Cross-channel marketing puts your customers first, allowing you to look at all the marketing tools you use and the data you have gained from them to develop your services even more in order to create the best customer experience. It’s one of the most important elements of your marketing, yet continues to be overlooked by many business owners, who prefer to only use one or two marketing techniques.
If your brand is looking to increase customer loyalty, optimise your customer experience and also gain important insights into how your customers are interacting with your marketing methods, then cross-channel marketing can be a great solution for your business.
So let’s take a closer look at cross-channel marketing and it’s importance for your marketing plan, giving you an understanding of the benefits and how you can incorporate cross-channel marketing into your marketing strategy.
What Is Cross-Channel Marketing?
Cross-channel marketing incorporates all of the different marketing methods available and treats them as a whole, rather than as separate tools, allowing you to look at your marketing as one and helping you reach out to customers across a number of touchpoints rather than at separate places.
You can reach out to your customers in a number of ways, through email, pay per click ads, social media advertising and even SEO, all of which when used together can give you a detailed look at the customer lifecycle, helping you develop a consistent marketing message and a unique experience to your customers.
Why Should I Cross-Channel Market?
There are a number of reasons why you should consider cross-channel marketing, from short term results to long term returns on investment. Here’s a run down of some of the main benefits of cross-channel marketing;
– Improved Customer Experience
By knowing what marketing methods your customers are interacting with and how they do so, you can determine what works best, encouraging your customers to interact in a way that suits them regularly, paving the way for more engagement, more leads and ultimately more sales. An improved customer experience also make it more likely that your business can gain more loyal customers, who are likely to recommend your business to others, helping grow your business.
– Consistency
By grouping your marketing channels together you are less likely to get your marketing messages mixed up or sharing conflicting messages on separate channels, which could cause confusion and portray your brand as not knowing what it really wants. The last thing you want to do is share incorrect information on your marketing channels which could cause confusion or even frustration. Combining your marketing channels allows you to limit the chances of posting inconsistent information.
– Keeping Up With Current Behaviour
By using cross-channel marketing you can gain more insights into how consumers are behaving, monitoring which devices they are more interactive on and allowing your business to stay in tune to what potential audiences are doing. By gaining these insights you can learn more about your audience but also develop your marketing strategy in order to stay one step ahead, ready for changes in behavioural trends.
How Can I Cross-Channel Market?
Cross-channel marketing may seem like a scary challenge, however it can actually be quite simple and there are a number of ways you can effectively market across multiple platforms, without having to worry too much, here’s a few possible ways you can cross-channel market your business and your products.
– Social Media Remarketing Ads
Say your customer has been browsing your website and decides to place an item in their shopping cart, only to abandon it later. With social media retargeting ads you can show this item off to your potential customer in a new place, encouraging them to come back and actually buy the product.
– Gain Email Addresses In-store
If you own a brick and mortar store then why not try and encourage your customers to sign up to a mailing list or for vouchers and coupons, by sending them an email and even a letter or coupons through the post, you are marketing on a number of levels, encouraging people to both visit your store in person and online.
When it comes to cross-channel marketing the main goal is to your customers close, always having a method available to reach out to them on. With so many platforms now available and technology growing even more, you need to start thinking about how you can reach out to your audience in new ways. By staying on top of consumer demands and understanding how they both interact and purchase online, you can cater your needs accordingly.
