The difference between Multi-channel marketing and Omni channel marketing

Developing an online marketing experience that truly speaks to the online users is both an art and a science. Marketers need to be creative enough to imagine and test varied ways to get to the same end point. They additionally tend to use best practices and valuable data to create paths that can deliver optimal ROI. As marketers explore distinguished strategies to drive the right kind of engagement, whether to use a multichannel or omini-channel marketing approach becomes one of their most crucial decisions. While both of these approaches do involve the use of more than a single channel of communication, there are key differences between the strategies.  

Multi-channel marketing focuses on getting a user from point X to point Y by sending a common message with the help of individual channels. For instance, you might advertise a certain promo code on your website, social media platform and email newsletter with the intention of getting the target audience to use the code to purchase your offerings or at least engage with them.

Omni channel marketing, on the other hand, puts greater emphasis on getting a user to engage by offering them diverse types of branded content through connected channels. For example, the customer may get an email that announces the launch of a new product, while they receive a promo code on SMS for the same new product, and on the company app they get to see detailed advantages of using the product.

In both the marketing method, the key goal is to encourage the users to take the desired action, such as buying a product, subscribing to a newsletter and so on. The difference between both of these marketing approaches is not rooted in whether a marketing process is engaging in a few or all touch points in an online journey, rather their differences lie more in whether one perceives the user journey as heading toward a particular goal — or take a step back and let users define the journey for themselves.