What Are the Barriers to Human To Human Marketing at Scale?

We all receive emails and LinkedIn messages requesting “10 minutes of our time.” Even though they use our first name and appear to come from someone’s personal email address, they are clearly automated — and annoying.

But against tough targets — and equipped with technology that makes it easier than ever before to reach buyers at scale — it can be easy to fall into a trap of talking to everyone in general and no one in particular, making it difficult to build genuine human connections.

So why is the case and what can be done about it?

Why is it important to be human at scale?

Automated emails — even if “personalized” by name — are, simply, well, impersonal. They get in the way of the reader; they don’t offer anything insightful; they, perhaps most importantly, do nothing to build trust between the recipient and the brand.

Automated emails may provide you with scale. But they rarely provide you with the opportunity to build human relationships at scale.

Being human at scale is important because, as marketing continues to become more digital and automated, gaining traction and trust with the person at the other end becomes more challenging.

What are the barriers to making the digital marketing experience more human?

One of the barriers to humanizing the digital experience is a lack of time and personnel to develop processes and campaigns. Other barriers can include legacy technology, integration between systems, and internal disagreements about the best approach to take.

The biggest barrier is a lack of quality data. Organizations must ensure they are targeting the right accounts and that they have a good contact acquisition strategy in place so they know they are targeting the right stakeholders.

Poor quality data leads to poor quality connections

Central to the problem of being human at scale is knowing *who* you’re talking to. Here, data matters. If the data is wrong, your marketing is wrong.

And it’s incredibly easy to get it wrong when campaigns are built quickly and lists aren’t vetted. Obvious examples can include:

• • Failing to exclude existing customers or competitors from new business lists.
  • Bought data that hasn’t been cleansed, appended or processed.
  • Leads are missing information on other communications received — for example, where sales activity hasn’t fed through to a marketing automation system, meaning active prospects get new outreach.

Beyond the above, there is also the chance that engagement data hasn’t been applied effectively.

For example, if a prospect hasn’t engaged with your any marketing efforts for several months, is your offer compelling enough for them to do so now? Likewise, if someone is researching solutions, what if their engagement data hasn’t been connected to a lead score?

All of the above can lead to poorly-targeted marketing and missed opportunities to build connections.

Automated Marketing is yet to pass the Turing Test

The reality is that despite advances in artificial intelligence, people still crave content and interactions with other people — not machines.

And while there are some simple examples where AI has helped (such as ChatGPT helping to outline content, draft initial reports, and analyze data), applying it to complex sales is still a long way off.

Marketers might be better off if they use technology to prove they are human.

Obviously, webinars are one way of doing that, but there are many others. Email can be used to send messages that carefully address known (rather than assumed) needs. Dynamic creative can be used to drive prospects to account-specific landing pages that have been crafted individually. Social engagement through personal accounts can open up individual conversations.

When you compare this to marketing in the pre-digital era, it’s clear that marketing at scale can be human — as long as there is a human behind it.

Why You Need to Be Human in an AI Era

There is still a human being at the other end and we need to engage with them in a meaningful way. But engagement is too often measured in clicks, views, and tiny digital signals that might indicate interest. But where is the moment of persuasion and connection? That takes engagement. Real. Human. Engagement.

The good news is that genuine real engagement is becoming more possible every day. Landing pages are dynamic, websites are integrating AI-powered chatbots, and there are all kinds of virtual environments where prospects can interact with your brand.