Content Programming & Automation in Marketing
“Content creation” and “automation” are used together more and more often. While automating anything before was a pain, now, with all the tech advancements, including AI (hey there, ChatGPT! Or is it DeepSeek these days?), the process is pretty easy peasy.
Today, there is no lack of tools for content automation. Yet, there is another huge challenge — how do you keep your content human enough?
No one wants their content marketing to turn into a pile of generic "Dear Sir/Madam" pieces, right? Well, if you do, then we’re sorry (not sorry) — this guide won’t be useful for you. But if you are on the other team, welcome!
So, let’s see how you can embrace automation without murdering your creative spark. And we’ll top it all with the most effective content programming strategies you could consider.
Why Would You Need Automation?
Let’s take the slower pace first. Or even better, let’s take a look at the stats:
Source: ServiceNowYes, with the current state of marketing, if you are not automating, you are slowing your business down. Who wants that?
Basically, the main reason you need automation is to avoid repetitiveness. Because the number of do-it-again-and-again tasks is constantly increasing for everyone.
❗Disclaimer:
Content marketing automation isn’t an army of evil robots that’s going to steal your job or create soulless blog posts.
Typically, these are tools — algorithm-powered tools — that handle repetitive, soul-crushing tasks. It can be anything: scheduling, posting, email follow-ups, and all the other stuff you postpone, like that Christmas dinner with your ‘favorite’ relatives.
Of course, you can also try and automate all of your tasks. Still, our honest advice is to leave all the creative work to humans. Your writers, designers, and marketers do know better (you hired them for something, after all).
The main role of automation is to help your team be more productive, not to leave you with no team at all.
What Are the Best Things to Automate?
So, what are the main processes you should automate? First of all, take a look at your business and try to detect if some operations are more time-consuming than others. It’s especially important to do this with those seemingly “easy” tasks.
Once you know the things that eat much of your team’s time (maybe way too much), think about how you can apply any automation model for that process.
Let’s see a couple of common examples.
✅ Social Media Marketing Automation
Here, we won’t talk about your typical post scheduling. Hopefully, by now, you’re using automation for this. You know, we’re already a quarter of the way through the 21st century!
Still, instead of just posting, you could create a true matchmaker between your blog and your audience. In other words, automation can trigger personalized content based on user behavior. Hello, wider reach! For example:
- Automatically share newly published content on socials.
- Automatically respond to comments and mentions.
- Send notifications to team members for new interactions.
- Generate pre-approved replies for common queries.
- Optimizing your SM posts according to the best SEO practices.
- When a user spends lots of time on a particular product page, you can automatically send a targeted email with features or offers. Please don’t go overboard here, and remember that GDPR still exists for many of us.
- After an ebook download, you can deliver customized content like blog posts or webinars.
Now imagine if you had to deal with all this by yourself.
As a result, you save time, which means more hours to brainstorm big ideas (and actually work on them).
But you also nurture your connection with people who support you. Don’t underestimate how important consistency is when it comes to building trust and engagement with the users.
👉 Tool: As for the tool, you could start by using something more beginner-friendly, like Content Studio or any similar alternative.
Source: Content Studio✅ Email Marketing Automation
Email marketing has gotten smarter. How? By integrating email marketing automation tools.
Typically, this software organizes your subscriber list, divides users into segments based on demographics or behavior, and delivers emails at the perfect time. As you understand, the functionality can get more or less advanced depending on the tool you choose.
Why does email marketing automation matter? Your brand can become a more familiar (and welcome) part of your customers’ inboxes, building stronger connections. If you don’t spam them with useless stuff, of course.
👉 Tool: A good (and obvious) example is Mailchimp. Yet, try different alternatives before settling for anything (this strategy works beyond just marketing 😉).
Source: Mailchimp✅ Abandoned Cart Emails: Reclaiming Lost Revenue
A suddenly abandoned shopping cart is a sad experience for any business, especially if it happens often.
But there is a way to return a distracted customer. And it isn’t just automation. It’s also some really, really, really good copy. We won’t focus on copy in this blog, but you can always check other blogs we have, like this one.
Now, let’s talk automation.Here is an example of Casper — they prioritize a clean and easy-to-read email design with a bit of fun copy that guides customers back to the checkout process. This is a combination of content programming and very good writing. An absolute win.
Source: Really Good EmailsThat’s not all, though. They also include customer testimonials to show that other people were rewarded with a good product for not abandoning their cart :)
Why? If you see a testimonial from others on your screen, you may understand why the product is good. Especially if they aren’t that typical. So, keep this tip in mind.
Source: Really Good EmailsDo these content programming strategies actually work? Yes. And if you’re still missing on them, you might at least try to reconsider.
👉 Tool: One of the good options to check out is Klaviyo, especially if you work with Shopify or WooCommerce.
Source: KlaviyoContent Programming Best Practices
#1 Create a Clear Marketing Automation Strategy
A marketing automation strategy is a way to help you achieve your marketing goals faster. As simple as it sounds, the execution might be more complicated than it seems.
Why? Well, first of all, you have to answer many questions before it can actually work.
What should your strategy consist of? What is the goal of automation? Which customer interactions should you automate? What specific tasks can you automate? How can you measure the success of your automation efforts?
And that’s not even all the potential questions.
But don’t get too overwhelmed. While building a working strategy is always complicated (we won’t lie), you can still make it easier. Just make sure you go through this checklist:
- Analyze your current marketing workflow: You need to understand where automation can bring you the biggest advantages. Go through the main processes and try to spot what is not working or working poorly. Then, see if automation can solve your problem.
- Define specific marketing goals: Unless you know what you want to achieve, no automation can help you. So, before you sit down to write a marketing automation strategy, make sure you know exactly where you’re headed.
- Choose automation metrics: To understand and measure the effectiveness of your campaigns, you need clear data in specific time frames. So, select a couple of representative metrics and track them over time.
- Select marketing automation tools: If you already know what needs automation, your next step is to select the proper software. The programs you choose should be a logical pick based on the points we’ve mentioned above — your workflow, goals, and metrics.
Of course, you can and should tweak this approach. Watch what works for your brand in the long run, and adjust.
🤓 Pro tip: If you want to take it one step further, try to build your automation strategy based on your funnel.
And every time you launch any campaign, think about whether there is a component you can automate. Once you manage to integrate this ‘habit’ into your usual workflow, your marketing will get much more efficient.
Source: Semrush#2 Consider the Features You Need in Automation Programs
When it comes to automation platforms, the old good question comes up — how should I choose THE one tool to rule them all?
Finding one tool for every single process is probably a slightly delusional approach. Still, there are many quite universal programs out there. So, it’s a matter of doing your research and testing.
These are some of the main characteristics you want to consider:
- Simplicity: If you're managing multiple platforms, you need one unified dashboard with a simple design. This will make your life so much more painless. Besides, most of us need proper analytics capabilities that are also easy to understand.
- Complexity: No matter what you want to automate, often, there are some obvious choices on the market. Yet, they can be quite complex and expensive. So, before you go for the obvious (aka market leaders), think if it’s actually what you need.
- Scalability: While we stand by the previous point, don’t overdo it — you still want your tool to offer more advanced plans. One of the most important questions is whether the program you choose can grow with your business.
- Budget vs. features: Start with a free or low-cost version to see if it meets your needs before investing in premium features. Yes, this is an obvious one, but still useful.
- Integrations: Check if the tool integrates with your existing tech stack. It’s no fun when your automation tool doesn’t talk to your CRM or CMS. Of course, you can then use Zapier or something like that, but do you really want to deal with this when there is an alternative?
#3 Prioritize Quality Control
Look, everyone always talks about quality. We get it. You might brush this off, thinking, 'Yeah, yeah, we have amazing quality in all our services and processes.’ But stop for a moment and think — how much can you automate without sacrificing quality?
If you aren’t 100% sure, do this:
- Develop comprehensive test cases for automated content: Identify every type of content your automation setup will handle. Then, create test cases for each format and delivery platform. Most importantly, test your automated content in realistic environments. What does it mean? Consider different variables — device type, time zones, and user behavior. For instance, check how a promotional tweet displays on mobile vs. desktop and whether links function correctly.
- Use machine learning (ML) for error detection: You can train ML models to predict how well content will affect your target audience based on historical engagement metrics. It isn’t as complicated as it sounds, just do your research.
- Incorporate human oversight: Why do you need this? Just to make sure content quality and relevance are spotless. We recommend involving your people from marketing, customer support, and sales to provide a well-rounded evaluation of the content’s effectiveness. If it isn’t effective, why do you even need it?
- Regularly review automated processes: Schedule regular evaluations of your automation tools and algorithms. They need updates — any automation can't last forever. Review their performance metrics and address any decline in efficiency or quality.
#4 Automate Just Enough
How much should you automate?
This is one of the most important questions that can roughly be translated as: “What if my content programming gets carried away?”
No, really, can too much automation ruin your brand’s voice? Yep, if you try to automate everything. Nope, if you maintain a balance and leave content creation to humans.
Use automation for repetitive tasks, but keep the human touch for things like customer complaints, unique interactions, or creative campaigns.
You can always brainstorm with AI or other tools. But ideally, anything related to topics, titles, tone of voice, and composition should be done by your team, not some programs. If they know what they’re doing, they’ll do it better.
Conclusion
So, here we go. Now, you probably understand that content programming is an absolute must. And if you’re still where your automation should stop, keep this one golden rule in mind:
Manual creation — automated distribution.
This approach benefits everyone — your readers, your brand image, and even Google’s algorithms.
FAQ: Your What-Ifs Answered
What Is Content Automation?
Content automation is the process of using tools and platforms to create, schedule, and publish content automatically. It helps reduce manual effort and provides a consistent flow of posts, videos, or messages across different channels.
Why Is Content Automation Important for Businesses?
It seems like in today’s world, content needs are constantly increasing. Companies these days have to deliver almost impossible amounts of high-quality content. That’s exactly why you need automation.
Content programming saves time, keeps your audience engaged, and helps your content strategy stay on track. You can post at the right time, build awareness, and adapt to the needs of your audience without constant manual input.
What Kind of New Content Can I Automate?
You can automate any kind of new content:
- Blog posts and social media updates.
- Email campaigns, including event invites or follow-ups.
- Videos and series for platforms like YouTube or LinkedIn.
- Posts tailored to specific holidays or audiences.
These are the main content types to automate. But you can apply programming to literally anything. For example, you can set up tools to repurpose content and turn a long article or video into bite-sized social media posts.
The key is to program it in a way that aligns with your current business needs and overall strategy.
What Are the Benefits of Content Automation?
The main benefits of content automation are:
- Time saving: No more manual posting or chasing deadlines.
- Consistency: Programs publish your content on schedule.
- Scalability: Businesses can grow without needing extra team members for every task.
- Data insights: Automation toolkit collects and analyzes data.
How Does Automation Help With Audience Engagement?
Automation helps you reach your audience at the right time with specifically created content. Other factors come into play as well. Automation tailors content to each user’s preferences and delivers messages exactly when the audience is most likely to engage.
Plus, you can reach a large audience without losing the personal touch, strengthening a connection with your people.
