Marketing channels should work together to help your business succeed. Here’s how.
You’ve built your Facebook account, run Google ads, and written an email newsletter. You know that every part of your marketing plan has different needs.
But they all serve the same goal.
Supritha Shetty spent years at Facebook managing the full advertiser journey for Marketplace ads before joining Blip as Head of Product. She knows firsthand how the biggest digital platforms think about marketing, and has seen how channel-by-channel thinking has left money on the table.
For small and medium business owners looking to spread the word about their brand and gain visibility, this teamwork is key. A collaborative marketing plan allows people to see you, remember you, and then buy from you.
Key Takeaways:
- Don’t focus on individual platforms. Focus on the full picture.
- Each channel serves a different purpose. Measuring them against each other misses how they work together.
- Finding the right mix takes time, but it’s worth it.
Focus on the Full Picture, Not on Individual Platforms
Your marketing channels are teammates, not competitors.
“Many business owners tend to focus on individual channels,” Supritha explains. “It’s rare for marketing teams to blend digital presence in different formats and real-life experiences.”
Focusing on one channel might make that channel look successful. But channel success and business success aren’t the same thing. Mistaking one for the other can actually limit your growth.
The Power of the Marketing Mix
Given her product marketing background and experience managing large projects, Supritha sees marketing as one puzzle with many pieces.
According to Supritha, marketing plans should begin with the user journey: the experience a consumer has with a brand over time and across different channels.
Design for journeys, not channels
What is our user journey?
What problem are we trying to solve?
How do we know it worked or didn’t work?
These questions reframe the entire planning process.
Instead of asking “Should we spend on billboards or Facebook?” teams should ask something like “What does our customer go through before they’re ready to buy?”
Consider how someone chooses a new HVAC company. They saw your billboard during the summer when their AC was working fine. Then in October, as the weather turned cold and the heating season crept in, an online ad reminded them of your name.
In December, when their heater broke, they remembered your name and searched for you. They checked your website, read reviews, then called.
Each time they saw your name played a role in their ultimate decision to give you a call.
“Always try to gain awareness, even though it doesn’t drive immediate sales,” Supritha notes. “Grab customers’ attention before they even have the thought of buying your product. Because when they do, they’ll think of you.”
Map out the journey from when they’ll see you to when they’ll need you.
Each part of the journey should serve a distinct purpose, from awareness to a sale.
Match the message to the stage of the customer journey
If all marketing channels worked the same, you wouldn’t need more than one of them. But they don’t, so you do.
Each channel serves a different purpose, so they should each include different wording.
A billboard requires short messaging. Someone is only going to have 5-7 seconds to look at that board. You want those words to be memorable.
Organic social media channels offer the chance to get a little more wordy, so it’s a great place to tell your story.
Search ads show up when someone is already looking for what you offer. They don’t need a story, just confirmation that you’re the right choice. Keep the message direct: what you do, where you are, and why you’re worth clicking.
Without the memorable billboard, someone might not read a long social media post when they see it. Without that post, they might not click your search ad when the time comes. Without any of those earlier touches, they might be less likely to contact you when they need you.
Each piece of the puzzle represents a different stage in the user journey. Not every stage needs to make a direct sale.
Track the journey progress as whole
As the puzzle pieces that make up the whole, these different channels have different jobs, so they have different definitions of success.
- A billboard’s job is to get seen. Track reach and impressions: how many people had the chance to see it.
- A social media post’s job is to build familiarity and interest. Track engagement: saves, shares, comments, and time spent.
- A search ad’s job is to capture people already looking for you. Track clicks and conversions.
When the full funnel is working, you’ll see it in the numbers that matter most to your business: more people searching for you by name, shorter gaps between first seeing your name and making a purchase, and how much you spend to bring in each new customer holding steady or dropping over time, even as you add channels.
Those are the signals that each piece is doing its job.
Finding the Perfect Mix
“You don’t have to be in front of customers right when they need you,” Supritha explains. “But you have to start building awareness early and stay consistent over time.”
To start gaining consistent awareness, start putting yourself out there. Smart business owners know that they need to get in front of their ideal audience often, and in many different places.
Launch that social media profile. Publish that blog post. Book that billboard.
Billboards are the perfect way to get in front of your ideal audience. No matter your budget, you can add billboards to your marketing mix right away.
Frequently Asked Questions:
How do I know which marketing channels to use at different stages of the customer journey?
Start by mapping out your ideal customer’s day. Where they are, what they’re doing, and what they need at each point. Then match the channel to the moment.
Early on, when someone doesn’t know you yet, you need channels with broad reach: billboards, radio, or social media. Once they’re familiar with your name, channels like search ads meet them when they’re actively looking. By the time they’re close to a decision, direct communication (like email, or a text offer) gives them a reason to choose you.
Take the busy professional looking for a lunch spot. A billboard on their commute puts your name in their head on Monday. A social media post with your menu and a photo of the food fills in the details later that week. When they search ‘lunch near me’ on Thursday, your search ad shows up. By Friday, they’re in your restaurant.
How should I measure the success of a marketing channel if I don’t know how many people made a purchase because of it?
Marketing channels that don’t directly lead to sales are generally considered awareness channels. You can track awareness through metrics like visits to your website, how many times people search your brand name on Google, or even by asking people through a survey if they saw your ads.
Billboards are an awareness channel. If you’re testing out billboards, compare these numbers after your billboard has been live for a month to your pre-billboard baseline to see if it’s working.
Why should I invest in awareness if my digital channels are getting sales?
Oftentimes, a digital ad is the final step in a customer journey, so it gets the credit. But a billboard (or other in-person marketing tool) helped keep your business top of mind before the sale happened. You can’t control when a customer needs you. But you can control how quickly they think of you when they do.
There’s also a cost problem with relying on digital alone. Ad platforms get more competitive every year, which means you pay more to reach the same number of people. Awareness marketing (the kind that keeps your name visible before someone is ready to buy) builds brand recognition that makes every future ad work harder.
When people already know who you are, you spend less convincing them to choose you.
