Long gone are the days when advertising and PR teams worked in silos. The days when sales and marketing teams worked independently but, albeit, effectively. Today, sales and marketing, PR and advertising–and social media– need to work together to achieve a common set of goals and objectives in order to generate tangible results. And, to achieve this objective, an integrated marketing program is the best approach to take.
Integrated marketing minimizes the potential for non-performance
It’s a common pain point for businesses and nonprofits alike – allocating a high volume of marketing resources (both budget and manpower) to a strategy or tactic that isn’t delivering the desired outcome. Whether your email open rates are low or your social media engagement is sporadic, when the lead tactic in your marketing program isn’t carrying its weight, it can be challenging to justify a continued investment.
Fortunately, an integrated marketing program uses multiple channels to deliver messages and achieve goals. This multi-pronged approach ensures that a wide audience is reached, that information is shared in multiple formats (which allows recipients to digest information in the format that they prefer most) and that one low performing program component doesn’t impede the ability to achieve marketing success. With multiple communication and marketing tactics at play, brands can easily reallocate resources to capitalize on what is working best without having to ‘go dark’ while they restrategize.
Integrated marketing programs are highly measurable
It wasn’t that long ago that circulation and ad equivalency were the only quantifiable ways to measure the success of advertising and media relations. The advent of social media and growth of digital marketing channels now presents a wide array of tools for monitoring and measuring success. Curious if your digital advertising is driving website traffic? Check Google Analytics. Wondering what time of day is best for sending marketing emails? Check the open rates and click rates on your recent e-communications. Trying to hone your social media content strategy? See which posts have generated the most likes and shares.
With the ability to measure results in real-time, brands can be nimble and adjust their marketing programs as appropriate to maximize returns. The ability to measure not only outputs, but also outcomes, makes it much easier to show leadership, boards of directors and other key stakeholders what is and is not working.
Integrated marketing programs allow companies to showcase multiple facets of their organization
Is your production process unique? Is your CEO a wealth of knowledge on timely business topics? Do you host educational events that you want to share with a broader audience? Thanks to YouTube, Vimeo and Instagram (Stories) to name a few, video can play a leading role in your integrated marketing program.
Are you a B2C company whose products are eye-catching and best shown through photos? Instagram can help.
Integrated marketing programs seamlessly blend content and creativity to educate, engage and activate stakeholders through a variety of communication channels. The unique format of each platform allows organizations to tell their story through multiple formats and showcase everything from products and services to culture, team building and the like.
When creating your integrated marketing strategy, focus on both leveraging the platforms that reach the highest volume of stakeholders as well as those whose content/formatting requirements are best suited to the information you are looking to share. Commit to implementing a program that aligns both sales and marketing, and is geared towards helping achieve your organization’s overall strategic goals.
