It is quite a surprise when you view a product you quite liked on a website, then log onto your social media account for your daily binge and there that item you liked is displayed on your feed, at 10% off! Or you go into a store and buy something thinking you will go back for the second item you liked.  Then when you log onto Instagram the shop’s post appears on your feed, with the second item offered to you for easy online purchase.

This is multichannel and omnichannel marketing at its best.  Involving technology, we can now reach the consumer across channels with specific appeals based on their previous consumer behaviors.  Touch points that delight and engage with offers that we know will convert, as we know where they have shown interest previously.

Multichannel vs Omnichannel

Multichannel marketing is defined as marketing to your audience across channels, online and offline, allowing you to create touchpoints with your audience in multiple different places. Omnichannel Marketing is the same, but takes more of a UX approach. It is more consumer-centric and enables the seamless integration of message and branding across channels. This ensures positive brand association and is great for brand building.

Crosschannel marketing is more like multichannel marketing with a more uniform strategy approach, for example offers are standardized as opposed to the more personalized offers of omnichannel marketing.  

The path to brand advocacy goes through four primary stages: awareness, conversion, retention, and advocacy.  The way in which multichannel and omnichannel marketing strategies work in this context are: Awareness takes place at one touch point through one channel, and then conversion takes place at another touch point through another channel. There may be multiple awareness touch points and channels before conversion, but this is the path it follows.

UX and Social Media

UX (or User Experience) is when we use technology, design and strategy to create products that meet the consumers’ needs in every way, from the sales funnel to usage, the consumer is delighted by the experience.   

During the promotion phase of creating a great user experience, when working across platforms, a key consideration is that the user expects different things from different platforms.  When they log onto LinkedIn they are in ‘work mode’ and are expecting related content, when they log onto Instagram, they expect lighthearted, topical content that they can relax and enjoy.  This is where omnichannel marketing becomes an art as the brand has to speak the language of the platform, incorporate the brand personality, ensure consistency and still appeal to the user to convert.  This is a challenge but once mastered, it converts. 

Avoiding a negative experience is very important for your strategy, if a client forms a negative association with your brand it is expensive and time consuming to repair that damage.

If we speak about avoiding a negative experience, then exactly how do we ensure a positive omnichannel marketing strategy experience?  Important factors are: convenience, consistency, relevance, empowerment and agility. 

This all sounds very complex and if you find it too confusing get a Marketing Agency with UX experience on your side, find them at Agency Vista. 

So how exactly is this all done?

An important part of omnichannel marketing is automation.  Your social media platforms have to communicate with your website, your email and more.  This is done through software integration, and can be quite complex. A technical expert is mostly needed.

Tracking: A complex issue

A challenge with multichannel and omnichannel marketing is how to track the results.  Who gets the credit for the conversion and how do we know how to budget? If the conversion takes place on a social media platform does that mean it did all the work? A combined predictive scoring tool is used that tracks each touch point.

Social Media’s value in multichannel and omnichannel marketing 

Social media has over four billion users world-wide and use is rapidly growing in popularity.  It is easy to reach your market on social media.  The platforms provide great targeting features and pixels make your audience trackable and improve reach.  Many people’s daily routine is to check their social media account, so reaching them at that touch point makes a marketer’s job easy.  Social Media also provides a very cost-effective way to reach your audience.  Creating compelling social media posts across platforms is easy with a social media management tool like Vista Social, to ensure brand consistency across platforms you can create posts, save them and compare them in the post creation tab before scheduling. 

An example of a multichannel campaign that is very successful, with social media shining as a channel, is Spotify’s Wrapped campaign.  Listeners are given a break-down of what they listened to that year and an overview of the year’s top songs, artists, playlists and more. It is run every December. 

Some of the channels used, which consist of off-line and on-line channels are:

• Email
• Social Media (paid and organic)
• Billboards
• Spotify platform itself

The way in which these channels are used:

• Email and in-app notifications are used to alert users that their “Year in music” is here. Users are directed to a landing page where they sign up.  The messaging used encourages action with clear CTA and simple, customer-focussed messaging. 
• Users are then encouraged with engaging and fun messaging to share their Wrapped Report on their social media networks. The campaign creates a social media buzz every December, with users sharing and commenting.  Spotify gains new sign-ups due to the buzz. Creating such a buzz is priceless to a marketer and is achieved because of the nature of social media platforms. 
• Spotify uses organic content to create hype before launch day. 
• Billboards are placed worldwide with messages of gratitude to the artists for the love they have spread through their music throughout the year. This adds to the emotional appeal. 

Spotify then produces a Wrapped Report aimed at advertisers, detailing the statistics on how well the campaign performed. It is quite impressive and concludes with a lead generation form.

The end result

There are two points that are so appealing to a marketer about multichannel and omnichannel marketing, the first is a more targeted approach with improved touch-points and the second is improved personalization and better UX. Consumers spend 48% more on a personalized offer and 86% of Americans swap channels throughout the day. The Purchase rate of omnichannel campaigns is 287% higher than single-channel campaigns. Using Social Media in your multichannel and omnichannel marketing strategy is important in today’s world and is becoming more important as the channels grow.  

To effectively manage your social media accounts and ensure brand consistency across platforms, Vista Social is a great option – try it for yourself, create a free account now at https://vistasocial.com/