The Right Way to Build Your Marketing Automation Team

When discussing the finer points of marketing automation, you’re undoubtedly going to hear a lot about the team, but what exactly should that team look like? There’s a lot that goes into making automation work, and the marketing department needs to be divided into roles to make the most of the technology. The roles discussed herein may vary from organization to organization and you should exercise some level of discretion when setting these roles up. Despite this, however, the following is ostensibly the cookie cutter model for what your marketing automation A-Team should look like.

At the head of your marketing automation efforts should be the Administrator or Admin for short. This is the leader of your solution’s effort and the one running the show so to speak. If only one individual is able to be certified in your solution, this is the person that needs that qualification. The general of your automation army, the admin is going to have a full grasp of the solution, know the ins-and-outs, and will generally have the final say in what the strategy is going forward. As far as deciding who should take this role, ideally you’ll want to find the most senior team member, but since that person may not be the most qualified to work with the solution, there may be some middle-ground to find.

Underneath the admin are even more specialized managers for each aspect of the automation. For example, you’re going to want a team member working full time on collecting the analytics, as that job requires a lot of in-depth number crunching and is too important to be relegated to anybody’s afterthought.

Similarly, the lead nurturing responsibilities should fall under the purview of one (preferably seasoned) individual. Without the concentrated efforts of this one individual, leads do not receive the attention they need to advance their interest in your organization.

Most of your automation team will be focused on content; both its creation and its proliferation. Heading up this majority will be the content manager. The content manager will oversee the creation and sending out of your marketing materials that initiate the customer experience. Though not exactly the administrator, the content manager is arguably the most important member of the automation team.

The content manager needs to have a strong understanding of content management, be able to think on his/her feet, and must be able to leverage analytics to the team’s advantage. They will unsurprisingly be working very closely with the Admin.

Beneath the content manager is the rest of the team, creating content, drafting email templates, designing landing pages, creating forms, and just about everything else you can think of. The managers are at the top of the process, but these are the talented professionals that are the lifeblood of the team. The creatively-minded team members that do the creating and realize the vision of the manager’s strategy.

Picking the right members for your automation team is really important, arguably more important than the solution you end up choosing. People make the solution, not the other way around. Put the appropriate marketer in the right place at the right time and you’ll see your marketing plans come together.

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