How Business Owners Can Increase Their Profit Margins Through Leveraging Systemization and Automation Using Keap

Jason Benedict on November 28, 2022

As a small business owner, you are always looking for ways to increase your profit margins. You may think the best way to do this is to cut costs or find new revenue streams. While those are both important, there’s another way to increase the profit margins that you may not have considered — systemization and automation using Keap.

Keap is a software that helps small businesses automate their sales and marketing processes. By leveraging Keap, you can free up your time so that you can focus on other aspects of your business. Additionally, Keap can help you streamline your processes so that you can save money on things like labor costs. Let’s take a look at business automation and how tools like Keap can help you increase your profit margins.

What Is Business Automation?

Business automation allows companies to enhance their offerings and provide a better experience for their customers by using technology to its fullest potential. By automating business processes, your organization can avoid spending time and energy on mundane tasks.

Having your team’s time and energy freed up by automating routine processes like lead generation funnels, sales reports, conversion tracking, email marketing, order monitoring, and more will allow them to better apply their skills to more strategically significant initiatives.

The development of digital banking is a prime example of customer-centric business automation. Customers can avoid long wait times at the bank by handling their financial needs right from their mobile devices.

How To Scale Your Business Through Automation

Here are some guidelines for successfully automating and scaling your organization, no matter your industry or strategy.

Have a Clear Idea of What You Want

Without a doubt, growth and scalability are at the heart of why you should adopt Keap marketing automation in your company. However, before implementing an automated system, it’s crucial to have a firm grasp of your desired outcomes and accomplishments and the areas of your business that need the most attention. Understanding your objectives for automation will help you establish milestones and priorities. After that, you can create long-term plans of action.

Establish Reasonable Objectives

The key to success is setting reasonable objectives and expectations for the many areas you plan to automate. However, don’t establish unrealistic goals or compare your company’s procedures to those of others.

Make Use of Automated Processes Whenever Possible

To successfully expand your business and see the results you seek, you must focus on the tasks that significantly impact your bottom line, such as marketing and sales. Nevertheless, try to think out of the box. Every company can benefit from adding a bit more automation to several processes. It’s time to take stock of all the manual work you put in each day and make a list.

Create a Checklist To Measure Growth

Since tracking your progress is essential for making informed decisions and changes in direction, it’s crucial to establish a set of criteria in advance that can be used as milestones. If you make it a habit to review this list regularly, you’ll have no trouble keeping tabs on the many aspects of your business’ automated processes and determining which are performing as intended, those that require tweaking, and ones you can safely do away with.

Pick the Correct Platform or Tool for Automation

The automation tools and platforms you use should be tailored to the specific business process you’re looking to streamline. There are several specialized platforms available, each with its own set of pros and cons, that can be used for various business operations. When it comes to sales and marketing automation, Keap is one of the best tools out there.

Areas Where Automation Improves Process Efficiency

The process of automating work processes is not without its challenges. Nonetheless, companies can take baby steps in this direction. Here are several areas in which automating might help increase productivity within an organization and, by extension, its bottom line.

Sales and Marketing

Thanks to automation, businesses can better develop sales and marketing strategies that successfully attract and retain new customers. Companies can streamline their sales and marketing processes by automating tasks like lead management, email marketing, customer relationship management (CRM), and social media marketing.

Human Resources

Using automation, the HR department will be able to streamline the hiring process. Automating tasks like interview scheduling, candidate screening, and communicating recruitment status updates can relieve pressure on HR teams and improve prospective employees’ experiences.

Finance and Accounting

By implementing automated accounting systems, companies can eliminate the need for human intervention in a wide variety of financial processes, including computation, auditing, and payment processing. Automating routine tasks allows teams to get more things done because less time is spent on processing.

Project Management

Managing projects effectively is essential for organizations in various industries. When the project management process is automated, the team can spend less time on non-essential administrative tasks and more on strategic activities like development, testing, and new releases. Businesses can save time and effort by automating various processes, including report generation, and resource allocation.

Essential Marketing Processes You Can Automate

Using automation software, you can streamline several marketing tasks. Take a look at these four key marketing processes that need to be automated if you want to achieve your business goals:

Email Automation

You can use business automation solutions like Keap to set up an email drip campaign if you want to send multiple emails to the same group of subscribers or automate the delivery of personal emails like welcome messages or status updates. With this capability, your team will be able to devote less time to monotonous tasks and more to achieving strategic objectives.

An automated drip email campaign can be configured to send out messages based on specific criteria. Any time a lead meets one of these parameters or completes one of these steps, they will immediately enter the associated drip campaign. Combining triggers with email marketing helps get your content in front of customers right when they’re ready to engage with it. Additionally, the open rate for drip campaigns is 80% higher, meaning you have a greater chance of closing a deal.

Lead Nurturing

Some aspects of the buyer’s journey or customer journey can be automated as well. Various marketing and sales techniques can be used in the lead nurturing process to increase the likelihood that the lead will become a paying customer.

Your target audience’s preferences will likely shift over time. You need to adjust to the evolving tastes of your customer base when you want them to remember your brand favorably. One strategy is to learn what factors customers consider most important before making a purchase. With the help of a CRM system that also includes marketing automation, you can better understand your target demographic and re-engage with your existing customers.

Reporting and Analytics

Reports on marketing initiatives should not be overlooked, but they can take a lot of work. Keap marketing automation allows you to schedule the generation of reports based on criteria and run them at regular intervals.

One of the best benefits of automating reports is that errors and inconsistencies are less likely to occur. In addition, sales processes can be streamlined with the help of automation solutions, allowing you to better evaluate the contribution of different marketing efforts to the progress of your pipeline and the growth rate of your revenue.

The list continues with the potential to automatically perform website audits, referrals, social media promotions, and keyword analysis. The automation tools you choose will be determined by the objectives of your company.

What Is the Return on Investment of Marketing Automation?

Once you pursue marketing automation, budget and ROI are the first things that spring to mind. The marketing automation software you choose could have a significant impact on your company.

Research shows that marketing automation can boost sales productivity by up to 14.5% while cutting marketing costs by 12.2%. In addition, 80% of those who used marketing automation experienced an increase in the number of leads, and 77% saw a rise in their conversion rate. For these reasons and more, 91% of businesses that utilize marketing automation tools rate it as “very important” to the effectiveness of their digital marketing efforts.

Introducing Keap: How It Works

Keap works by consolidating all your customer data into one centralized platform. This includes contact information, purchase history, preferences, and more. With this information stored in one place, you can create customized marketing and sales campaigns targeting specific customer segments. For example, if you have a group of customers who have made recent purchases, you can create a targeted campaign to upsell them on additional products or services they may be interested in.

How Can Keap Help Me Increase My Profit Margins?

As a small business owner, your time is precious. There are only so many hours in the day, and there’s only so much you can do yourself. This is where Keap comes in. By automating the tedious and time-consuming tasks that eat up your day, Keap gives you more time to focus on revenue-generating activities that will help you increase your profit margins. In addition, Keap’s tools can help you streamline your operations, which will also save you money and boost your bottom line.

Optimize Your Customer Relationship Management

Keap’s CRM features will help you keep track of your customers’ contact information, purchase history, and communication preferences. This will allow you to provide them with a better overall experience since you’ll be able to quickly resolve any issues they’re having and address their specific needs. Additionally, by segmenting your customers into groups, you can create targeted marketing campaigns that are more likely to convert into sales.

Streamline Your Appointment Processes

If you run a service-based business, chances are that a large portion of your time is spent scheduling appointments. This time could be better spent working on other aspects of your business or developing client relationships.

With Keap’s appointment scheduling feature, you can automate the process of setting up appointments. This includes sending automatic reminders to both yourself and your clients before the appointment date.

Not only will this save you time but it will also reduce the likelihood of missed appointments. And because happy customers are more likely to do repeat business (and recommend your company to others), streamlining your appointment scheduling process with Keap is a great way to increase your profits.

Reduce Labor Costs

You can also reduce your labor costs by automating repetitive tasks and streamlining processes. This is because you will no longer need to pay someone to do things like input data into a spreadsheet or send out manual reminders. The money you save on labor costs can be used to invest in other areas of your business or increase your profit margins.

Improve Collaboration

Collaborative projects involving multiple people can quickly spiral out of control due to the sheer number of moving parts. Fortunately, even the most intricate projects can be monitored and carried out without a hitch, thanks to automation.

Assigning and following up with targeted prospects are two examples of time-consuming, manual processes that can be automated with Keap marketing automation. Businesses often struggle to unify these departments effectively. Thanks to marketing and sales automation, cooperation between the two areas is more productive than ever. Once everyone is on the same page, managers and team leaders can track everyone’s progress and ensure everyone is doing their part.

Smarter Decision-Making Using Data

Recently, “Big Data” has become a popular term in the field of information technology. Sadly, not all companies are effective at gathering and leveraging this information in their marketing and sales activities. With the help of Keap marketing automation, it’s much easier to make sense of Big Data, and once you have that insight, everything else becomes simple.

One of the best ways to evaluate marketing activities and anticipate customer reactions is with the help of a sales and marketing automation solution like Keap. It has the capability to generate a comprehensive profile of your leads.

Personalize the Customer Journey

Converting a one-time buyer into a lifelong supporter is one of the most challenging tasks businesses regularly face. Using automation to create content tailored for social media and blog posts is one way to accomplish this goal. Research also shows that companies that use sales automation early on also enjoy greater levels of customer satisfaction.

Statistics on video marketing indicate that more than 70% of consumers are on the lookout for content that is extraordinary, unique, and relevant to their interests. Keap marketing automation tools optimize the process of delivering the necessary content through email to the right customers at the right moment.

Another perk of marketing automation is the information it gathers, which is helpful for validating marketing leads before sending them on to sales. Using a grading and scoring system based on data about visitors, marketing automation can route qualified leads to the most suitable salesperson, further tailoring the experience for each prospect and increasing the likelihood of a sale.

Finetune the Marketing Process

Keap marketing automation software provides a means of mapping the customer journey. Your marketing plan will also help you create processes based on your customers’ needs and preferences. Implementing procedures designed around the customer journey streamlines the processing of targets and the nurturing of leads.

Knowing that 44% of customers will go elsewhere if they don’t get a response within a reasonable amount of time may cause you to reevaluate your follow-up procedure and the benefits of implementing marketing automation to boost customer satisfaction.

Boost Employee Morale

Most employees actively seek to avoid routine work. Doing the same thing over and over again can be tedious and unrewarding. If these repetitive chores can be automated, employees will have more time to focus on higher-value tasks, such as those that require them to use their intellect. If we put our brains to work, we can accomplish amazing feats. If you spend too long on dull or repetitive work, you may find that you have less energy and drive for more interesting or rewarding endeavors.

The positive domino effect that automation has on morale can do wonders for a company. The workplace culture rarely benefits from the contributions of weary and frustrated workers. When employees are happy in their jobs, they are more inclined to put in extra effort, learn more, and strive for excellence.

Capturing Leads

Keap has several features that make it ideal for lead capture. First, it offers a customizable lead capture form that can be embedded on your website or blog. This form allows leads to input their information so that you can follow up with them later.

In addition, Keap allows you to set up webhooks, which are essentially automated messages sent to leads when they take specific actions on your website (like submitting a form or signing up for a newsletter). These webhooks help you quickly respond to leads so that you can nurture them through the sales funnel.

Finally, Keap integrates with other popular marketing and sales tools (like Zapier, and Google Sheets) so that you can quickly transfer data between platforms and capture leads from multiple sources.

Creating Marketing Campaigns

Finally, Keap’s campaign feature allows you to automate your marketing efforts by sending targeted messages to groups of contacts based on their interests. For example, if you sell women’s clothing, you could create a campaign specifically for women who have expressed interest in dresses and send them periodic updates about new dress styles and special offers. Or, if you sell home goods, you could create a campaign for people who have bought from you in the past and send them updates about new products and exclusive discounts. By automating your campaigns, you can ensure that your marketing efforts are always on point and that your contacts receive the information they’re interested in.

As a small business owner, automation tools like Keap can be a lifesaver. By automating critical tasks like lead capture, sales pipeline management, and invoicing/payment processing, you can free up your time to focus on other areas of your business.

Keap offers an innovative solution that helps businesses streamline operations and increase efficiency.

The Bottomline

Businesses can save money on labor costs and redirect those savings to critical strategic efforts by adopting marketing automation solutions. But that’s only the beginning. Having the right marketing automation tools at your disposal can help you foster better teamwork, improve employee morale, and ultimately boost customer satisfaction.

If you’re not using automation tools for your business yet, now is the time to start.

Contact the Automation Agency today to learn more about how Keap can help your business grow! Request a FREE 14-Day Trial of Keap.

First Generation Black Entrepreneur, Brandon Anthony Clark, Leverages Keap CRM To Automate & Grow His Small Business

Jason Benedict on November 4, 2022

As a first-generation black entrepreneur, Brandon Anthony Clark wasn’t always living his dream. In fact, he was living day-to-day in what he called his “regular job” that was a means to an end.

“I just wasn’t living the type of lifestyle that I had imagined living as a kid growing up, because I wanted to be a professional athlete (football player to be more specific). And, one day I’m 28 years old, and I’m working at my regular job. And I’m like, wait a minute, how did I get here. I’m not driving what I want to drive, I’m not living where I want to live, I’m not doing anything that I want to do. I’m literally just going to a job, living paycheck to paycheck – living for the weekends, for football, sports, and to get away from real life. So, I had to make some different decisions,” said Clark.

Fast-forward a few years and Brandon is now the owner of Thrive Wealth Solutions, who teaches everyday people his patent pending F.L.I.P Method that helps him and his clients to obtain more wealth through a unique life insurance investment policy.

“I had never in my life thought that I would be selling life insurance for a living, right, because I’m not even a good salesman at that,” Clark added.

When asked to explain what the F.L.I.P method is, Clark stated “The simplest way I could put it is – imagine you had this credit card, and this credit card paid you an average of 3% cashback on every single thing that you purchase, for the rest of your life. That’s what the F.L.I.P method is … Basically, what we do is we take a life insurance policy, (not something that a lot of people are, let’s say familiar with, in terms of using a strategy like this). But to keep it simple, all we do is we take the life insurance policy, and we structure it in a way that allows you to be able to use your cash as collateral and borrow against your own money.”

As you pay money into your policy, it’s like paying money towards a mortgage. As you pay your mortgage down you are creating equity in your house, right, and that equity can be tapped into it anytime. So, we’re taking that same concept, but we’re applying it to a life insurance policy that provides many tax advantages.

Brandon not only used this F.L.I.P method to create wealth for himself, but says it works for nearly anyone looking to secure their financial future.

While Brandon is living his dream life he is also no stranger to the challenges of starting and growing a small business.

“There’s a lot of legwork involved in running a business, especially when you’re first starting out,” he says. “It can be tough to keep track of everything, from sales and marketing to customer service and operations.”

That’s why Brandon decided to leverage Keap CRM & Automation Agency to help organize and automate his small business.

“I remember a point in my business where I wasn’t busy, I’d keep track of everything. I literally had a piece of paper that I would write down what I needed to do the next day, maybe five tasks, maybe 10 at the max, and I would fill up my whole day, and I have downtime. But once I started growing, the business started growing, more people started reaching out and tasks and other things started getting left behind. There were just too many tasks to put on a piece of paper. And I knew then that I was in trouble. I needed to be able to either hire somebody or develop a system that can do the repetitive tasks, the things that I don’t like doing,” Clark added.

So, Brandon decided to do both. By hiring the Automation Agency, a growth agency located in Tempe, Arizona, Brandon was able to get organized, save time, and automate many repetitive tasks after purchasing the Automation Agency’s flowchart and funnel diagram service.

When asked about Brandon’s experience with the Automation Agency, he stated “I feel like this is the best money I’ve ever invested, you know, best money I’ve ever invested. I’m naturally not a very structured person. You know, I’m more of a creative person. But when you guys were able to sit me down and ask me all these questions about my processes, questions that I didn’t even really know should be asked – you asked. And basically you were able to take that information and plug it into my flowchart. And when I saw the flowchart, I was just so impressed. I was showing everybody – like I’ve got another partner who wants to experiment with the Keap CRM system. And I showed him the flowchart, he said, Man that is “Elite,” just the start to finish.”

In order to scale his business and continue delivering high-quality work to his clients, Brandon and his team began to use the Keap CRM solution that the Automation Agency customized to their specific needs. With Keap, he is able to manage his contact lists, create and send email campaigns, set up appointments and reminders, collect payments, track his progress towards sales goals, and much more. All of these features have helped him save time so he can focus on growing his business.

“It felt like a weight had been lifted off of me. And what I experienced with you guys (Automation Agency) is just your level of knowledge, I just knew it was gonna be good, just because of how I was, I came into contact with you, I know you guys were gonna be just great. Everything from start to finish was outstanding,” added Clark.

As a young, inspiring, black entrepreneur, Brandon has always had a servant’s heart that wants to give back to others. When asked about what advice he might provide to other young professionals not living their dream or those who want to start a small business, said

“I would tell them that they will never be successful or make more money than they believe that they can make. So, the first work that you gotta do is work on your own personal attitude. Before you go out and try to change – just know that as your personal attitude gets better, as you grow as a person, that your income will grow. And you can serve more people because that’s what it’s all about. Serving more people. In order to serve more, you have to become more. It’s that simple.”

When Brandon is not inspiring other young professionals or creating TikTok videos or YouTube videos on his patent pending F.L.I.P method, he enjoys spending time with his wife and kids.

As a small business owner of a rapidly growing company, Brandon knows that he can’t do everything himself. He also knows that his time is valuable and that he needs to be strategic about how he spends it. That’s why he decided to leverage the power of automation by using Keap CRM. By automating tasks like email marketing, lead capture, and appointment scheduling, Brandon has been able to free up time with his family so that he can focus on running his business and making sure that his customers are happy.

However, Brandon isn’t the only one who has benefited from automation. His customers have also appreciated the fact that they can schedule appointments and make purchases without having to talk to a live person. This convenience has helped Brandon build a loyal customer base who keep coming back for more advice.

Thanks to the Automation Agency and the Keap CRM, Brandon has been able to streamline his business and make it more efficient. He is now better positioned than ever to continue growing his business and achieving even more success in the future. As he looks towards the future, Brandon is confident that automation will continue to be an important part of his business and help him scale to new heights.

“What the Automation Agency has done for me is give me a system that I want to imitate, like, the way you guys work with me, Jason, I was like, man, if I could take my clients through the same system, or that process. I love your guys’ process, it just is everything that I want in my business to where we’re working as a team, right. But then I can just kind of be hands off and just step in when I need to step in and just help our team members, you know, get the job done for our clients, right. But it’s been awesome. Definitely saving some time already,” added Clark.

Brandon Anthony Clark is proof that the American dream is still alive and well. By leveraging the power of automation with Keap CRM, Brandon has been able not only to build a successful business, but also inspire other young black entrepreneurs to pursue their own dreams. We’re excited to see what Brandon will do next!

If you’re a small business owner who is looking for ways to automate your business, then Keap CRM is definitely worth considering. Thanks to its powerful automation tools and robust reporting features, Keap CRM has helped first-generation black entrepreneur Brandon Anthony Clark save time and grow his business. To learn more about how Keap CRM can help your business, schedule a demo today.

The Benefits of an Ascension Program Versus a Marketing Retainer

Jason Benedict on November 1, 2022

As a small business owner, you know that marketing is vital to the success and growth of your business. But what’s the best way to go about building marketing services into your business?

You have options:

If you have a strong knowledge of marketing, you can hire specific marketing services on retainer from agencies, or
You can hire and build an internal team of marketing staff within your company, and/or
You can join our Ascension Program, giving you benefits of both.

Our ascension program was built after hearing so many business owners share their challenges that the marketing services, they purchased from other agencies just didn’t give them the results they were after, and so they tried to build their own team – often still not achieving the results they sought.

The missing gap for many is the confidence, knowledge, and experience of HOW.

This is what our Ascension Program is designed to provide to you.

The Program is built across five (5) phases of growth enabling businesses to join at their stage of growth.

Here we explore where it is best for you to join.

Our aim is to walk with you, at your pace, some seek very fast growth, others want to progress a little slower. We will start you at the correct point and help you move across all five layers of growth.

Phase 1. Educate: Typically for very small businesses under $200k in revenues.

Our first aim is to build you the confidence and knowledge of how to go about achieving growth past $200k in revenues.

When signing up for a marketing retainer, you’re generally only paying for someone to execute on a set number of tasks each month, and you need to tell them which ones. With our ascension program, you are receiving one-on-one access to a growth coach who will strategize with you and educate you on the best way to achieve growth and help you move into the next phase of growth.

Phase 2. Launch: Your revenues are typically $200k-$800k

The Launch phase of our ascension program gives you the experience, knowledge, and resources you need to launch new products, services, and marketing campaigns quickly. What we want at this phase is solid growth.

We find the marketing retainer option at this stage of growth is less strategic and more of the support being a line item on a punch list – it becomes hit and miss and thus the disappointment in results.

We have chosen to build support around you with more dedicated resources, someone who is focused on your continued growth and specializes in launching campaigns, automations, and customer journeys. This phase requires you to consolidate your position in the marketplace, you must have the confidence now to really launch your marketing services.

Phase 3. Promote: Businesses with revenues above $800k can start here.

Revenues are typically $1-3m during this phase.

Now you really want to promote the business and drive in sales growth.

The Promote phase of our ascension program provides you with tangible assets, more robust resources, and a deeper knowledge of how you need to promote your business effectively. This phase is primarily focused on campaigning throughout your customer journey. Promoting your business can be a full-time job, so having an agency that is an extension to your team and who knows your products, services, and processes intimately can be a major advantage. At this stage our marketing team will develop targeted campaigns to help you reach your ideal customers to collect more leads, convert more clients, and create long term fans.

And we start the conversation with you now about how to build your internal team, at this size you now want to recruit some internal resources that can leverage the work you are doing. At this point we create the roadmap for building your internal team.

Phase 4. Partner: Businesses with revenues of $3m-6m typically start here.

While others on the Ascension program have now grown up to this stage.

At $3m in revenues the only way to continue to achieve growth is to start to add more product lines into the company and to open up partnerships that can help you expand.

In this phase of the ascension program, our team is deeply involved in helping you to campaign, automate, and build customer journeys across each of your marketing channels. This is where we help you identify and recruit partnerships with other businesses in complementary industries to cross-promote each other’s products or services. We are crafting custom marketing strategies and refining your unique value proposition that clearly articulates the offerings of your business and what makes you an attractive partner. Ultimately, we help you to optimize and productize your partnerships for growth.

Phase 5. Scale: You are now well above $6m in revenue. Businesses with current revenues of $10-25m+ typically start here.

Take a moment to acknowledge how far you’ve come. Scaling a business is no easy feat, but you made it to the top of our ascension program. In this phase we’re focused on helping you to develop an integrated internal team that helps you scale in your sector.

There are some common obstacles that prevent most businesses from achieving this level of growth and scalability. At this stage we are tapping into new markets to expand your product offerings and customer base. We’re helping you to invest in new technologies and processes that improve efficiency and competitiveness while also helping you to attract top talent and build a strong leadership team.

The benefits of our ascension program and its return on investment can be measured in several ways. Our focus is to build you a lifetime of confidence, vision, knowledge, and experience that delivers less stress, more guidance, more strategic direction, and sustainable financial growth. Clients see benefits from this program for many years to come.

Here are four key measurements of growth that are experienced when investing in our ascension program:

More Sales – clients that invest in marketing see sales revenues go up; this is called Top Line growth.
More Margin – this is cash in the door, it is called Bottom Line growth – profits. Automation and systemization can increase a client’s margins without the need to increase sales; and this has a direct impact on the financial returns of the client.
More Time – equally automation and systemization, reducing a client’s manual labor can save the client direct costs but can also save them considerable time. This is ‘opportunity cost’ – time saved and reinvested back into the business to achieve more sales creates direct financial benefits for the client.
More Value – this can show up in two ways a) the building of assets within a company builds long-term value which in turn will show up as increased attractiveness; this makes recruitment easier, retention longer, more partners are attracted to the company, more sponsors etc; and b) increased equity value, increasing the sale price of the company when it sells.

Conclusion:

As you can see, our ascension program is ideal for businesses that are looking for growth. Whether it’s sales growth, margin growth or value growth – we’ll help you to gradually scale your business while instilling a lifetime of confidence, knowledge, and experience.

Ascension is not a typical coaching program or business consultancy. We focus on real, sustainable results that will help you take your business to the next level. Our program is specifically tailored to meet the unique needs of each client, and our team of growth experts has a wealth of experience across nearly every industry and vertical.