Integrated Marketing: The Basics

Integrative marketing is a buzz word that is making its way around the marketing community. The emergence of digital data when in relation to marketing has seen a shift away from creative solutions towards data-driven strategies that allow marketers to more accurately predict the reach and resonance of their campaigns. Ever since big data made its appearance on the scene, marketers have not looked back. The focus on digital is necessary as it empowers marketers with insights into behaviour and performance like never before. However, integrated marketing has emerged as a fantastic way to ensure cohesion between your online and offline channels. By integrating traditional marketing approaches into your digital strategy, businesses are reaping the benefits of both worlds!

The shift away from traditional marketing mimics a change in consumer behaviour. With the digitalisation of the marketplace and the dominance of e-commerce, digital strategies are a result of the demand for a more personalised online customer experience. The information era has equipped consumers with more knowledge than ever when it comes to products and services. That means that marketing as a whole as had to adapt and get smarter.

While traditional methods of marketing relied on wide-scale campaigns based around audience assumptions, digital marketing is able to predict, track and monitor the way campaigns are resonating to the target audience with real numbers and analytics. Results and performance are tangible in the digital space making it a much safer investment for business’. However that doesn’t mean traditional marketing methods should be forgotten forever. In fact, the most successful campaigns are the ones that use integrated marketing, that is inbound and outbound strategies to create a cohesive customer experience, both online and offline.

Traditional Marketing

Traditional marketing approaches in the form of TV, billboard and radio ads (to name a few) have gotten a bad rap in our digitally obsessed marketing landscape. The negative connotations associated with traditional methods within marketing circles usually boils down to the perception that they rely too much on luck and chance. What is missing from this observation is the figures that tell us that most target audiences are informed by traditional marketing tools when making purchase decisions. Therefore a presence in this space is beneficial in not only capturing their attention but also giving your brand a sense of relevancy.

The Benefits

Outbound or traditional marketing as it’s more commonly known actually presents a great opportunity to build brand awareness among a wider demographic who would fall under the passive customer umbrella. While your digital marketing strategies are poised to drive action in active audiences, integrating some traditional methods may establish a greater sense of brand authority that attracts a wider audience. Take a print advertisement for example, although the ad may not be targeted to any one particular audience, someone may see the ad in passing and unconsciously internalise its message. Then, when a situation arises when this individual needs your product or service, they will remember the ad and therefore your brand. Establishing a familiarity within a wider demographic is crucial in cultivating brand recognition and reputation.

Digital Marketing

Digital marketing allows a business to hone in on their target audience and directly reach that audience through informed campaigns. The measurable capacity of digital tools such as metrics and analytics are poised to give business’ a better ROI. With these metrics spanning across web and social channels, it has never been easier to track how people are interacting with your brand. Digital marketing targets the potential customer at the moment of relevance, meaning when they are looking for your product (via a search engine or otherwise).

The Integrated Approach

As the digital space continues to become saturated and the fight for relevancy continues, innovative approaches are needed to reinvigorate marketing campaigns. Integrated marketing refers to the combination of inbound and outbound tools to create a cohesive, diverse, customer-centric content experience across all channels. Integrative marketing uses outbound tools to complement your digital strategy giving you the best of both worlds.This works to establish a broader sense of brand visibility and enables you to use tangible data to track your success.

How To Do It

creates the opportunity to cross-promote traditional marketing content or re-purpose content for digital platforms. An example is the prevalence of TV-style ads on YouTube or print advertisements on Instagram or Facebook. Big multinational companies have been harnessing the benefits of integrated marketing for a while now and other brands are following suit. Investing in outbound marketing doesn’t have to mean a loss of ROI, especially if you are creative about re-purposing content and using social channels to drive traffic to your campaigns.

One of the most note-worthy benefits integrated marketing has is the way it’s able to create brand cohesion across all platforms, online and offline. The most successful examples of integrated marketing will create a sense of unity that will differentiate your brand and strengthen its identity. This can be achieved by using the same slogans, colours, brand voice, tone and identity across all platforms and channels. This requires creativity and needs to be considered when formulating a campaign. A complementary approach must be employed when formulating slogans, colours and a tone that resonates across online and offline platforms.

Integrated Marketing Means Collaboration

The premise of integrated marketing lies in a brand’s willingness to collaborate. This collaborative planning should put the brand’s values at the core of the campaign and use this to curate a story that best represents this. Having your brand identity at the centre of the story you are telling will give your campaign a sense of purpose, which will guide the inbound and outbound strategies you employ. Diversification is key to integrated marketing, creating content for a broad range of audiences and platforms that all adhere to the core purpose of the campaign.

Integrated marketing may be the approach you’ve been looking for. If digital strategies are failing to gain you the traction you’ve been chasing, it may be time to consider a more inclusive strategy that combines creativity with metrics and analytics. Digital data doesn’t just have to be used to track inbound campaigns, but can be employed to monitor more traditional marketing means. Using the creative basics of outbound marketing and re-purposing it for the digital sphere is an effective way to track brand resonance whilst still achieving ROI.

Marrying digital and traditional techniques may be the answer to your marketing problems. As the digital marketplace continues to become flooded with campaigns, a more diversified approach may differentiate you from the crowd. One Stop Media is an all-inclusive digital marketing agency that specialises integrated marketing. We are Melbourne’s leading agency, meaning we are at the forefront of the latest industry approaches. Contact one of our experts to find out how an integrated strategy can be tailored to suit your business needs.