Integrated Marketing: The One-Two-Three Punch

Would you like to improve your marketing results by 74%?

That's what the one-two-three punch of integrated email, direct mail and website marketing can do for your wellness business.

A marketing campaign is simply a series of steps designed to lead the potential customer along the path of an eventual purchase. It's easy to get started if you focus on simple tools like an email newsletter or a direct mail postcard.

The following common scenarios illustrate how your wellness business can implement an integrated marketing campaign:

Who doesn't? Happy customers are a wonderful source of more happy customers. Yet blanket referral campaigns sent to all customers produce unimpressive results and can annoy your reliable but less passionately loyal customers.

The trick is to create a context where your most loyal customers act as unofficial ambassadors who bring in more prospects just like them.

Step 1: Create an online survey asking customers to rate on a scale from 1 to 10 how likely they would be to recommend your business to friends and family. Include a comment section asking for feedback on the two things they like best and the two things they'd like your business to do differently. (Get more tips in The Best Customer Loyalty Metric For Wellness Businesses and Customer Surveys: Nine Keys For Wellness Businesses

Step 2: Send an email with the survey link to current customers asking them to respond to the survey. Give them a deadline. Enter the names of all who respond by the deadline into a drawing for something desirable.

Step 3: Create a list of everyone who responded with an 8 or higher. These are your most loyal, most enthusiastic customers.

Step 4: Send that list a postcard for an invitation-only event with a desirable local speaker who'll address a topic related to your business focus. Tell them that they can invite up to two friends. Include a mouthwatering description of the tasty refreshments you'll be serving.

Step 5: Send an email to the original list in Step 2. Share the survey results and the name and picture of the drawing winner.

Need a way to stay top of mind with potential customers until they're ready to buy? Promote your monthly email newsletter with a postcard campaign. You'll capture lots of email addresses - and that gives you the ability to communicate with them about your products and services on your schedule.

Step 1: Send a postcard campaign offering your newsletter.

Step 2: Direct recipients to a link on your website where they can view a sample copy and subscribe.

Then, move the next step in the marketing process. For example, you could:

Step 3: Then send them an email invitation to a free seminar.

Step 4: Capture contact info for everyone who attends the seminar.

Step 5: Follow up with a special offer via postcard and/or email.

So your wellness business offers trial memberships, sample classes, or other "try-before-you-buy" programs. You need to avoid freeloaders, so the trick is to design a marketing campaign that targets only those who are most interested in what your business can offer. This way, you get enthusiastic customers to bring in friends, family and coworkers that are likely to be a much better fit for your business.

Otherwise, you'll fill up the place with looky-lous and tire-kickers. They want the freebies, but they're not remotely interested in actually paying for anything.

Here's a sample approach:

Step 1: Send a postcard introduction to your website, highlighting no more than three cool things that will entice them to visit your website. Do not try to sell anything on this postcard.

Step 2: Include a prominent email newsletter signup on every page of your website.

Step 3: After they've received at least one newsletter, check your email statistics and send an email invitation to your promotional event to everyone who clicked at least one link in your newsletter.

1) If the first step in your campaign is a postcard, you absolutely must start by offering something that will motivate recipients to volunteer their email addresses to you. Otherwise, your integrated marketing campaign will crash to a halt because you can't communicate via email.

2) Postcards are like darts. They can't bring down big game. Don't try to cram all your selling points on a postcard (even an oversized one). Instead, use postcards to spark interest so that the recipient wants to get more information from your website or a local event.

3) Unsolicited email is spam. Only email folks who have agreed to it. If you need to build your email list, check out 50 Ways To Get Email Newsletter Subscribers.

4) Always put your most expensive, labor-intensive marketing activities - free consultations, for example - towards the end of your marketing process, not the beginning. That way you invest your time and dollars in targeting the people most likely to buy, and buy soon.