Ever hear the expression, “the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.”  We think this perfectly describes the essence of integrated marketing.  Tactics alone can drive results, but when they are used in conjunction, they can drive even better results.

Matt Landau is a case in point.  Matt is a writer, online marketer, and vacation rental operator in the historic district of Panama City, Panama. Because of the nature of his business, his marketing budget is limited and content marketing has resulted in an excellent return on his investments.

In addition to maintaining his well received blog, writing guest posts, and interviewing with major news organizations, Matt uses email marketing from iContact and press release distribution from PRWeb, and the combination of both, with great success. In fact, press releases and email marketing are vital for drumming up sales for Matt’s small business because it is easy to measure the results and see the benefits.

He has spelled out in his blog some metrics for his experience with a press release and an email.

• In one blog post, Matt discussed his success with a press release he wrote and distributed through PRWeb. It was picked up by the Miami Herald, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Boston Globe, and 120 other publications. In 12 days, his press release garnered 32,567 impressions, 528 page reads and 398 visitors to his blog, he received 14 sales inquiries and 9 bookings for 22 total nights. For his $199 PR investment, he received $3,850 in bookings and gained nearly 100 new subscribers for his blog.
• In another blog post, Matt revealed the results of his first ever email marketing newsletter. On his very first first newsletter through iContact, he experienced very positive results. Of the 205 former guests to whom he sent the newsletter, nearly 75% of them opened it, 38 responded with emails, and 12 booked stays that took advantage of a $100 per night special he’d offered only for repeat guests. For his first monthly investment of $14, he received $4300 in sales! He was so ecstatic that he sent iContact a thank you letter.

An integrated content marketing strategy is working just as it should for Matt’s vacation rental business. His press releases attract direct business and feed into his subscription list. Emails sent to his ever-growing subscriber list result in additional sales as well. His blog, the interviews, guest posts and other will continue to attract new readers, interested subscribers and even sales.

The different combination of elements for successfully integrated content marketing efforts can vary. Here are some examples for how different tactics can be combined.

• Using a blog or PR to grow email lists
• Writing emails to share helpful blog posts
• Publishing blog posts about prolific press releases
• Distributing press releases via email marketing lists
• Attracting more viewers to videos via email or press release
• Sharing blog posts and press releases via social media channels

This isn’t an exhaustive list. Though the means might vary, the goals for content marketing are to attract target consumers to your website, subscribe to your blog, sign up to your email list, contact you directly or, best of all, make a purchase. With an integrated marketing campaign, you can maximize the potential for reaching these objectives.

Photo credit:  Pintrest.

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Filed under: Marketing, Small Business by Frank Strong