Marketing Tips: Cross Channel Marketing

What Is Cross Channel Marketing?
Every successful business uses multichannel marketing, utilizing more than one channel in their marketing mix, for example direct mail, email, text messages, and online social networks. Cross channel marketing uses one or more marketing channels to promote a marketing initiative that uses another channel.


Increase Direct Mail Response and ROI Through Online Channels
A perfect example of using a cross channel marketing approach is pre-publicizing a direct mailing though online channels. Use your Facebook, Twitter, email and text messaging to tell people to look in the mail for the soon to be arriving piece. This method can be used to promote the mailing of a product catalog, season brochure, or donation request.

Timing is critical with integrated cross channel marketing; make sure that the online publicity is distributed before the direct mail piece is expected to arrive.


Increase Traffic to Your Online Content With Direct Mail
Conversely, one of the best ways to publicize your online content is using your printed marketing collateral. You may have people in your direct mail database that have not visited your web site, Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter pages. Let them know about your online presence by giving them a link!

One way to accomplish this is by including a QR Code on your direct mail piece that links to your online content. QR Codes can link to not just your web site, but to any URL including Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter pages.

You can track the number of times people go to the web page via the QR Code by using a service like bit.ly. Bit.ly shortens long URLs and tracks the number times people visit a link via the shortened URL. Using a shortened URL has the additional advantage of having less data so the QR Code image is easier to read by smartphones. Here is an example QR Code using a bit.ly shortened URL to Wilson Printing's Twitter page.

QR Code to Wilson Printing's Twitter page using a bit.ly shortened URL http://bit.ly/ijWaoZ

A great example of using print marketing collateral to increase online traffic is in the Forms+Surfaces Architectural Surfaces catalog we profiled in our last newsletter. They included a QR Code on their Additional Resources page that links to a web page to sign up for their eNews.

Forms+Surfaces catalog with QR Code to web site.

Important! Make sure that the web page you are directing the customer's smartphone to is compatible with smartphones! When creating and testing QR Codes, smartphones have difficulty scanning a CRT monitor, so print the QR Code to test. Also, not everyone has access to a smartphone with a QR Code scanner application, so make sure you include the actual URL address wherever you use a QR Code in a printed piece and link the graphic if it is online.

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