How multi-channel is your multi-channel marketing? All too often the term multi-channel marketing is used to refer synonymously to refer to online/digital marketing across blogs, social media, email and other web based platforms with SMS messaging occasionally being included as well.
However are we missing a trick with some of the more traditional means of marketing? For example in the past year we’ve worked on some brilliant campaigns that have used some pretty wacky and creative direct mail ideas, everything from hats and scarfs to pens and empty boxes. This unique approach offers something different to a market that is saturated by tired faceless digital content that uses constantly recycled statistics and “facts”.
Whilst one is “new” and the other is “old” the objective of direct mail is the same as any digital channel in driving people onto websites and into nurture or automation cycles. Another interesting take on direct mail that we have seen is using the promise of posting something tangible to a prospect to drive up web traffic and get their contact details, after all who doesn't like free “stuff”!
And it’s not just direct mail that people are using to regain that competitive advantage, for example telemarketing is being used to drive digital engagement such as webinar sign ups or whitepaper downloads.
It may seem a bit strange to use such a direct method of marketing just to drive up digital engagement however if we think about the way that people now purchase B2B products and services we can understand why getting prospects to engage early is so important. The majority of people make the first 60% of their buying decision based on their own research therefore getting a prospect to engage with your material early is vital. Telemarketing maybe an old dog but it can be used for new tricks by funnelling the right type of prospects towards your content and into your nurture cycle.
Driving digital engagement and making sure prospects progress through a nurture process is only step one and at some point we all need to engage with our prospects and help them with the final 40% of their buying decision.
The trigger for this can be anything from following up on an event, webinar or whitepaper to engaging with a prospect to gain feedback, qualify leads or set up appointments for the sales team. After all automated lead scores can only tell you about a prospects digital behaviour for real personalised marketing you need to engage with them directly.
With all the excitement and buzz around digital it’s easy to forget about tried and tested methods such as direct mail and telemarketing. Although digital aka "multi-channel" has changed the pace of marketing by empowering buyers to make more informed decisions it‘s important to remember that this new method of marketing is best served as a holistic, truly integrated multi-channel approach.
If we think about it we can see that it is not tools such as telemarketing that need to change but rather the way we use them. By using all the tools in our arsenal both digital and traditional we can ensure that the right people are getting the right information at the right time to make the right buying decisions.
