Want to drive real results by integrating print and digital tactics? Here are three ways to combine traditional and digital (“tra-digital”) marketing to amplify your message.
To get started on a successful tra-digital strategy, it is essential to understand the power of printed marketing versus digital media. Digital media captures attention and delivers your message quickly. Print marketing is both tangible and experiential. It engages our sense of touch and smell.
According to neuromarketing research1 that compared the subconscious responses, emotional engagement, and deep-brain activity (e.g., empathy and reward) of print versus digital marketing, printed advertising evoked a more robust emotional response in consumers. People can remember printed materials better than content read on a screen.
Successful campaigns start with a plan that leverages the emotional influence and other proven benefits of combined print and digital marketing techniques.
1. Combine digital ads + direct mail with geofencing.
Reach your audience on their phones, laptops, TVs, tablets, and mailboxes. Geofencing advertising creates brand awareness by getting your message in front of the people who are the best fit for your business. Combining geofencing marketing with a direct mail program creates a one-two brand-building punch!
Geofencing uses first-party data (e.g., CRM contacts, email list), mailing lists, “look-alike” audiences, and other data sources to capture mobile devices and serve digital ads to your audience. Direct mail compliments your digital program by delivering a totally custom, personalized message to the household.
Marketing Tip: Blending digital ads with direct mail marketing is a proven formula for brand awareness. For maximum performance, plan a long-term, ongoing campaign with regular digital ads and ongoing direct mail drops.
2. Create a newsletter from your best digital content.
Printed newsletters offer a platform for your brand to entice, entertain and educate your audience. Physical printed collateral cuts through the digital noise and a full email inbox by taking advantage of an empty mailbox to make a meaningful connection.
Producing a monthly, quarterly, or annual newsletter establishes your expertise in your industry and tells the reader that you are invested in the relationship. Integrate your newsletter with your digital strategy by highlighting your best-performing content. Your newsletter can be a natural extension of your email marketing and blog material. Drive readers to your website to learn more about a topic in your blog, download a digital tool, or claim promotions and discounts.
Marketing Tip: Printed newsletters are an opportunity to take advantage of the emotional influence of print. Deliver value-added and comprehensive content like case studies, industry news, trends, tips and checklists, and top-performing subjects.
3. Create a book from your blog.
If you invest time in blogging, capturing your top-performing content in print can result in a brand-building marketing piece with staying power!
Publishing your best ideas in a book positions your brand as an authority and helps establish trust. It is an opportunity to deep-dive into the subjects your audience cares about. Documenting your ideas in print conveys thought leadership and quality.
Marketing Tip: To plan a book based on your blog, create an outline of chapters from your proven content. If you’re just getting started blogging, plan a year of content in advance, and form chapters around your topics of expertise.
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Which campaigns do you think do a great job of integrating print and digital marketing? Which blended marketing tactics have delivered results for your business?
1 “Enhancing the Value of the Mail: The Human Response,” USPS Office of Inspector General, Jun. 15, 2015.
