• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, March 5, 2024

Marketers are feeling good about themselves. Twenty-eight percent rate their marketing automation strategy as best-in-class -- a 3% increase vs. 2023, according to The State of Marketing Automation 2024, a study from Ascend2.  

Another 69% of marketers say they are successful, while only 3% admit to being unsuccessful. 

Only 9% of marketers say their customer journey is fully automated, but 32% claim it is mostly so, while 59% say they are partially there.  

In addition, 68% are increasing their marketing automation budgets in the coming year -- 14% significantly -- and 24% expect to remain the same. Another 9% are expecting moderate decreases, and only 2% are expecting significant declines.

What do they hope to achieve? 

• Identify ideal customers (or best prospects) — 47%
• Improve data quality — 40% 
• Decrease costs — 39%
• Increase personalization — 37%
• Create or optimize overall strategy — 37% 
• Integrate technologies/data — 27%
• Increase automation across the customer journey — 26%
• Identify better metrics to gauge success — 21% 

But there are challenges in using automation to improve performance:  

• Collecting quality data — 52% 
• Creating an overall strategy — 47% 
• Allocating budget and resources — 41% 
• Building effective customer buying journeys — 40%
• Integrating technologies/data — 40% 
• Identifying better metrics to gauge success — 37% 

Email marketing is the leading area for marketing automation, with 58% of marketers utilizing it for email. Although the percentage is down from 63% last year, that may be because more companies have already automated in this area.  

Social media management is second, with 49% using automation for this channel. That’s down slightly from 50% in 2023. Otherwise, few areas are automated in comparison with last year.  

One exception is SMS — it’s up to 30%, versus 28% last year.

And 28% are now using automation for campaign tracking, up from 28% in 2023. Live chat has gone from 21% to 24%. Dynamic web forms and lead scoring, both scoring in the teens, have seen increases.   

AI is increasingly being applied. The most effective areas are: 

• Targeting audiences — 45% 
• Analytics and reporting — 39%
• Email marketing — 36%
• Content creation — 34% 
• Personalization — 33% 
• Customer service—28%
• Lead generation and qualification — 25% 
• Campaign/channel optimization — 14% 

Meanwhile, 89% feel the tool they use makes it easy to build customer journeys and 30% agree strongly, with 59% saying they agree somewhat. Another 11% disagree, but only 1% have strong feelings about it.   

Ascend2 and its research partners surveyed 387 marketing decision makers. Of these, 21% are in B2B, 46% in B2C and 33% B2B and B2C equally. In addition, 23% are in companies with more than 500 employees, 33% in firms with 59 to 500 employees, and 44% are in companies with fewer than 50.