How to Fit Email Marketing Into Your Multi-Channel Marketing Campaign
There’s a reason email marketing is as popular and successful as it is. Most people check their emails daily, many do it 3-4 times per day. It’s like showing up right on their doorstep, with them giving you permission to do – so it doesn’t have that creepy, stalker factor. The problem with email marketing is that too many marketers are abusing their privileges, making it bad for the rest of us.
Email marketing should never be used as a solo strategy, but rather combined with several other marketing techniques to create an integrated multi-channel campaign. If each channel is treated independently, there will be a lack of cohesiveness in messaging and tactics that will most likely confuse potential customers.

The Digital Marketing Funnel (Source: Moz)
Here’s how email marketing should be handled as a part of your larger marketing strategy.
- Consider where it falls in the marketing funnel
Sending an email to your subscribers introducing them to your brand and products doesn’t make much sense, unless it’s something new. Persons who have subscribed to your email list most likely did so after learning about your brand and products and wanting more in-depth information and content.
It’s important to think about what potential touch points the person receiving the email has had with your brand. Most of them will be at the Consideration stage of the Digital Marketing Funnel, so they are trying to figure out if your product is for them.
Additionally, subscribers don’t automatically unsubscribe after purchasing your product, so there’s a good chance you’re talking to persons already familiar with your product. These persons are seeking out valuable content that helps them to use your product better.
- Capture emails from all other channels
There’s no reason to limit your email SignUp form in the sidebar or footer of your website. You should maximize every opportunity from other channels to drive people to your mailing list, since this is the element with which you have the most control and direct connection with your audience.
If you use traditional advertising methods such as television, radio and print, drive that audience to a landing page that captures their information in exchange for free content. Always have a sign-up sheet or app at events and trade shows to capture the contact information of booth visitors. On your website, use your sign-up form as a call-to-action at the end of blog posts and place it prominently on frequently visited pages.
Social media campaigns should also capture emails. It’s a common belief that if you have someone as a fan of social media, they don’t need to be a subscriber, but this is far from the truth. Email marketing has been proven to be up to 60% more effective than social media.
- Segment your audience and utilize autoresponders
As mentioned above, not all your email subscribers are the same. Some are still thinking about buying your brand, others are active buyers and some probably never will buy and are just looking for free information. They can also be segmented by demographics, geographic location, website visits, previous interactions with emails and a host of other ways.
Personalizing emails based on these criteria will net you much better results than sending one generic email to everyone. This sounds quite complicated, but it doesn’t have to be. Nowadays, Email marketing companies like do all the work for you. You simply allow it to track and measure how subscribers interact with your emails and it segments them into groups based on the criteria you specify.
You can even take it one step further by crafting unique autoresponders that go out to individuals based on specified actions and events.
- Create unique content not available elsewhere
We receive mountains of emails daily, many of which are emails from businesses pitching their latest products and services. The last thing we need is another one. The reason persons subscribe to your mailing list is to get information that they can’t readily get elsewhere. If your emails are strictly hard selling, or you’re providing content that we get from all your other marketing channels, we don’t need it in our inbox.
It’s not that hard to develop unique, interesting content that your audience will find appealing. Simply thinking about the lives they lead and what tips or resources they would find useful. You can also curate content based on their interests and offer unique viewpoints on hot topic industry discussions. Make it interesting and entertaining and they’ll make the association of your brand with something they enjoy.
- Ensure message and visual elements are consistent with other channels
Even if you’re offering fresh, unique content, your branding and offering should be coherent with your other channels. Otherwise, they will be less likely to make the association between the content and your brand and the effect will be minimized.
Additionally, if you sell products online and offline, but you offer better discounts and promotions via email than you do in store, you are training customers to only buy through email to get the better deals. Of course, if this is your intention, that’s great. If not, you’ll want to offer a balance to ensure that one channel doesn’t get abandoned.
There are no hard and fast rules for how to execute an email marketing strategy or how to integrate it with other channels, but if you follow the guidelines outlined above, you will be on your way to getting great results and making your subscribers happy.