Offline Vs Online Marketing, which one is better? Multi-channel marketing is a must. It’s a well-known fact that customer satisfaction grows by 23 times when customers deal with companies with omnichannel strategies. So you absolutely should be using both offline and online marketing methods in your campaigns. Like anything in life, there are pro and cons to each. Understanding these will help you decide where and when to use each method. Below we will break down a few examples and compare the offline and online equivalents of each.
It’s Offline vs Online Marketing, let’s get ready to rrrrrrruuuuuummmmmmmble!
Direct Mail vs Email
Direct Mail and Email are used in a very similar way. They are predominantly used to get your brand in front of potential customers or give discounts or offers. They can send them out to large groups of people, and you can highly target them. So let’s compare the two.
Trust
People perceive the two marketing communications in very different ways. Direct Mail is a more trusted form of communication. A Royal Mail study found that 87% of people consider printed Mail believable, only 48% say the same for Email.
Round one offline marketing
Cost
Let’s focus on the cost of producing and sending the communications, so we don’t get bogged down with the cost of purchasing data etc. How do you create email campaigns? You can use many free email programmes such as MailChimp. Mailchimp offers a free option, and the software is straightforward and intuitive to use. Using drag and drop options, you can easily create a gorgeous email. So the cost of building and sending emails is free. Direct Mail, on the other hand, can have a higher price. You must create the design (usually using Adobe packages). If you don’t have those skills, you will need to hire a graphic designer. Then you need to print the Direct Mail and then send them. So the initial upfront cost can be high.
Round two online marketing
Lifespan
We flaunt the following fact around a lot because it drives home one of the most significant and impressive differences between Email and Direct Mail. The average lifespan of an Email is 2 seconds. The average lifespan of a piece of Direct Mail is 17 days! Plus people also file and sort Direct Mail to come back to it at a later date. All that extra time in the customers’ hands may be why the response rates of Direct Mail dwarf that of Emails.
Round three offline marketing
Response Rates
Let’s face it, in the marketing world, you’re only as good as your last campaign, and most campaigns tend to be based on your ROI. The best way to get a high ROI is to get responses. People doing something with your advert, whether that is going to a website or picking up the phone and making an appointment. Unfortunately for online marketing, it looks like offline marketing may take this round as well. Direct Mail can attract a response rate of 4.4% over emails 0.12%.
Round four offline marketing
It looks like Direct Mail has given offline marketing the early lead with superior response rates, lifespan and trust. Yes, offline marketing has an initial upfront cost, but it’s worth it for the better chances of a higher ROI. Every budget is different, and Emails do have a place. Especially to inform customers of insight news and so on. Direct Mail is better used for offers and enticing customers to respond to a call to action. Let’s get away from Direct Mail and Email and look at a few more categories in more of a broad look.
Noise
Being heard over all the noise in the digital world can be like trying to ice skate uphill. We live in a world where we have the world on our phones. We get bombarded with information every second of the day. (By reading this article you are proving my point). Social media, emails, pop-up ads ad’s at the bottom of newspapers are all constant. Digitally you can be a drop in a massive ocean. However, in the offline world, it can be a little more relaxed. Yes, you still have TV ads, billboards and newspaper adverts. But there are much less of them. So even on numbers alone, the chances of your brand standing out is higher. Plus adverts tend to last longer in the offline world. Again the Direct Mail lifespan is 17 days leaving much more of a lasting impression.
Round five offline marketing
Tracking
Tracking is where online marketing does reign supreme. With every social media platform having their own analytics and of course, Google Analytics and other similar such programs and plugins will give you all the data you could ever ask for and pretty much immediately. But don’t disregard offline marketing too quickly. There are ways of tracking offline campaigns (albeit using online tools). Custom landing pages are a great way to track how your offline campaign is doing. Especially if you only use them for your offline campaign. Another great way of tracking offline data is unique codes. Generate a code per person and then when that code is used, you can track who used it and when. Doing this gives you pinpoint accuracy for tracking offline marketing campaigns. If you are going for brand awareness and have taken out a billboard, this is much harder to track. You are limited to seeing if there is an influx of web traffic or sales.
Round six online marketing
Immediacy
The ability to respond to the customer falls directly into the wheelhouse of online marketing. Did you know that 50% of consumers give a brand only one week to respond to a question before they stop doing business with them? (Source: RightNow). Being able to respond to customers straight away over live chat, Email or social media is an excellent way of keeping that customer happy and therefore loyal. Offline marketing is slower. From receiving a lettter, responding and sending the response will take a few days. Again though offline marketing makes customers feel more valued, so maybe doing this for your customer might make more of an impact than a 140 character response on Twitter.
Round seven online marketing
Scores
The judges have cast their votes, In the fight between offline Vs online marketing, offline marketing has won 4 rounds to 3. Offline marketing has won! There is no definitive approach to marketing, either online or offline. But now we have highlighted both the pros and cons of both you can now take this knowledge forward, know when to use each method and create perfectly crafted campaigns. Omnichannel marketing uses the best of both worlds and will ensure you get the returns on investment you expect while being on budget.
PSE can help and advise you with your offline marketing campaign. Get in touch today to find out how. Did you like this blog post? Please share it with others using the links below!
