Multi-channel marketing (sometimes called cross-channel or omni-channel marketing) is an exhausting concept that entails extensive planning and analyzing. It takes a full creative marketing team to implement a multi-channel marketing initiative, making it critical for everyone to be in agreement about your audience, messaging, branding and overall goals. With so many moving parts, i.e. so many channels, make sure to keep one thing in mind: the consumer. Whether you are brand new to social media marketing and are hoping to reach 100 Twitter followers or are a social media savant, keep these tricks and best practices in mind as you strive to get your brand in front of the right people on all the channels.
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Do your market research
Don't dive into multi-channel marketing head first. You risk coming across as robotic, overeager and unorganized. If you're new to using multiple social platforms and mediums all at once, then take your time. Your reputation and target audience will thank you in the end.
- Are you sure of your target audience? Make sure your marketing team knows to whom your selling. If your product and brand has undergone change or transition, it could be time to open yourselves to a new demographic. Maybe you're now targeting college students and business owners. This affects the social channels you want to be using.
- How is your target audience consuming content? Not only do you have multiple channels across which to promote, your leads are consuming that content on any number of devices.
- What type of content should we be sharing on these channels? If you've done your content inventory, you should have a clear vision of the best resources you can be repurposing.
"More options mean more opportunities for marketers to connect with and engage their markets. But it also means a great deal more complexity. Keeping interactions consistent across multiple channels and ensuring a seamless experience for consumers is the new challenge," explains Lin Pophal in her EContent article, Multichannel vs. Omnichannel Marketing: Is There a Difference, and What Does It Mean to You?
Put yourself in your lead's shoes
We all fear sounding robotic as marketing becomes intertwined with technology and automation. Despite removing face-to-face contact from much of our sales processes, we need to always remember that there is a person at the receiving end of every piece of content we publish.
In a press release, PayPal's Senior Director of Global Initiatives notes, "At PayPal we've seen our mobile growth rise from less than one percent of our payment volume in 2010 to more than 20 percent in 2014"
The ability to market to leads on their desktops and mobile devices is an incredible opportunity, but one that should be planned with care. Just because consumers are making more purchases on their phones does not mean that their inboxes and social feeds should be bombarded 24/7.
"Personalize messaging whenever possible." via @SheerID
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Think about the buyer's journey and the type of content they would most likely want on any given channel and at what time of day. Don't send someone a link to a 10-page PDF during rush hour and when you're scheduling posts, be mindful of holidays. Marketing automation has been a gift to marketers, but just like every technological advancement, it needs to be handled with care.
"I'm sure there are retailers out there who are guilty of similar missteps. It's easy to see how it could happen. You finally get the ability to contact your customers online, on a mobile device, and over the phone, so you do all three, all the time!," recounts Angela Modzelewski of an experience with a dentist who over-marketed in her Business 2 Community post, When Multichannel Messaging Goes Wrong.
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