Marketing and IT often talk past each other. You're creative; they're logical. You dream up campaigns, they're caught up managing the daily minutiae of keeping the company running.
If you're looking to make an investment in marketing automation, the head of IT or the CTO will likely be involved in the decision process. Impress IT with your practical side by having answers to these 5 questions on marketing automation implementation.
"How does this solution work? For example, is it hosted on-premise or is it a SaaS offering?"
IT wants to know both the long-term and upfront costs of implementing marketing automation. Do your research beforehand so you can explain just how the solution fits into your company's IT structure.
"How and where is the data stored, transmitted and protected?"
Chances are your IT department has a mapped out protocols for how it ensures the safety of company and customer data. They want to be sure whatever online marketing solution gets added fits with those protocol vendor's security structure and reputation.
"What are the regular, ongoing operational aspects of the solution?"
Your head of IT has multiple solutions and systems humming every day. There's a lot of maintenance that goes into making that happen. They want to know how much work will go into keeping a new solution going, and how it will impact other vendor solutions.
"What kind of ongoing support does the vendor deliver?"
Note that the question is deliver, not promise. IT wants to know it can get help when there's an issue. Look into your marketing automation vendor's culture and history around support. Bring those real-world examples to your meeting with the CTO or head of IT.
"If we aren't happy with the solution, what does it take to extract ourselves from it both operationally and contractually?"
Be sure to do your research into this question before you meet with IT. Explain how the process works and the time it would take to pull it off. Demonstrate that you've done the legwork and read the fine print.
Your discussion with IT about marketing automation will differ in tone and content than your chats with the CEO or CFO. That's why we created the free guide, How to Sell Marketing Automation to Executives. Inside you'll find more tips for tapp