Improve Omnichannel with Tactile Marketing

Conversely, retailers may sense a new wave of spending due to pent-up demand that shoppers will pay for with Covid Relief and Stimulus dollars. There's also the fact that digital growth and improved consumer trust in digital transactions are at an all-time high.  A fact that will most likely remain through year-end and beyond.  Omnichannel marketing is the more personalized version of multichannel marketing, and we'll commence by reviewing the two marketing disciplines.


Our Quote of the Day:  "Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they realize it themselves."
— Steve Jobs


Omnichannel versus Multichannel

Omnichannel marketing provides and delivers consistent, personalized experiences for consumers across all channels and devices.  The primary principle of omnichannel marketing lies in providing a shopper-based mentality versus one that is channel-based.  The overarching goal is to create the easiest shopping experience for consumers, which means that wherever the consumer engages with the brand, they encounter a consistent brand experience.

Multichannel marketing channels, such as social media, mobile, direct mail, and physical locations are considered multichannel.  Each channel functions as a separate entity and operates independently from the other platforms or sites.  This marketing strategy works in a vacuum or silo void of different channels and is likely consummate with independent goals.  This type of multichannel marketing does not include integration with other media.  As a result, negative consumer engagement can occur due to confusing messages, which frustrates consumers and imparts an impersonal shopping experience.  This process, also more times than not, hinders shoppers, who then opt out to look for other shopping alternatives.

Why Omnichannel Marketing Supersedes Multichannel 


Marketers and brands focus on creating seamless shopping experiences, especially during the last several years, which led to the omnichannel strategy.  Omnichannel marketing leads the way for a seamless experience.  Whatever product a consumer may have viewed on a computer, laptop, or PDA, will happen with that product across multiple platforms like Instagram, Facebook, or an email, irrespective of the device.  If the product goes on sale, that same consumer will receive the same product discount across the digital spectrum. This personalized process offers consistent messaging, regardless of device, and is customized based on browsing behavior.  Multichannel fails to achieve that product consistency.  Equally important, more than a third of consumer purchases can occur across multiple devices.  This multichannel behavior supports the data that digital devices are a notable influencer for in-store sales.  It also helps shoppers who use multiple devices or platforms along the shopping journey.  In short, the cohesive shopping experience produces a higher lifetime value over those that use a single channel for shopping.



Explaining Tactile Marketing


Tactile marketing represents the relationship between the content marketing strategy and the consumer's request to interact physically with branding materials, collateral, and the product.  Tactile marketing also delivers marketing items, such as printed collateral, swag, and other promotional materials to connect with and influence a targeted audience.  The end goal is to provide a heightened brand association and experience. For example, t-shirts, pens, coffee cups, and other promotional items given out for promotional purposes qualify as tactile marketing. White papers, infographics, and case studies also provide a tactile marketing experience.  Tactile marketing introduces unique moments that reach consumers outside the digital environment, allowing the brand to transform a physical piece of collateral into a creative brand experience.


Tactile Marketing Automation

Undoubtedly, marketers and brands are aware of a recent American Marketing Association estimate concerning the daily number of ad impressions experienced by consumers.  That number has ballooned to 10,000 marketing impressions per day.  This extraordinary number of ad impressions is a well-known reason why digital interaction rates are dropping.  Given the declining digital engagement rate, the way to remain competitive is with tactile marketing automation (TMA). Direct mail marketing has risen in value for its effective reach. TMA is a physical marketing effort that helps trigger consumer behavior, making up the shortfall from a digital-only strategy.

Per earlier recommendations, it is best to create and automate a direct mail program that can send postcards or private letters with hand-written content.  Or, at least, content that appears to be hand-written. In addition, ensure that the copy includes critical data points acquired, such as the customer's name, address, and other personalized information relevant to the data.

Why Use TMA?



TMA integrates direct mail with a marketing automation platform or CRM.  When appropriately executed, it establishes a balance between digital marketing and direct mail marketing tactics, resulting in an omnichannel or multichannel approach for automated marketing campaigns.  In most cases, we suggest that omnichannel is the best approach for personalization strategies.

Brands can natively integrate TMA with various automation tools that marketers currently utilize.  Tools such as Marketo, Oracle, and Salesforce, offer aid and support extending the ability of sending customers and prospects specific targeted, personalized direct mail collateral (which is trackable) and based on digital behavior data.  Further, the data demonstrate that relevant, coordinated marketing campaigns that include tactile components can deliver, on average, a 5x increase return in comparison to campaigns that limit the marketing tactic to digital-only.

Marketers can also set up email bounce-back offers that deliver special incentives for purchasing, albeit after the fact. An important aspect worth noting is to include a postcard mailing as an integral part of the marketing strategy. A postcard mailing can be positively effective and can reach and entice consumers who are more likely to engage quicker when receiving mail over and above an email, web directive, or app notifications.

Let's not forget how important personalized content has become. Therefore it's also a best practice to send a flyer or short brochure filled with engaging user information, trends, special tips, tricks, or other helpful content.

The Benefits of Using TMA

The AMA survey mentioned earlier states that consumers are hit with over 10,000 ad impressions per day.  Reaching the emotional triggers that get consumers to add purchases to their digital shopping carts requires real-world emotions that dive into deeper brain activity.  Stimulating deep brain activity is achievable by touching and feeling physical objects, thus triggering tactile responses.  This engagement is much deeper than sowing desire on a digital device.  In addition, a Millward Brown research exercise reveals that physical objects are more likely to be recalled and can create an uplifting brand experience.

Therefore, it should be no surprise that 52% of marketers experienced a moderate to a significant uptick in campaign performance results when their omnichannel or multichannel is combined with impactful direct mail content.  This observation is backed by data across several researchers, including PFL and Demand Metric, to name just two.  Of course, getting consumers to continue with the purchase after loading the cart requires more than simple postcards. 

What Successful TMA Campaigns Require


TMA campaigns are no different from similar technologies that push relevant, timely messaging experiences, often from within the digital landscape. To create and deliver effective direct mail marketing campaigns, the following points can be a useful starting point:

• TMA campaigns rely upon customer relationship management (CRM) and other marketing automation platforms to capture insights that range across the customer journey.  These insights help create and deliver relevant campaigns.  Further, TMA can arrange direct mail delivery in combination with other marketing tactics and strategies, including email campaigns, sales meetings, ebook downloads, events, trade shows, and other meet-ups. 
  
  

• Consumers are of the mindset that brands should demonstrate relevance by speaking to their individual needs and requirements. From a data standpoint, 97% of business buyers in a Demand Gen survey state that content that talks about their company matters and 96% of the participants say they require proof of industry-specific expertise.  TMA provides brands the capability to deliver on a specific requirement that can focus a company's industry or hone in on an individual role within the business hierarchy.  These elements help to maximize relevance by tying delivery times to either single or recurring events.
  
  

• Tracking and measurability are available when engaging TMA.  Hence, physical marketing collateral delivery, engagement, and performance are as accurate as digital display ads or email marketing efforts.  Further, since brands can track direct mail response rates, they can incorporate those results into universal marketing dashboards.  This effort will offer a more profound understanding for brands to gauge the impact of physical marketing campaigns within the overall marketing strategy.​


The Net-Net


Merging TMA objectives with direct mail marketing targeting is the best marketing alternative to fight the declining digital engagement and response rate conundrum.  Buyers state that they expect more personalized experiences across omnichannel offerings.  TMA increases the engagement and response rates across the multitude of digital channels, and when incorporating an omnichannel strategy, brands are sure to reap increased sales and brand responsiveness. Thanks for reading "Improve Omnichannel with Tactile Marketing!"




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