Why Email is an Essential Part of Your Omnichannel Marketing
Personalization means telling the right story to the right person. It is the key to good customer communication. Remembering your name is difficult for some restaurants, so how can our website, social media, and shop remember it? What is the benefit?
Well, we’re glad you asked.
What is the Role of Email in Marketing?
People love getting mail, just not junk mail. Email marketing is one of the most popular communication channels. It is also one of the most important and effective tools in online marketing. With the help of email marketing, you can advertise products and services and create strong customer loyalty.
But we’re preaching to the choir, right?
Consumer intent is the holy grail of marketing your product. Email marketing to an engaged, active audience brings results -- and we are sure you’ve seen that.
“What matters in email marketing? What really matters in the context of your business goal and campaign objectives.” (Andrews Wharton)
Why is Email an Important Marketing Channel?
According to an Adobe survey, people most prefer to receive marketing offers by email. That’s more than social media, direct mail, or other marketing channels. However, most important is that the emails are personalized, especially in personal correspondence.
Interestingly enough, there is definite room for improvement in personalized email marketing. Some of the reasons people dislike email marketing?
incorrectly-spelled names
marketing for products already purchased
incorrect personal data
marketing for products they have no interest in
We can all relate to these problems. So why not turn these pain points into opportunities?
“Email often acts as an initial touchpoint in an omnichannel strategy, leading potential clients to other marketing channels on a regular basis. According to the latest Market Email Tracker report by DMA, for every $1 invested in email marketing, the estimated average return is $32.28.” (NDN Group)
What is the Role of Interaction in Omnichannel Marketing?
Having a brand exist on only one channel (or just a few) allows a company’s online marketing to be focused. This is the omnichannel approach.
Omnichannel marketing means linking the various brand channels in the best possible way. The goal is twofold. First, to create an optimal customer experience. The second is to create an almost seamless customer journey across devices and platforms. Omnichannel marketing brings all your customer touchpoints together.
Web intent data connect what you are doing online with what your customers are doing. Interactions are communicated across channels. A customer could be physically in your shop at one moment and then receive an email or push notification alerting them to a sale based on their browsing history or physical location.
Real-time interaction is just as much a part of the omnichannel marketing concept as traditional email traffic, social media, and website communication. According to Zendesk’s State of Messaging Report 2020, messaging applications help companies resolve customer queries more quickly -- an advantage for both customers and companies.
“Problem-solving, which is at the heart of our shopping, begins with researching the solution to a need. Our customer journey takes us across multiple sources of information before we finally make that last click to purchase.” (Andrews Wharton)
What Are the Three Key Characteristics of Omnichannel Marketing?
Omnichannel, multichannel, and cross-channel all describe linking multiple sales and communication channels. For this reason, the terms are often mistakenly used as synonyms. However, there are differences.
Multichannel: is best known and states that a company or brand uses different channels for sales and communication. Each distribution channel is treated separately and functions independently of the other channels.
Cross-channel: is the further development of the multichannel approach. Here, the different channels are linked with each other so new customer communication experiences are created.
In Omnichannel Marketing, data and analytics serve as the foundation. All channels are interlinked, and a consistent user experience is a focus. This can mean, for example, user information and settings stored on one channel are taken into account on another. This results in a very coherent brand experience for your customers.
Three distinct features characterize omnichannel marketing in both sales and communication channels:
Consistent messaging across all channels
Marketing reflects audience interaction across all channels
Personalization at all stages of the customer journey across all channels
“The goal of omnichannel marketing is to meet customers where they are and provide them with a consistent experience no matter which channel they’re using.” (Contentful)
Advantages of Omnichannel Marketing
Brand Experience
The interaction between the customer and the company runs smoother with an optimal omnichannel strategy. These seamless processes result in a better customer experience and, as a result, higher customer satisfaction.
Probability of Higher Conversion
The fewer hurdles consumers have to overcome to complete a purchase, the more likely it is that a conversion occurs. Omnichannel marketing makes the user experience simpler and more practical, so you benefit from improved processes.
Higher Customer Loyalty
Seamless processes make for satisfied customers and increase the likelihood of user loyalty to your brand in the long term. Personalization of offers means a better relationship with your customers. A positive brand experience helps to differentiate from competitors, significantly reducing acquisition costs in the medium term.
Better Customer Insights
The foundation of omnichannel marketing is data and analytics. Omnichannel marketing offers a good opportunity to collect data. By linking online and offline channels, you can better understand your audience. Only when the various channels are optimally connected do you have a complete overview, which gives an idea of the strategic added value.
“Consumers said they spend approximately five hours a day checking work email (three-plus hours a day) and personal email (two-plus hours a day), according to our 2019 “Adobe Email Usage Study,” which surveyed 1,002 U.S. adults in July 2019. They’re refreshing their inboxes from a variety of times and places too: while watching TV, in bed, during work meetings, during meals, while driving — and even in the bathroom.” (Adobe Cloud)
How Email Fits Into Your Omnichannel Marketing
The advantage of email is that it fits pretty much anywhere. Email marketing is flexible, easily personalized, and almost always effective. Why? Because it is one-on-one.
As emails can be behavior-related -- for example, after-sales support or event notification. -Email communication builds trust.
Campaigns are built on data.
This is the foundation of all your email campaigns – and probably your social media campaigns as well. Your omnichannel marketing gathers behavior data from your customers so use that insight to create emails that speak directly to your customers.
Segmented lists can be further segmented.
Get granular! Smart segmentation is the secret to a successful campaign. Telling the right story to the right person means your customers feel like individuals. Good segmentation means mining personalization that people want.
Remove any and all silos.
Your online teams need to talk with each other. They need to understand that you don't have an omnichannel product without a comprehensive view of your customer. You have to recognize your customers from one device to the next, from website to social media to shop. Every time we move from one device to another, Google is always asking us to log in again - or sends us emails asking if we logged in from another device. Doesn’t that make you feel forgotten?
Using the right software nails it!
Data is worthless if you don’t have the tools to use it. Your software needs to keep your customer data ready for use and move from one team to the next, from one platform to the next. You need software that leverages your data.
Your Omnichannel Marketing Deserves a Dedicated Partner
Find out how you can optimize email’s role in your omnichannel marketing today.
Andrews Wharton is known for sourcing data across the entire marketplace and curating it for your unique needs. We understand the importance of accurate, verified, and compliant data. We literally built a company on it! You can Be Certain, we know how fundamental data is to the future of your business.
