Businesses all over the world; large, small and somewhere in between face tough decisions every day. None more so perhaps than choosing the best type of marketing software to use in order to provide the very best when it comes to productivity and building and maintaining customer relationships. Let’s face it, today, digital marketing is the norm for all businesses, and it’s constantly expanding and diversifying, making it even more crucial that your business has the best software available in order to help you and your sales and marketing teams to organise and manage your strategies. And in today’s technological age, you’re certainly not short of options!
The general consensus among entrepreneurs seems to be that the easiest thing to do is to use an all-in-one platform for your business needs, instead of using an array of dedicated software tools for each of your marketing disciplines.
Spoiler alert: that’s not necessarily the best solution for your business.
An all-in-one marketing software sounds great on the surface because it gives you a combination of online marketing functions as one beautifully integrated package. These are great for start-up companies and small businesses that take care of their own marketing needs, and useful features include marketing automation, CRM, email and mobile marketing, eCommerce, Live Chat and Analytics.
Fabulous, right?
In a sense, yes, they’re easy and convenient to use, and are a good choice for companies who don’t have the budget to purchase several different software options that need to be individually managed.
However, it’s important to know that ‘all-in-one’ doesn’t necessarily mean ALL, just that the software can cover MOST of your marketing needs with one tool. Disappointing. Also, in the long run, taking the all-in-one approach can actually work out more expensive than running separate software tools.
Another huge disadvantage of using an all-in-one marketing tool is that you might find that they don’t evolve at the same rate as your company - and what’s the point in choosing a software that isn’t capable of supporting your business needs in the long-term, when you can invest in a solution that will do a bang-up job WITHOUT running into issues at some point in the future?
Exactly.
So, what’s the solution?
The answer is Make (you might know them better by the former brand name of Integromat, which was changed in the early part of 2022), an integration system that allows you to build and automate everything from tasks and workflows to apps into one visual platform. If your mind instantly goes to the non-intuitive and linear no-code integration and automation platforms of old, stop right there. Make offers a new breed of platform that promises to boost productivity across every area of your business including marketing, sales, operations, IT, and HR - and Flowbird will be right there to support you in using this new and exciting technology.
Make is one of the newer automation systems on the block, and one of its many advantages is that it doesn’t require you to have much (if any) experience or knowledge of coding. It’s incredibly easy to use and features a really strong graphical element - ideal for business owners and workforces who prefer to see complicated processes laid out visually. For example, if you want to filter an action, you can simply click on the dotted lines between modules. Because of its layout and the way that it handles conditional formatting, Make is a fantastic option if you need to make long and complicated automations, allowing you to set up integrations between programs quickly and easily. The toolbar at the bottom of the screen (a great addition in Flowbird’s opinion!) gives you instant access to secondary tools, and even gives you the ability to add notes - super handy for tricky steps - and also has a feature that explains the flow of each scenario.
By using Make there’s a very good chance you can kiss making your own templates goodbye - Make’s are that good, and it has loads to choose from, including some that you never knew you needed until now, or even thought were possible. Be sure to browse through the templates of your favourite apps that are available; we think you’ll be surprised by what’s there! Make supports 250 apps ranging from Google Drive apps and project management tools, to smart home functions and social media apps like Facebook.
Make’s built-in data store is going to be a huge benefit to your business, letting you take specific types of data produced by apps such as social media posts, for example, or the number of entries on a spreadsheet, and keep them in a well-managed store. This is a massive plus if your workflow is really data-heavy, meaning that not only can you bypass third-party apps for storing a single type of data, but you can also put that data store into a specific scenario like you would any other module.
Eager to get started or find out more about Make? Get in touch with the expert team at Flowbird, and find out today how Make’s integration system could be just the solution your business has been searching for.