The digital world is still a relatively new concept in comparison to traditional marketing methods, only becoming mainstream in 1999 and growing even larger since then.
Practically everything we do has some form of online component nowadays, whether that is a connection to the web that makes the experience smoother and enhances it or a completely online version that offers a similar service built in an alternative way.
This shift to digital has forced companies adapt their methods of marketing in new ways that fit the world we live in now. This isn’t to say that traditional forms of marketing are dead as they are far from that. In fact they can be used together to create a marketing campaign that is even more powerful. In this blog post we are going to discuss online and offline marketing that are quite similar and how you can use them in tandem with each other to benefit and grow your marketing campaign even further!
Email vs direct mail
Email is obviously the online version of direct mail. You have addresses and mailboxes with both and both are used to send things to a recipient. How they do this though gives them different strengths and weaknesses. Possibly the most significant difference is the fact that direct mail gets a much higher open rate than emails. Most people open all of their direct mail but will avoid opening emails that are no of interest to them. Direct mail also has more of an impact today. People can receive hundreds of email every day whereas most people only get a few letters a day. It feels special as it is less frequent.
Emails come with their own benefits however. Most importantly, it is a lot cheaper than direct mail marketing. Paying to send a letter to every individual customer can result in a hefty bill. All you need with emails is a designer to create the email, the email addresses of your current customers and an email marketing service which can get a personalised messaged to thousands of clients.
Not only that but it is easier to track how effective your campaigns is going. You are able to track open rates, click through rates and conversion rates of every email where you would struggle to measure the same results from a direct mail campaign.
Combining both of these forms of marketing could be done in a few ways. You could send out an email about a specific product or to make them aware of an offer and then send a direct mail to everyone who doesn’t open the email to try and reach them that way. Alternatively you could send a letter to any customer that does open the email, clicks through to the site but doesn’t buy anything. You could use the letter as a way to try and get them to convert when they may be thinking about it.
Meaningful content vs promotional products
The connection between these two isn’t as obvious as email and direct mail but both are for a similar purpose. Promotional merchandise are products like branded stress balls that are printed with a company’s artwork and logo and are given to customers for them to use in their lives. The customer will see the branding every time they use the product with the goal being to get your company cemented in the customers mind so when they do need something that you provide they will instantly think of you instead of any competitors. They provide a useful tool that may not be entirely related to your products to the customer to ensure that they will get great usage out of in the hopes that they will purchase with you in the future.
In the digital world on the other hand, because you can’t give physical items over the internet, you have to provide something that can be downloaded instead. Things like videos, blog posts and high quality images. The intention of content like this is to give the user something entertaining or educational that is somewhat related to their brand that they will consume and either derive amusement or information. This will improve their opinion of your brand and hopefully make you more memorable in the future. Content like this is also more popular on various social media that will lead people to share the content with family, friends and followers thus increasing your audience.
The use of both items is quite similar as they are both items that you distribute to clients that don’t have to be entirely related to the company that the consumer will use in the hopes of making you more memorable and likable. Combining the two can be as easy as you write up a blog post about your branded merchandise or upload images and videos that include them. Another idea would be to print imagery or information that is related to the content you have uploaded onto the product to promote it. Use the same image that you have used online on a piece of merchandise or advertise a video by including a screen capture of it.
Social media vs traditional media
Tradition media includes advertisements that existed before the revolution that the internet. Advertisements that are shown on TV, print media and billboards are all marketing methods that would fit under this category. They all allow you to show your brand, your products and your service and make a statement as to why they should buy from you while the consumer is doing something else. Whether that be watching their favourite shows, reading their favourite magazines or driving to work. They are not going out of their way to see your marketing message but just happens to be seen by them. It allows you to reach masses of potential customers and is a very effective way to market your brand. However the biggest drawback is that it can be very expensive to get your marketing out there.
This is all very similar to social media as you advertise to people while they are doing something else. They will be browsing news from their friends and family when they will see your post or your sponsored ad. The major differences is that viewers are not always passive and can actively engage and interact by commenting, liking and sharing, and in some cases disliking.
It takes advantage of what makes the medium special, the interactive nature of the web, which can make your promotions over the web even more effective. Another benefit is that it is cheaper as you can get a successful marketing campaign without having to pay a single penny.
Merging both methods is actually a common practice in lots of marketing campaigns. You will see lots of traditional adverts that have a hashtag at the bottom that is trying to promote an online campaign and lots of businesses use social media to also show off their traditional adverts as well. Other ways you could combine these different marketing avenues is by promoting a competition that is held online with your print ads to get them exited in the possibility of winning something. You can also tell your customers to keep an eye out for your new advert on TV at this time or tell people to keep an eye out for your special billboards that are dotted around the place.
These are just a few ideas of what you can do to promote by using both offline and online promotions and how you can combine them both to make a marketing campaign that is truly special. We hope we have shown that traditional forms of marketing are not gone for good and they can be used simultaneously with digital marketing.