At the crossroads: Traditional marketing vs digital marketing

Some people find a crossroads to be a scary place, such as encountering one on a hike through unknown terrain. It’s also thought that blues musician Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil at the crossroads. Well, at Savoir Faire, we proudly live at the crossroads – of digital and traditional marketing, that is. It doesn’t need to be traditional marketing vs digital marketing. Instead, consider traditional aligned with digital.

Sure, in today’s world, digital marketing techniques are the most effective by and large:

• Digital marketing has the furthest reach.
• Digital techniques are targeted or segmented.
• Digital messages fine-tuned to varying segments of an audience.
• Digital marketing efforts are easily measured for investment return and customers closed.

A lot of the work we do today is digital, and that digital frontier is ever evolving. Savoir Faire’s team has expertise in most digital marketing techniques, including emerging techniques. But, because of our collective background, collective experience (and a little bit because of our collective age!), our team understands why traditional marketing is still important and why those traditional tactics and techniques have value.

Traditional tactics

Some traditional tactics haven’t lost their power over the years; or, their effectiveness has ebbed and flowed vis a vis their connection to and correlation with digital techniques.

For example, direct mail may fall out of favor for a time, but it can still be a smart way to use it for connecting back to your digital campaigns, such as driving people to offers online or at a physical location. Some of us may take whatever arrives in the mailbox and flip it right into the recycling bin, but others (i.e. millennial consumers) invest time eyeing each piece of paper. And, especially in the current climate, people have time and are interested in what’s in their mailboxes.

Look at these recent postal service stats:

• 90% of millennials think direct mail advertising is reliable.
• 84% of millennials take the time to look through their mail.
• 64% would rather scan for useful info in the mail than email.
• 57% have made purchases based on direct mail offers.

Or consider a family with dogs, cats and/or hamsters getting excited to see a new pet supply shop opening that carries brands they use – especially if there’s a 25% off everything coupon attached to that piece of direct mail.

Tools such as brochures are still effective in places, and can become an important part of your overall marketing strategy. The pandemic notwithstanding, these are places to promote live events, which may be back in the future. What you present in those live engagements with your audience has to be in line with what you’re doing online.

Print ads can be useful for visibility and awareness on a consistent basis or for announcements or congratulations messaging. These traditional tactics must also be in line with your digital efforts.

Traditional marketing vs digital marketing? Can they play nice together?

Today, there are many marketing companies that do digital only. These companies may be run by younger marketers who don’t have a grounding in traditional tactics. Or, they don’t portray the importance of supplementing traditional tactics to strengthen your brand.

The team at Savoir Faire has a deep background in the traditional print world, so when we encounter a problem, we have two toolboxes we can pull from, digital and traditional. The problem may be solved by tools from one box or tools from both boxes syncing together.

For example, say you’re looking for net new leads outside of your existing contacts. An email marketing campaign via your current database is out; those people already know you. Also, many of your followers on social media may also be existing leads in some capacity. However, you may consider putting an ad in your local newspaper or advertising on a hyper local news site to attract new eyeballs. Postcards or another direct mail piece might also be a great solution for getting new leads to attend a virtual event. And, of course, digital marketing can put you in front of targeted audiences as well. 

At this moment, with so much of our lives shifting online, it’s nice to open your physical mailbox to find a piece of mail that doesn’t read as soulless. Your potential customers might actually enjoy finding something “nice” in their mailboxes right now.

Branding across the board

Having solid, recognizable, consistent branding is hugely important for your business, especially if you’re visible in multiple arenas online and offline. You do not want a potential customer encountering you in one place and not connecting it with you when they see your branding in another location, such as in a newspaper ad (traditional) and on your website (digital). We understand the value in that consistency and we share that value with our clients.

Signage is not always thought of as a marketing tactic. If your signage in your physical location does not align with your website, brochures, direct mail or online campaigns, you could be creating customer disconnect.

Today, due to the pandemic, brick and mortar signs are a hot mess. They’re handwritten. Or printed from the office printer, which doesn’t have the brand’s fonts or logos or even colors. There are multiple signs with mixed messaging. Right now, signage is a visible problem for many businesses.

It’s understandable that you’re working quickly to relay messaging that may be coming from the corporate office. It’s a bad practice to go off-brand to make that happen. Even if you need a sign today, how difficult is it to get something professionally printed from one of the big box office supply stores or a local printer? Looking professional and staying on-brand is important, pandemic or not.

We’ve always done it this way

Another current challenge is companies moving their products or service offerings online, and they’ve yet to focus on digital marketing. They’re entering the digital landscape on top of a shaky foundation. You need ecommerce but your current website cannot accommodate it.

Playing devil’s advocate again, we find the crossroads still valuable. Even if some traditional marketing elements might not stand on their own right now or even in conjunction with digital, one thing we can always count on is change.

We know the foundation of traditional and digital marketing techniques is valuable – and we’ll always pivot and adapt what we know to meet your next challenge.