Marketing Intranet: How To Get More For Your Marketing Buck

Feb 22, 2021 | 0 comments

With increased pressure on marketing budgets, companies are looking for new ways to maximize their ROI. Leveraging a marketing intranet will help your organization to get more for its marketing buck. Streamlined business processes, better sharing of information, comprehensive customer information, and market research make your marketing budgets go further. Plus, you’ll find a ton of additional business benefits on offer, making it an all-round solution.

Here’s everything you need to know about marketing intranets and how to get more bang for your marketing buck.

Streamlined Processes Through Your Marketing Intranet

More efficient, streamlined processes on the marketing intranet are a great way to reduce overheads. Let’s look at a standard marketing task of preparing a product launch and explore how the intranet enhances the process.

  • product launchData Gathering And Analysis: Often requiring the input of several teams, the marketing intranet’s collaborative workspaces make this first phase of a product launch easy. All relevant data is shared and discussed in one platform. No more long meetings or emailed updates.
  • Developing Marketing Materials: Brainstorming ideas can also take place in a collaborative workspace. Use embedded Google Workspace or Office 365 apps for real-time collaboration on documents. Several employees can work on a draft at the same time. Think about all the effort that goes into collating comments on drafts and the amount of email this generates. The marketing intranet reduces these coordination costs and provides an overall speedier process.
  • Product Launch: Informing colleagues about product launches (or other key events) is simple with the marketing intranet’s corporate calendar. Alert all staff to a product launch through a ‘hot news’ button on the marketing intranet’s homepage. Publishing product information on the intranet ensures customer-facing personnel provide an immediate, knowledgeable response to clients’ queries.

So, whether it’s a product launch or a new marketing strategy, there’s plenty of potential savings to be achieved. Streamlined and collaborative processes on the intranet equal more bang for your marketing buck. This is important as marketing department budgets become tighter, companies are looking for new ways to increase their ROI.

Better Information Sharing

The marketing department is often a hub for critical company-wide information. The savings possible from better dissemination of information are significant.

With a marketing intranet, you can easily share corporate branding and company-wide marketing information. These include graphics, logos, adverts, email templates, and case studies, plus customer feedback. A document management system coupled with advanced search enables workers to source information directly from the marketing intranet. This frees up marketing staff from responding to requests and queries. Instead, they can get on with other essential marketing jobs. Also, employees can be confident the marketing intranet is current and up to date. The possibility of making embarrassing or costly errors with staff using incorrect or outdated branding materials is reduced.

The marketing intranet’s company calendar is also a great communication tool. We have all had experience with siloed departments and a lack of coordination. We know of one marketing department that scheduled a major push for a current product. However, they discovered at the eleventh hour that R&D instead had plans to release a new version next month! These sorts of scenarios arise because of breakdowns in communication and the absence of a central alert system. The company calendar on the marketing intranet prevents these costly errors from happening.

Centralized Customer Information

A primary task for marketing is to undertake market research and be the customer’s voice within the organization. The intranet is the obvious place to store and share relevant customer information. From feedback, Google Analytics, surveys, and case studies, the marketing intranet is the go-to resource. Everything is held in one central location for fast and easy access. The data also contains information on different products and services, geographical areas, or individual customers. Therefore, it will inform the work of several teams and not just marketing.

Furthermore, customers provide important feedback on your products and services. And they do so through a range of channels. It could be a Facebook comment, tweet, phone conversation, or email. Collecting all such interactions in one centrally held database on the marketing intranet ensures you have comprehensive customer profiles. And it’s readily accessible to all staff.

Integrate Your CRM Platform With The Marketing Intranet

Some companies have taken their marketing intranet a step further and have integrated it with their customer relationship management (CRM) software. Salesforce is one of the most popular CRM systems. Using a simple web form, you can provide gateway access through your marketing intranet.

Salesforce software enables you to log, manage, and analyze all activity and every touchpoint with customers and prospects. With order histories, support calls, sales leads, and customized marketing, CRM software ensures businesses provide a comprehensive service.

However, Salesforce licenses can be expensive, especially for small businesses. And to get the most out of Salesforce, you have to keep it updated with data regularly. This data-inputting task usually falls to admin and support staff. Often these personnel are not using Salesforce to its full potential. And so, rather than buying expensive licenses for support staff, a more cost-effective solution is to use an intranet web form. This ensures team members can connect to Salesforce through the intranet using the same sign-on.

Creating a web form is simple. Use the marketing intranet’s intuitive forms builder and follow the simple wizard. Next, map all the relevant Salesforce fields that you need into your customized form fields. All the data is conveyed to Salesforce through the online form. There’s no need for any complicated code to connect the two platforms. Even better, you won’t have to buy unnecessary Salesforce licenses. Marketing can continue to enjoy the benefits of the personalized, digital marketing platform that Salesforce offers minus a hefty price tag. And the hassle factor of juggling different screens, logins, and passwords is also eliminated.

Salesforce Intranet: Save Money With A Winning Combination

Better Management Of Branding Materials

Improve access to all brand assets and marketing collateral with one central platform. Workers know exactly where to go for all resources needed to support a successful campaign. Whether it’s case studies, customer personas, photos, logos, or color swatches, marketing has complete control over the management of these crucial assets. And you can easily restrict access to appropriate staff only.

Automated Marketing Processes

We have already touched on this, but automated processes are such a game-changer, they deserve their own section.

Automated approvals processes and workflows save you time. Faster and more accurate, automated processes mean staff can focus on delivering your marketing strategy. The team won’t be distracted by responding to queries or chasing updates. Whether it’s a content sign-off request or external branding query, online automated forms are more efficient and effective.

Easy Access To Comprehensive Market Research And Client Data

The marketing department is also responsible for conducting market research on behalf of the business. The insights gained help build a clear understanding of what customers really want. Market research allows managers to identify new opportunities. And it informs the process of product refinement and redevelopment. Plus, market research involves analyzing the competition to support superior product development and more efficient marketing techniques.

Market research is, therefore, a critical function for businesses. However, all too often, the results are not widely publicized throughout the company. Knowing what customers think and what competitors are doing is relevant for every member of the organization.

Publishing market research on the intranet gives all employees access to the results. Whether you are the receptionist or the CEO, staff can use the data to inform their daily work. And it ensures you deliver the right marketing messages to your target audiences. Alert employees to important market research news or updates through the intranet newsfeed and the integrated notifications feature.

Positive customer feedback and market research is also an excellent motivator for employees. Use it to build a strong company culture and a sense of purpose. This is especially important for those staff that perform supporting rather than customer-facing roles.

Idea Generation And Increased Collaboration

Marketing is all about implementing new and creative ideas to give your company a unique competitive edge.

Generating ideas is usually a collaborative process as two heads are better than one. Set up a project workspace on the marketing intranet to share insights, brainstorm ideas, and deliver effective idea management. Project workspaces simplify the process of collaborating with other departments. They make it easier to develop innovative ideas and get a product out to potential audiences. Use the project workspaces to gather feedback on a campaign, encourage problem-solving and share marketing best practices.

Google Workspace and Office 365 allow multiple staff to edit and comment on one document in real-time. Embed them directly in your marketing intranet for quick and easy access. You can also include explanatory notes and provide context directly on the intranet page. A marketing intranet not only saves time but also reduces coordination costs, helping your marketing budget go further.

Easy Collaboration With External Partners

And the benefits of the marketing intranet’s collaboration tools extend beyond the internal team. It’s possible to set up a portal or extranet to allow for easy collaboration with people outside the organization. You can share files, graphics, or images with designers and printers. Save time and hassle with the marketing intranet’s streamlined, external collaborative processes.

Align Internal And External Branding

When your business operates in several markets and involves remote workers spread over wide geographical areas, brand consistency is challenging. How do you go about ensuring your brand is consistent across every region and department? The marketing intranet offers the solution.

All corporate brand assets and materials are held in one central space. And a set of guidelines sets out for workers how these assets should be used. The marketing intranet means that colleagues can share best practice insights and knowledge on what works best for which customers. A centralized platform simplifies the alignment of internal and external branding. And it gives marketing control over the management of branding assets in all formats.

Enhanced Internal Communications

Many companies have set up a marketing blog on their intranet to enhance internal communications. Alongside internal marketing updates, you can share external blog posts so employees know what’s going out to customers. Also, use the blog to publicize press releases and product updates, and everyone in the organization will be on the same page. What’s more, the marketing intranet is the perfect company-wide platform to celebrate marketing’s achievements and successes.

Employee recognition is a great motivator for staff across the business. All the best marketing intranets publish positive customer feedback and testimonials. It’s an excellent vehicle for acknowledging employees’ efforts and demonstrating their value to customers and the whole organization.

Another option used by many businesses is a dedicated # channel on the intranet’s team chat or instant messaging feature. Use the channel for super-fast responses to employees’ queries. And keep them informed with timely updates on all the latest marketing news and events.

Marketing Intranet For Increased ROI

A marketing intranet means you can manage all marketing activities in one integrated, comprehensive digital solution.

Here’s a summary of how marketing intranets can impact the bottom line and deliver more bang for your marketing buck.

  • Improve your internal communications and celebrate your achievements.
  • Take control of brand assets and marketing collateral.
  • Centralize customer information and market research.
  • Integrate your marketing intranet with your CRM for a powerful combination.
  • Enhance collaboration opportunities with internal and external partners.
  • Share marketing information and assets more easily.
  • Automate approvals processes for more efficient workflows.

Additional Marketing Intranet Business Benefits

The scenarios that we’ve looked at in this article are not exhaustive. Nor are they confined to the marketing department alone. Other parts of your business will benefit equally from the marketing intranet’s capabilities and its advantages. These include:

  • Increased workforce productivity.
  • Improved team integration and collaboration.
  • Upgraded internal communications.
  • Less time spent on sourcing and updating organizational information.

Want to get more for your marketing buck and improve your bottom line across the whole organization? Then contact the team at MyHub. Our all-in-one intranet software comes packed with all the great features essential to an effective marketing intranet. Beautifully designed, easy to set up and manage, marketing departments across the globe use MyHub’s cloud intranets.

Sign up for a free demo or 14-day trial and get started on your marketing intranet today.

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