The Integrated Marketing Toolkit - A strategic plan for every stage and channel

Integrated Marketing Toolkit - Restaurant Example

The Integrated Marketing toolkit is a strategic management tool. It allows you to plan, implement and monitor your marketing campaign across multiple channels. This method comes from case studies of successful growing enterprises across the globe.

(When starting it is advisable to focus on 3 channels before expanding to more)

Why should you use it?

• Gain real-time visibility into your marketing activity across various channels.

• Unify your content strategy by seeing how content can be adapted and connected across channels.

• Optimise your call to actions (CTAs) at each stage of the buyer journey.

• Align your marketing team by providing a clear picture of all customer touchpoints.

How to use it

Engaging content is essential for all marketing strategies, by visualising the customer journey across multiple channels we can enhance our call to actions.

Key questions to ask at each channel stage

1. What problem am I solving for the customer at this stage?

2. How can I adapt my content for this specific channel?

3. What performance metric best measures success at this stage and channel? (e.g., website traffic, conversion rates, social media engagement)

Buyer Journey:

Consumer behaviours are ever-evolving, consumers have multiple touchpoints, and an abundance of information available. It is crucial to deeply understand your buyer persona and their journey so you can create content that helps them along that path of awareness, consideration, transaction and retention, all while positioning your unique selling point. 

Channel:

Marketing channels are constantly growing and evolving, it is essential to understand the value each channel provides, different marketing channels come with different benefits, businesses must utilise different channels in their marketing strategies to meet their unique business goals.

The Integrated Marketing Toolkit empowers you to take control of your marketing efforts. By strategically planning and visualising your campaigns across channels, you can create seamless communication with your audience, leading to increased brand awareness, stronger customer relationships, and ultimately, a competitive edge in the market.

Integrated Marketing Toolkit - Restaurant Example

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Why the focus on buyer journey and marketing channel approach?

By mapping messages, CTAs and content to awareness, consideration, purchase and retention, you stop pushing the wrong offer at the wrong time. Prioritising the right message for the right channel at the right time, improving conversion across the funnel.

2. Which marketing channels should SMEs prioritise first (SEO, social, email, paid)?

Start with the channels that drive intent and revenue, usually search (SEO or paid) plus email/CRM, supported by social. Once those are working, layer on additional channels to increase reach.

3. How do I map my customer journey (awareness, consideration, purchase, retention)?

You define what the customer needs at each stage, then match content, channels and success metrics to that stage. The result is a joined-up plan that mirrors how people actually buy from you.

4. What are the most common mistakes SMEs make with integrated marketing plans?

Trying to be on every channel at once, jumping straight to sales messages, and not setting a metric per stage. The toolkit avoids all three.

5. Website vs Social Media where should my growing businesses focus first?

Your website should come first because it’s the owned space where you control the journey, capture leads, and measure properly. Social media is brilliant for discovery and traffic, but it should be pointing people to a page you own, not replacing it.

6. SEO vs PPC what’s better for a growing business?

PPC buys speed and testing; SEO builds compounding visibility and lower-cost leads over time. We recommend a hybrid: PPC for immediate demand + SEO/content for durable growth.

7. Email vs SMS which is better for growing businesses?

Email is better for richer content, nurturing and segmentation over time, it supports every stage in the toolkit. SMS is better for time-sensitive, high-intent prompts (offers, reminders, events) where you need instant attention.

8. PR/Affiliate vs Events which should a growing business prioritise?

PR and affiliate give you reach through other people’s audiences, so they’re great for awareness and credibility without building everything yourself. Events (online or in-person) are better for moving warm audiences through consideration quickly because you get richer interaction. If budget is tight, start with PR/affiliate for reach, then use events as targeted conversion moments.