What Is Interactive Marketing?

Interactive marketing is a big part of modern-day communications and a concept that ties into Conversational Marketing pretty neatly.

The definition of interactive marketing

What exactly is interactive marketing? It’s a two-way approach to marketing that focuses on interaction and collaboration. Instead of simply talking at your customers with a one-way stream of marketing, an interactive approach makes it a group activity.

This makes it a perfect companion for Conversational Marketing because they both focus on building relationships and having meaningful interactions that go beyond the often cold and impersonal approach of traditional marketing, which is perfect to integrate in your marketing strategy.

To illustrate the idea in a little more detail, let’s take a look at some common forms of interactive marketing and how they can be done in a conversational way.

Examples of interactive marketing

Product Launches

One of the advantages of remote digital presentations is the ability to dynamically demonstrate and launch your products in real time. 

With traditional forms of online content and sales it’s very hard to do this, and even pre recorded videos don’t quite capture the real-time nature of a good demo. Also, with static channels, your audience can’t ask questions live or interact with the demonstration.

Virtual events are perfect for this. They allow you to showcase features of products and services in real-time, so the experience for viewers is almost like actually being there in person.

Here’s how to get your virtual product launches just right:

• Be clear on the purpose and use your resources. Is it a how-to video, or a troubleshooting guide? Are you introducing a brand new product or a new feature on an existing one? Are you just clarifying a common issue?

• Rely on your sales teams and their knowledge. Sales staff are often more intimately aware of the product and its features and benefits than anyone else.

• Mention connect chatbot to broadcast — viewer can go straight to landing page via chatbot, get more viewer details

Email marketing

Reach your potential customers and get your audience’s attention by providing the relevant content they want to see. This is highly achievable through interactive marketing. Use customer data to detect what triggers your target audience, gain insights, and keep your marketing costs low. By using email marketing you can send out emails such as when they abandon your shopping cart or repeat a visit to your website.

With interactive content, you will get more conversions to your e-Commerce. Reach out to the right resources to engage with your customers and learn from customer feedback. – while applying trigger based marketing. Let your customers know that you appreciate them considering your business, and provide them with useful information or an incentive to make the sale – which is possible through email marketing.

Calculators

Calculators are super popular and highly effective. They work well for service providers who may struggle to demonstrate the return of investment customers would get while using their services. Calculators are customizable and invite customers to put their own numbers into practice to get some answers – which makes it perfect for interactive marketing.

At Whisbi, we’ve created a ROI calculator where you can discover how Whisbi’s Live Engagement platform can change your customer experience and help you sell more. You can put in the numbers of your monthly web traffic, the industry that you’re operating in, the average number of products sold per transaction and the average transaction value. Whisbi’s calculator will calculate your additional website revenue with our platform.

FAQs

FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions) have been around as long as the internet. On the face of it, they are a tool for solving common issues and questions, so users can overcome simple problems by themselves without having to bother support staff with them.

However, FAQs are also a valuable opportunity to make a closer connection with your visitors, have a conversation, and market your products.

In fact, FAQs can be seen as a basic precursor to modern-day Conversational Marketing. They were traditionally just a static list of questions and answers, but that’s still a conversational format.

Using Video Broadcasts for FAQs

Chatbots are a great solution for FAQs, but an increasingly popular option is using live video. This allows for a much more dynamic Q&A format, not only addressing existing questions but also allowing customers to ask their own questions in real-time.

Some of the benefits of live video FAQs include:

• They help address customers with specific problems outside the normal FAQ

• It allows you to expand your online video presence

• It’s a more personable and interactive kind of FAQ, helping you connect with your customers more effectively

• You can record it and share the video later

Effective Crisis Communication

In times of crisis and uncertainty, marketing teams have an important role to play – especially when it comes to incorporate interactive marketing. It’s their job to provide reassurance and help, communicate clearly and regularly with customers, and be a stable and reliable presence in the midst of fear and uncertainty. This means the marketing strategy needs to be adjusted with interactive tools.

Done right, challenging times can allow marketers to establish a strong reputation for their brand which will last beyond the current situation.

This is also a great opportunity to build interactive and conversational sales and interactive marketing into your crisis communication strategy. Chatbots can be used to handle the increased volume of customer problems and take the load off staff when offices are closed.

Crisis communication is also another area where live video broadcast can be really effective. This is because:

• It provides immediate, reliable updates when events might be changing fast

• It’s a more personal and reassuring way to contact your customers

• You can reach large numbers of people at one time

Whisbi Video Broadcast is the perfect tool for this, built for reaching large numbers of your audience with real-time video interactions: exactly where interactive marketing relies on. 

Virtual Events

Virtual, remote events are becoming increasingly popular. As communications technology develops it’s easier than ever to collaborate with people on the other side of the world through a screen.

This is a huge boost for interactive marketing — businesses can now reach members of their audience even when they’re thousands of miles away. You’re able to reach a remote audience in a much more personal way.

During the COVID-19 crisis, lockdowns and social distancing measures drove a spike in remote collaboration, as it was the only way to reach anyone, not just faraway followers.

Here are some more of the benefits of virtual events:

• They’re scalable. Unlike a packed conference center, virtual meeting rooms practically have no limit, allowing you to easily reach — and interact with — large numbers of your audience.
• They’re cheap. You don’t need to hire a venue, invest in expensive equipment, or pay for refreshments.

• It’s easy to collect data, like how many attended, how many left early, how many questions were asked, and much more. This allows you to understand your audience better and make any changes.

• They’re green. Virtual events massively cut down on transport and other energy expenditures, making them extremely eco-friendly.

Conversational marketing platforms, like Whisbi Video Broadcast solution, are built for virtual events, allowing you to reach large audiences with live demonstrations and the possibility for interactive Q&A sessions.

Polls and quizzes

Engage with your customers by providing them immediate feedback in the form of results. The reason why people complete a poll or quiz is because they want to know what score they got, or what other people answered. This is how they see if their opinion aligns with the rest of the people. The benefit of a poll is that customers will get their answers sooner, because it’s easier to complete. They don’t have to navigate through multiple steps to find out what the result is.

Personalize your content

If customers see the content they actually want to see at the right time, it can produce amazing results. Put that content in front of the customer and they will look at it – whether it’s a video, a blog post, an email – that doesn’t matter. It’s all about the relevancy. As a company, you want to create a unique experience for your customers. This will show them that you understand their struggles and preferences. Always try to add value and seek to address their pain points through the content you provide.

To make it interactive, create content that requires a specific action or incentive. Whenever a customer opens an email, takes a quiz or clicks on a pop-up, make sure you offer something in return. Offer something additional to your customers in exchange for their valuable time and attention. Examples could refer to free downloads of content they could be interested in, a discount code for your products or early access to new product launches.

Educate your customers every step of the customer journey. It has become a top priority for marketers in every single industry. Interactive marketing is a smart way to layer information for customers by delivering detailed content in increments. Tell your brands’ story by providing accurate content and easy-to-read information. Provide different layers to your audience if they want to know as much about a topic as possible.

Training your Remote Teams

So far we’ve focused entirely on interactions with customers, but conversational selling technology and interactive marketing techniques can also be used inwards, on your own company – for innovative marketers.

One good example of this is remote team training sessions.

Even before the Coronavirus pandemic uprooted the way we do business, remote work was already growing fast, with 30% of people working for a fully remote company.

One of the challenges involved in managing a remote team is training, and this is where interactive marketing can play a key role. 

Solutions like Whisbi Video Broadcast and automated Q&A sessions can be used to streamline remote training (with interactive videos) and create a collaborative and productive environment even when team members are on different continents.

Here are some tips for effectively training your remote teams:

• Use lots of personalization. Remote interaction can feel distant and isolating if you aren’t careful, so be sure to personalize your approach as much as possible. Maximize engagement and interaction.

• Make things as practical as possible. When learning through a screen it’s easier to get confused and miss important details. Demonstrate often and show things in action.

• Communicate very regularly. Check-in with your team members often, track progress closely, and address concerns as they arise.

Interactive marketing, combined with conversational marketing tools – like the use of social media platforms, is a powerful asset to modern businesses. 

It helps overcome many of the challenges involved in remote collaboration and brings customers and staff closer together even when they’re physically far apart, making it a powerful asset to a crisis communication strategy.

Most importantly, it helps build relationships and makes customers feel more connected with your brand, and that’s the essence of effective conversational and interactive marketing.