• by Jess Nelson , January 6, 2016

An average marketer spends 16 hours a week on routine, repeated tasks that could be otherwise automated with software for a fraction of the time, according to a recent Hubspot study.

Businesses are losing one third of their work week completing manual tasks that could otherwise be streamlined and simplified with marketing automation platforms including data analysis and reporting, email marketing and landing page development, according to the study.

The inbound marketing software company polled internal customers regarding the average time they spend completing routine marketing tasks and published the survey results on the company’s blog.

Collecting, organizing and analyzing data is the most time-consuming activity, according to the study -- which found that the average marketer spends 3.55 hours in an estimated 45-hour workweek on data administrative duties.

Sending emails was the second-worst culprit, with marketers spending 3.48 hours a week simply sending email newsletters to their subscribers.

Landing pages and social media both hovered just over three hours a week in time consumption, and list management rounded out the top five with an estimated 2.65-hour time commitment a week.

“The demands of the job, the technology available, and the size of the team all have a huge impact on how you can save time,” stated Sam Balter, manager of corporate marketing at Hubspot. “But if you focus on simplifying, delegating, or even removing some routine tasks from your day-to-day, it's very possible to work a little smarter.”

Automation tools have been shown to drastically increase marketing efficiency by improving productivity, saving time and boosting return on investment.

Companies that automate lead management see an increase of 10% or greater in revenue within the first year according to Gartner, and The Annuitas Group reports that businesses that use marketing automation to nurture prospects experience a 451% increase in qualified leads.