Integrated marketing means sending a united message across all your marketing platforms. Be it social media, outbound marketing, email marketing, and more. It is one of the essential marketing strategies for any B2B company. Nowadays, in the competitive marketing scenario, being able to make an impression is difficult. In this fierce world, if you run different messages across various platforms, you won’t be able to connect with your clients.
In any given B2B sale, a prospect takes around seven to fifteen meetings with the client. The process of closing a lead takes months, and sending a unified message to a potential client will help close the deal soon.
When marketing strategies are aligned and send the same message, it tends to leave a memorable imprint on their audiences. Many companies over the years have left an impression on audiences. They made history, and audiences still remember their tag lines or advertisements. This is the power of an integrated strategy. Here are pointers to running a successful strategy.
Clients: It is important to do thorough research on who your prospects are. You need to talk to your sales team as they are your ears on the ground. They will best keep you updated as to what your clients are looking for. You should give importance to your CRM, so as to know who the key decision maker is in the company.
Campaign: Focus on the message you want to convey and make a theme and slogan. Make sure the message that you want to deliver across all platforms is the same. Consistency is the key. This will help in building your brand confidence, loyalty and will increase lead conversions too.
Cost Effective: Since all the channels run a common strategy, costs are reduced. Your teams focus on one strategy, and costs for creating collateral or new campaigns are reduced.
Select Channels: Make sure that you focus on the channels that your potential leads follow. Do not waste resources on channels that have no connection with prospects. For example, if they consume print, social, or online media. Align your advertising channels, keeping them in mind.
Utilize Analytics: Use analytics to compare results. If a ‘Call to action’ is given, see if the buyer responds to them. For example; check if the click-through rate for an email campaign has increased or if new leads in your database since the campaign started have gone up. See if any channel is not performing well, that can be dropped.
Integrated Marketing is a multichannel activity and is complex in nature. You need to have a detailed study of the channels to use, audience behavior and responses. A simple motto for running any marketing campaign is to keep experimenting with what works best. Keep measuring, iterating, and repeating for the best results.
