Do you know how successful your direct mail campaigns really are? Direct mail is proven to work, but it’s difficult to track. Now, more than ever, there are powerful and effective ways to take your marketing to the next level by implementing an automated multichannel marketing strategy.
Multichannel marketing is a holistic strategy that blends online and offline communication channels to interact with customers. For example, a traditional multichannel marketing effort might include catalogs, direct mail, social media, mobile, and email. It’s undeniable that communicating across multiple platforms helps to maximize your customer impressions.
Fortunately, automation is transforming the efficiency of multi-channel marketing campaigns by combining physical marketing with digital marketing through a single platform.
Today, there are more modern ways to automate multichannel marketing efforts which allow you to advertise, personalize, promote, and track your marketing campaign while collecting analytical data to measure the effectiveness of your overall campaign. Here are 5 strategies you need to know.
1. Integrate Direct Mail Automation with Digital
There is no denying that direct mail works. Open rates for direct mail can be as high as 90%. As a result, 39% of consumers engage with a business for the first time because of direct mail.
All stages of the marketing funnel are improved when integrating direct mail and digital strategies – from raising awareness and interest to intent and purchasing. It also works to retain and re-engage customers for additional purchases.
Direct mail automation integrated with digital marketing combines the success rates of direct mail with the convenience of digital marketing. Integrating these services allows you to easily maximize brand exposure by utilizing multiple points of contact, such as coordinating a social media follow-up to your direct mail campaign.
This success can be attributed to direct mail’s many benefits. Direct mail is shareable and frequently discussed among family members. And when compared to email that has a lifespan of only a few seconds, direct mail has a significantly longer lifespan of 17 days, on average.
2. Use QR Codes to Initiate Engagement
QR codes are advanced 2-dimensional barcodes linked to a digital location that can be scanned with a consumer’s smartphone camera. The code allows you to put a direct link to a digital experience on a physical piece of mail.
QR codes are easy to use and are effective for driving traffic to a page. Simply generate a QR code that includes the URL address where you want to direct your traffic (your website, a landing page, your social media profile, etc.). The QR code is then printed on your direct mail marketing materials.
This method of direct mail integration improves the customer experience by providing quick and easy access to information, products, and services.
Pro Tip: Further increase customer engagement by making QR codes action-oriented. Customers could scan the code to:
- > Enroll in a rewards plan.
- > Place an order.
- > Follow a social media page.
- > Redeem a digital coupon.
- > Add an event to their calendar.
Why not get creative with direct mail integration by using QR codes to initiate meaningful customer engagement today?
3. A Dynamic Duo: Email & Direct Mail Marketing
When used together, email automation coupled with innovative direct mail software keeps customers engaged, saves time, reduces cost, and provides detailed reporting and data.
Email automation uses a set of pre-defined rules to send personalized emails to customers based on actions that they take or don’t take. It’s programmed to send the right message to the right customer at the right time – no action is required on your part!
When a customer signs up for your mailing list, new technology can combine email and direct mail automation to send a welcome email and postcard simultaneously.
Email automation allows you to understand your customers better. You discover what links they tend to click on, which pages they visit more, and the types of content they are interested in. This information can be used to plan and improve the efficiency of direct mail efforts.
Pro Tip: When a customer clicks on an email link for a new product or sale, send a direct mail piece that reminds them or incentivizes them to purchase.
4. Leverage Consumer Data for Targeted Lists
For more effective marketing campaigns you should focus on individualized advertising to consumers based on their specific traits, interests, and preferences.
In fact, McKinsey states that personalization can deliver 5-8x times the ROI on marketing spend and lift sales by 10% or more!
You can leverage customer information that is collected through automated marketing platforms and through social media to produce targeted advertising. This strategy allows businesses to curate mailing lists for both email and direct mail and helps to:
- > Build brand recognition.
- > Increase sales.
- > Save money.
- > Increase marketing ROI.
The data from direct mail automation and integrated channels is key for re-engaging customers.
A marketing concept called “the rule of 7” suggests that consumers tend to purchase after hearing or seeing a brand’s message seven times. Targeted ads, especially when utilized as part of a multichannel marketing strategy, increase brand recognition and top-of-mind awareness for potential customers.
Studies show that if they receive a re-targeted ad, 25% of customers will return to a site. And re-targeted customers are three times more likely to click on ads compared to consumers who haven’t engaged with your business before.
Customers also benefit from target lists. They receive more relevant advertising, easily find sales and incentives, discover new brands, and experience more personalized service.
5. Automate Abandoned Cart Recovery
It is very common for customers to browse a website, put an item in the cart, but not complete the purchase. The average online cart abandonment rate is about 70%. That is a significant amount of potential sales lost.
Approximately 58% of those shoppers abandoned their cart because they were just browsing or they were not ready to buy. Automated marketing presents the opportunity to re-engage these customers and close the sale. Abandoned cart software or website plugins allow you to take action when a customer abandons a cart and re-engage them. Whenever a customer adds a product to their cart, the software collects their email address and adds it to the direct mail automation sequence.
If the customer does not complete the purchase, emails can be sent reminding the customer about the item in the cart, offering support, or even providing discounts. Studies show that 45% of cart abandonment emails are opened and 50% of the customers that click through complete a sale.
There are many good options for software/plugins – some of them free – and most of them can be integrated with your automated marketing platform. Options for plugins include: ShopMagic, Abandoned Cart, CartFlows, or Retainful. Popular software options include Digioh, Keptify, CartStack, or ActiveCampaign.
Get the Best Results with Omnichannel Marketing
Most businesses today use some form of multichannel marketing. They have a website, blog, and Facebook in addition to sending emails and direct mail. However, businesses see the best results with an omnichannel marketing strategy in which all the channels work together to create a unified and efficient strategy.
Omni-channel marketing is a customer-focused strategy that seamlessly carries out your marketing campaigns across all platforms. With omnichannel marketing, the messaging changes based on customer behavior. This AI-driven approach sends the right message to the right customer through the right channel at the right time.
The benefits of an omnichannel marketing strategy include:
- > Better user experience
- > More personalization
- > Higher engagement
- > Cohesive brand strategy and identity
- > Better attribution data
- > Increased revenue
Artisan’s Echopoint: Your Omnichannel Marketing Solution
Multi-channel and omnichannel marketing campaigns can be complex and difficult to implement. Fortunately, Artisan’s Echopoint integrated onmichannel marketing system streamlines the entire process within a single platform. In addition to direct mail, your target audience will receive consistent messaging through email, social media, LeadMatch, call tracking, and online follow-up.
The results? You’ll boost your impressions across all channels!
By leveraging seven technologies, Echopoint automates, streamlines, and delivers strategic and timely communication across all channels, driving maximum brand exposure and customer engagement. The Echopoint system includes:
- > SocialMatch
- > Mail Tracking
- > Informed Delivery ®
- > Call Tracking
- > Online Follow-up
- > Social Media Follow up
- > LeadMatch
When customers visit your website, the platform will identify anonymous visitors and capture the postal addresses of those visitors not on your mailing list. This exponentially expands opportunities in future direct mail campaigns.
Using the Echopoint tracking dashboard, you can monitor your direct mail campaign and receive up-to-date analytics – including when your audience receives a touchpoint, if and how they respond, and any pertinent demographic information.
Most important to marketers, the platform tracks the effectiveness of your message and overall campaign so that you can make the right adjustments to align with business your goals. On average, Echopoint users have seen a 35% improvement over traditional direct mail efforts by implementing an omnichannel marketing strategy.
Contact us today to get started.
