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Omnichannel Marketing: The True Path to Scalable Success

 

If your business doesn’t adopt an omnichannel marketing strategy, you will lose to your competitors. That’s not a scare tactic, it’s a fact and the cold harsh truth of it.

As you know, digital marketing has not stopped evolving since first banner ad dropped back on October 27, 1994. Just look at that glorious eyesore!

 

 

I know what you’re thinking and yes. It was supposed to look like that. You have to give it up to Wired Magazine for launching hotwired.com. AT&T paid 30K to drop that banner on your screen! This started digital advertising revolution, which rages on today.

Let’s do a quick recap!

Brief History of Digital Advertising

In 1996 shit got real. ROI, as in “return on investment” tools hit the scene.  Double click was a game changer and D.A.R.T (Dynamic Advertising Reporting & Targeting) gave advertisers the ability to track how their ads were performing and make changes to live campaigns.

By 1999 search engines were gaining steam. GoTo.com stormed onto the scene by introducing the first pay-for-placement model. Today, they are commonly referred to as Yahoo.com.

Y2K was the year a digital deity would rise above the rest and rule them all with just one ring. Well, two, sort of. Maybe you got that. Anyway, gOOgle launches AdWords and AdWord rolls out a Quality Score model.

Poof! Click through rates become relevant as it is what now determines an ad’s placement on the search result page. Google continues to print money on this model today.

 

 

We’ll cover the differences between Google Display Network (GDN) and Google Search some other day.

So as digital advertising was evolving, so was the marketing funnel in parallel.

Oh and psst. The Facebook is live now and rolling. Just keep that in mind for a sec.

The Mighty Marketing Funnel

Back to the funnel. Those who understood and mastered it made a fucktard of cash with it. It was like having your very own Excalibur and when wielded correctly, you crushed your sales goals.

At the same time, digital content was maturing, some thought it might dilute or detour traffic from the funnel. On the contrary, they could not have been more wrong. You see, these new forms of content fit perfect within the varying stages of the funnel:

  • Blog post
  • E-book
  • Webinar
  • Video
  • Image

In fact, this content was a super steroid and helped that funnel go all crazy hulk like with powerful effectiveness.

Attract, engage, and convert.

That was the funnel in short. Ask any marketer, it was like the club scene in Miami in the 80’s…. Booyah!

 

 

Here enter social media. Perhaps the worst word ever used to describe what would become a global epidemic… I digress, that’s another topic.

The Zuck

So, Facebook manages to simultaneously ruin a generation (couldn’t resist) and launch one of the world’s most powerful advertising platform. I’ll just list some highlights

  • 2004 Flyers & Flyers Pro. Earliest on campus only ad experiment
  • 2006 The Gates Open. Anyone can join. News Feed and Share are born.
  • 2007 Facebook launches its own ad platform and goes mobile.
  • 2008 Pages is released to businesses
  • 2009 Advanced Targeting
  • 2011 Sponsored Stories
  • 2012 Mobile Ads & Facebook Exchange, Social Graph, Custom Audiences and more. Oh, and 1 billion users. Gah!
  • 2013 Lookalike Audiences.
  • 2014 We embrace Native Ads
  • 2017 Revolutionary Ad types and Ad Copy finds a new home.

Fast forward to today.

The Twitterverse is here, filled with the world’s most irrelevant self-loathing assholes.

Youtube is the world’s second largest search engine.

Instagram continues to be Facebooks best acquisition.

And our good friend Pinterest is doing its thing and not pissing anyone off.

So what hell is my point? You are. You are, right now on some or all of these channels. Do a hand check right now. My guess is you are either on your phone reading this or on your desktop with at least one, or many of those channels open on your screen. Or vice versa. You know I am right so here is my point.

Consumers are everywhere! That means your products and services must be too. Don’t kid yourself and think you will get by, with your paid media efforts on just one channel.

Why, because shit like this happens every day to many of us:

  • Algorithm changes leave you scratching your head and rethinking your strategy
  • Your best ad sets stop working out of the blue
  • CPA continually increases as you try to scale campaigns

 

 

There are two things you must understand today, right now.

  • The good old marketing funnel is dead
  • Staying within one channel is career suicide

Episode 4: A New Hope

So, just what do we do?

For starters, do not get sucked in the nonsense of debating of you whether you should be on Google or Facebook. Here is a little-known fact:

This year, the Big Two in internet advertising is expected to take half of all revenue worldwide, and more than 60% in the United States, according to research firm eMarketer.

Let’s look at some truth.

  • Facebook: Lower conversion rate, more prospects
  • AdWords: Higher conversion rate, fewer prospects

Now, let’s look at a dirty little secret.

SHH. Google and Facebook actually work better when used together!

Yeppers, it’s true. Don’t believe, then go read up on it on your own. I’m just trying to lead the horse to water, I know I can’t make it drink.

And what’s best about his dynamic duo teaming up is? Well, it is the foundation for your omnichannel marketing strategy.

You see we have proven that audience prospecting on Facebook directly impacts your AdWords ROI. We’ve also learned how AdWords campaigns convert for your Facebook audience, and how to take advantage of both ad platforms for a greater overall return.

As you come to realize this, you will need to widen your presence further. Consumes no longer buy in a linear format. Instead, they bounce around to multiple channels.

Up Your Retargeting Game

So the real name of the game becomes about mastering retargeting. Retargeting across every channel your prospect visits. As you do, your brand becomes more and more relevant.

It kind of looks like this:

And you know what, this is really nothing new.

When you see a message often enough and when your ready, you’ll take action if it’s relevant to you.

Case in point:

  • That local Comedy Show you see on that billboard
  • That beer that your buddy keeps buying when you’re out
  • That 80’s action remake that keeps popping up on the Netflix load screen

And at some point, when you need a laugh, or are thirsty, or just ready for retro action, you will take action. That’s why the big guys spend billions on advertising just to show you their brand and product. It’s just real-time remarketing brah.

This is How You Do it!

Guess what, omnichannel marketing is kind of the same in theory. Our strategy is as such, we know on average it takes 8-12 touches for someone to convert into a paying customer.

And while everyone else is pushing you to buy their product now, we take a hybrid approach to get consumers to know, like, and trust your brand.

Our process builds a digital ecosystem of touchpoints across the entire consumer journey to turn prospects into customers and, repeat buyers. As you build out your omnichannel marketing, you will, in essence, be creating a unique digital ecosystem for each and every customer your product or business serves.

And that folks, is why omnichannel marketing is the boss. You just can’t touch that shit.

I’ll summarize as such:

Use the data you already have and put a worm on a hook and toss it into Facebook. Now, refine your audiences, and learn. Take those learnings, put ‘em on a new hook and hit the GDN. Be patient. Now stay with that audience across all channels. Mix up your ad creative and styles and be sure to touch with relevant messaging for each stage of the buyers’ cycle. When the intent is high, catch that fish in search, and reel ‘em in on your web shopping cart. 

BADA BOOM!

That is how you do it. That is why you need an omnichannel marketing strategy for today and especially, for the future.