.

In addition, we may develop an automation sequence to move you through a funnel. For example, we will schedule the campaign to invite you to download a white paper, receive a follow up email a few days later and a third email a few days later. If you engage with all three emails, we will add you to our list of phone calls to make. Of course, if you don’t engage positively, additional emails won’t be sent and we won’t call you.

Your Digital History

We can track your digital engagement history. We can see opens, clicks, website visits, social media engagement and more going back years all in one place and it syncs with Salesforce and other CRMs. So before we call a client or prospect, we will review your digital history. We will know if and how you’ve been engaging digitally with our content, if at all. Your level of engagement will guide our next call.

And if you visited our website in the past, and just opened our email alert for the first time, we will be able to easily track your your digital engagement going backwards in time, turning an anonymous website visitor into a real actionable lead.

Anonymous Website Visits

If you don’t open an email, or sign up to receive our email alerts, we won’t be able to track every digital move you make. We will however know which company you are with when you visit our website. If you visit often enough, we may have enough interest to look into the relevant people at your company – i.e. your CEO, marketing or sales officer, or public relations pro to see if we can engage the mystery visitor.

Works for Asset Managers Too

So you think this technology only works for marketing firms? Marketing automation helps asset managers and mutual funds too, especially if you are still blasting emails to financial advisors, research teams and institutional consultants, and don’t receive actionable digital engagement data for your sales and marketing teams to use.

Mutual fund wholesalers or institutional sales teams will get a steady list of warm, engaged digital leads. Specifically, they will have access to a platform to help them learn the digital activity of each client and prospect. It also helps them focus their efforts on qualified leads instead of cold names on a list.

Marketers can better understand how to segment their lists based on engagement. They will understand who their top clients and prospects are, how they engage digitally and manage campaigns designed to move them through funnels.

Understand the Obstacles

Using sophisticated technology in your sales and marketing effort works great. But keep the following in mind.

Your website should be quality since you will want to drive targeted traffic to it regularly.

Your content should be strong and designed to engage (not commercials). It should be produced consistently.

There are many software solutions out there. Buy one that works for your budget and goals. Don’t overbuy, though, because most asset managers won’t use all of the functionality.

Finally, marketing automation software is much more sophisticated than email blast software. Your program should be managed by someone who understands digital marketing and what’s possible and is experienced with the software. If any of those skills are missing, there will be a learning curve.

Then, you can add sophistication to your marketing effort and give your sales people some much needed support. But for your prospects sake, I hope they don’t open your emails. Or else….

Dan Sondhelm is CEO of Sondhelm Partners, a firm that helps asset managers, mutual funds, ETFs, wealth managers and fintech companies grow through marketing, public relations and sales programs. Click to read Dan’s latest Insight articles and to schedule a complimentary consultation.