Blogger insights this week: Tackling integrated marketing in the digital age

If you’ve been around marketing as long as I have, you will remember integrated marketing communications as the Holy Grail of strategic planning. It promised greater brand awareness and cost efficiencies by integrating messages with precision deployment throughout the marketing mix: print, media, direct response and public relations.

It was a tough nut to crack back then. More so today.

Just getting up to speed with the many digital marketing options we have available has pushed the idea of integration down the priority list for many. But it is seeing a renaissance with some marketers.

The ‘converged media’ camp is focused on integrating channels by looking at optimizing the mix of paid, earned and owned media. Lead and demand generation specialists are integrating content messaging through the buyer’s decision process. And others are approaching integration through the optimization of content, search and social media marketing.

Two of my favorite posts from this week focus on some of these aspects of marketing integration. They are in the spotlight.

Spotlight: Integrated digital marketing

How marketers can drive engagement at every phase on the purchase cycle via Econsultancy

This post by Matthew Kates for Econsultancy takes a deep dive into the deployment of content that builds engagement and loyalty through the customer buying journey. It shows examples of how several retailers are executing content online, via mobile and in-person interactions.

The key to increasing engagement before, during and after the purchase, writes Kates, is to integrate your message and your communication channels. “Going beyond traditional campaigns, especially by incorporating data, mobile, and in-store tactics, can help your brand guarantee valuable engagement with consumers and drive customer loyalty.”

Read the full post to see how some marketers are doing it.

3 ways to raise the bar on your social media and content marketing strategy via Top Rank

Lee Odden’s Optimize is one of the few books I’ve seen that updates the idea of integrated marketing for today. Its examination of how to integrate SEO, social media and content marketing is must reading for every marketer.

In this post he lays out strategies for building social amplification into your content plan. Two tactics from this section are to involve your community in content creation and to develop content assets that build upon each other to form a whole.

The key to success is remembering that integration begins with your strategic plan, not after you’ve started implementing tactics.

Your effort in planning an integrated approach will pay off. Writes Odden:

“When marketers approach content marketing and social media as a symbiotic relationship, there’s no limit to the business goals you can achieve.”

He has a lot more insights to share on this topic, so be sure to read the rest here.

Other blogger highlights from the Web

Integrated Marketing

How to use emails to delight your new blog subscribers via Hubspot

How Pinterest leads to sales via Internet Retailer

Why video in email is the perfect marketing combo via Exact Target

Social Media

Paper: The latest step in Facebook’s native ad master plan via Contently

Say goodbye to one-way social marketing via iMediaConnection

How should business adapt to Facebook Paper app? via Ducttape Marketing

Content Marketing

How to make your website more click-worthy with goals, words and common sense via KISS Metrics

How to brainstorm content ideas in a fast, easy, visual way via Hubspot

7 useful Google tips for bloggers and publishers via Econsultancy

Should Coca-Cola quit its content marketing journey?  via Sparksheet

Why hard-working bloggers fail via Inc

Has content marketing hijacked content strategy? via Content Marketing Institute

Response Marketing

13 tips for producing high-converting videos for your business via Visual Web Optimizer

How to turn your online visitors into customers without them even knowing via KISS Metrics

Marketing for sales: 7 fixes for helping you close the deal via Crazy Egg

Is driving traffic to your website driving customers away? via Top Rank

When concise marketing copy converts better via Quick Sprout

Branding

Remember how awesome nostalgia marketing was? via Copypress

6 reasons your brand needs a social voice via MarketingProfs

5 content design lessons for brand publishers via Contently

How and why you should invest in getting good testimonials via Conversion XL

7 ways to awe your audience with the element of surprise via MarketingProfs

Newswire

Digital Marketing Weekly via JGO Digital

The top digital marketing news around the Web this week: Facebook releases Paper, its news reader and Flipboard rival; New Card Analytics from Twitter tracks key data on impressions; Google ends Motorola misadventure; Pinterest previews ‘Interest’ discovery tool; Bots will cause $11.6 billion in advertising waste this year; Plus more news and information.

Visual Marketing

Credit: tomfishburne.com

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