Things are constantly moving, shifting, and changing within both the business and marketing worlds these days. From AI advancements to changing social algorithms to shifts in user purchasing and everything in between. This means local businesses face a constant challenge: how to stay connected to their customers while also juggling day-to-day operations. That’s where marketing automation comes in.
Whether it’s sending timely emails or personalized texts, the right automation tools can help you streamline communication, nurture leads, and keep customers coming back again and again … all without adding more to your plate.
We’re breaking down what marketing automation really means, exploring its key components (like email and text marketing), and explaining why it’s more than just a marketing buzzword—it’s a smart investment. Plus, we’ll walk through how Hibu One makes it easy for local business owners to tap into the power of automation without any extra hassle.
[Related: 3 Ways to Stay Engaged With Your Customers Without Spending More Time]
What is marketing automation?
First, let’s put a definition to the term. Marketing automation is the use of technology to manage and streamline repetitive marketing tasks to make them more efficient. This includes things like email campaigns and text or SMS marketing.
Using marketing automation tools to automate messages and marketing campaigns can increase both revenue and efficiency. This is because the tech handles repetitive tasks and frees up the business owner or employees to tackle other, higher-priority tasks.
Marketing automation works by collecting customer data through things like emails, web visits, social media, app usage, and beyond. The data then creates a holistic view of each customer.
Once that’s complete, the tech takes over. It quickly finds the right audiences and sends them personalized messages based on their profiles. With just a few clicks, you can create tailored content across email, text, social, and more. Whether you’re reaching 10 people or 10,000, it helps you deliver relevant experiences efficiently and effectively.
Automated email marketing
The number of email users worldwide is approximately 4.6 billion in 2025. That number is projected to grow to over 4.8 billion by 2027. So it’s really no surprise that 53% of small business owners in the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Australia used email marketing as the most frequent strategy for finding new and retaining repeat customers. If you’re one of those business owners already using email marketing, or you’re in the 47% that doesn’t because of the time commitment, email automation can help you out.
Email automation specifically is the use of predefined rules that trigger emails to be sent and personalize your messages based on actions customers take (or don’t take).
Here are some examples of automated email messages:
- Welcome emails when signing up for a newsletter or mailing list
- Review requests after a customer has made a purchase
- Back-in-stock notifications if a customer has shown previous interest or entered contact details
- Abandoned cart reminders to customers who didn’t complete the checkout process
And automated emails are extremely effective. They generate 320% more revenue than non-automated emails.
Automated text or SMS marketing
Email marketing may have already been on your radar, but what about text marketing? Given that there are nearly 7 billion smartphones worldwide, and 95% of Americans have access to a cell phone, it’s time to start thinking about it if you haven’t already. And just like with email, you can use automation to help you out here too.
Automated text marketing is the use of technology to send pre-written text messages to customers at a predetermined time or when a certain trigger occurs.
Here are some examples of automated text messages:
- Order confirmations or updates to let a customer know their purchase was successful and provide delivery updates
- Appointment reminders to let customers know they have an upcoming appointment with you and provide additional information about that appointment
- Sales and promotional offers keep customers up to date on specials you’re running (especially if only available for a limited time)
- Low stock alerts on popular items or items that customers have left in their cart without completing their purchase
Automated texts are perfect for more time-sensitive offers and notifications because studies show that 81% of consumers check their text messages within just five minutes of receiving them.
[Related: 3 Ways to Personalize Your Small Business Marketing]
Why is marketing automation important?
Marketing automation is important for local businesses like yours for a few reasons. It helps maximize efficiency, personalize the customer experience, and compete effectively with larger businesses … even when you have limited marketing resources.
Here’s exactly why it matters so much:
1. Saves you time and resources – your marketing team is probably small or maybe you are your entire marketing team. Whichever the case, automation tools handle repetitive tasks to free you up for other responsibilities.
2. Improves customer engagement – because of the level of personalization that happens with automation, email and text interactions feel more relevant and timely to your customers.
3. Boosts lead generation and conversion – marketing automation helps capture leads through things like forms and landing pages within email and text, then nurtures those leads with targeted, personalized content until customers are ready to buy. Research shows that lead quality rises by 80% for those using marketing automation.
4. Supports consistent branding – when you automate some or all of your email and text marketing, you help ensure your messaging stays consistent across channels. And this consistency builds trust and recognition with potential customers.
[Related: How Marketing Automation Can Save Time (and Make Money!) For Your Small Business]
Should local businesses invest in marketing automation?
If you’ve read all that and are still asking yourself if it’s worth it for a local business to invest in automated text and email marketing, then the answer is yes.
Both of these channels are highly used by your customer base with 60% of consumers preferring to be contacted by brands through email and 75% of consumers preferring to receive promotional content via SMS. Marketing automation helps you execute them successfully without taking away from other parts of running your business. And a marketing partner like Hibu can make the process even simpler, so there really is no reason not to give it a try.
[Related: Introducing Hibu Assistant]
Marketing automation is built right into Hibu One
Here at Hibu, we’ve been handling digital marketing for local businesses for decades, and we’ve launched thousands of local business campaigns, so we know exactly how important automated email and text marketing is. Which is why it’s built right into our AI-enabled, all-in-one digital marketing platform—Hibu One.
With the help of your personal, virtual Assistant, you’ll be able to stay in touch directly with more prospects and customers, without adding more to your to-do list.
You’ll gain and retain customers with an automated reputation management loop:
- Capture customer data – build your contact list and keep adding to it.
- Generate more reviews – automatically send customers review requests via email and text.
- Convert prospects into new customers – send tailored campaigns to new customers and new contacts on your list.
- Re-engage current customers – encourage repeat business with specific campaigns that target active and inactive customers.
Start generating even more revenue for your business automatically by calling us today at 877-237-6120 or filling out our short Get Started form.
