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Lynn Campbell, VIP Tires & Service
Updated: April 9, 2024
How businesses can use integrated marketing to get a competitive edge
By Lynn Campbell, VIP Tires & Service
If you’ve never heard about integrated marketing, it is time to learn more. Integrated marketing is now the best way for businesses to reach various audiences, including employees or customers.
Integration is the process of unifying all aspects of corporate communication — from advertising to public relations and social media — into one coordinated strategy.
In other words, integrated marketing allows you to make sure that all of your messages and tactics come across with the same branding regardless of the platform involved. While it is important to use different platforms, whether it’s LinkedIn, cable news or something else, it is equally important for those platforms to showcase the same brand, with the same general talking points. This conveys cohesion to the target audience.
To succeed at integrated marketing and, by extension, audience engagement, it is first important to understand the various tools and techniques you can use. Here are a few examples.
Design. Just like brands are embracing “nostalgia marketing” and retro logos, reassess your company’s image to the general public and how it can be improved for new audiences. Something like your logo is your mark, so it needs to be presented consistently throughout the company, including marketing materials. That visually signals to the customer that they are indeed in “the right place.”
Social media. Post regularly on numerous platforms, such as Facebook and Instagram, and monitor comments every single day to track engagement. Not only is it important to create content on a regular basis, but companies also need to analyze how the content is performing, based on likes, retweets, and other metrics. Content creation is one thing, but content consumption is ultimately the end goal.
Public relations. Maintain a close relationship with news outlets through press releases, opinion columns, and other press materials. Grand openings, speaking engagements, and other events should be publicized to secure earned media that can then be promoted on social media too. “Integration” means that earned media can be valuable for social media, and vice versa — they complement each other.
Branded content. Come up with new ideas to demonstrate thought leadership, such as a company newsletter or magazine. At VIP, we recently launched Journeys Magazine to position employees as subject matter experts (which they are) and tell the stories behind our brand. We know the auto industry inside and out, and a company-branded magazine is one way to articulate that know-how to people who care.
Networking events. From Mainebiz-sponsored conferences to chamber of commerce meetings, engage with the local community to meet others within your industry and outside it. In-person interactions still matter, turning prospects into customers and new customers into even more loyal ones.
Employee feedback. Companies like ours, which focus on customer service, first need to recognize how the employees who serve customers are feeling. Solicit their feedback from time to time, gaining a better idea of the business’ strengths and shortcomings. Engaged employees represent the heart of your brand — VIP trains workers not only on the literal nuts and bolts of car care, but also the nuts and bolts of workplace culture.
Now that you have a better sense of marketing tools and techniques, this is where integration comes into play. Here’s the bottom line: Not everyone looks at everything you put out, hence why you need to deliver the same core messages in different ways, reaching someone who may be consuming content on LinkedIn, someone else who is active on Twitter/X, and other people.
Once you identify your target audience(s), it is time to provide the messaging “where they are at.” Segmenting the audience — platform by platform — allows a business to communicate with people where they are actually watching, listening or reading.
Above all else, a business needs to communicate leadership, whether it means providing top-tier customer service, contributing to local charities, speaking up on community issues, or remaining active in other ways. And the only way to convey leadership is through, well, the right leaders. Your leadership personifies the brand.
The best leaders humanize their brand in a way that attracts prospects and customers, while also keeping employees satisfied. Our president and CEO, Tim Winkeler, is a walking, talking brand ambassador who enjoys hopping on a podcast or attending an industry conference. His leadership is essentially a human advertisement for VIP’s professionalism, and it is very marketable at that. We are always eager to promote Tim’s words and actions across various channels, using many of the tools and techniques that I mentioned.
The most successful businesses are leveraging integrated marketing to grow their customer list, while their competitors fail to reach their full potential without a strategic foundation. It is vital to start with a plan that is both strategic and tactical, so you develop a deep and lasting relationship with your customers for a lifetime.
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