It can be tempting to think that online and offline marketing strategies exist in separate worlds with little to no overlap. Though this type of "channel-based" thinking might simplify the process of planning various marketing tactics and allocating funds for specific projects, it's also unrealistic. Research shows that consumers are influenced by both online and offline marketing strategies.

A recent report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau confirmed that multichannel campaigns can improve purchase intent by 90 percent and brand perception by 68 percent. But it's not enough to simply mash your online and offline strategies together — a consistent message is critical to a truly integrated strategy.

In today's digitally-focused world, it's tempting to devote the whole marketing budget to online campaigns in an effort to capture the attention of today's always-connected consumer. However, a report from the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) showed that such an approach might not be wise, as multichannel campaigns can improve purchase intent by 90 percent and brand perception by 68 percent.

Now that the holiday season of 2016 is behind us, the new year presents retailers with a great opportunity to take stock of the past year's events and plan for the year ahead. However, in addition to planning strategies to gain new customers in the next year, marketers shouldn't overlook a key opportunity in 2017: ensuring retailer customer loyalty.

According to a report from RJMetrics, customers acquired during the holidays have a 13 percent lower lifetime value. But it doesn't have to be this way. Marketers can take some proactive steps in the post-holiday period from January through March to boost retailer customer loyalty in the new year and make one-time customers into repeat customers.

Among the many reasons consumers seek out ad blocking software is the drag that slow-loading ads place on browsers. However, according to a report in Digiday, Google could be exploring the idea of creating an acceptable ads policy that would cut back on how much data ads require and how long they take to load. But could an acceptable ads policy really change consumer behavior?

It All Began With a L.E.A.N.

While this new initiative has impressive scope, this isn't the first time such a policy has been created in response to ad blocking. As Marketing Land notes, last year, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced its L.E.A.N. (light, encrypted, ad choice supported, noninvasive ads) program, which was intended to address some of the tech concerns that had been fueling the growth of ad blocking — such as autoplay and flashing ads. But, as Digiday points out, the IAB's program is not enforceable, so it only works if many advertisers and publishers subscribe to its standards.

Americans rarely watch TV alone. While the average U.S. consumer watches more than five hours of television every day, on average, even those people sitting alone on their couch are often accompanied by their smartphones. And those small devices are far from static or deferential to what's happening on TV. Instead, consumers are avidly using second screens to supplement their viewing experience and get answers to questions prompted by the broadcast.

As a new report from Google shows, second-screen searches have quickly come to rise not just for television shows, but even the commercials consumers are watching. Questions related to sporting events, awards shows, even products featured in a commercial are spurring smartphone searches at a stunning rate. This activity is so common that it's actually helping marketers assess the efficacy of TV ads — phone searches are providing instant and relevant feedback.

But that's just one of the opportunities marketing can seek through second-screen searches.

Deciding which media channels to use in your campaign is perhaps the most important decision you'll need to make when crafting an integrated marketing strategy. While many marketers may be tempted to focus on one or the other, data shows that multiple channels working together can produce big results. So let's take a look at how TV and digital, in particular, can drive better results when combined.

Better Together

A 2015 Nielsen study commissioned by Facebook looked at the marriage of TV and digital marketing campaigns and how well the two worked together, and the results were impressive. Campaigns that integrated digital ads on Facebook with traditional TV ads were able to grow their reach up to 15 times more than campaigns that just used TV alone. The digital component of the integrated campaign was especially effective at reaching younger audiences (18–34), who were more likely to be light TV watchers.

No matter what business you're in, it's never too soon to look ahead to the holiday season. While integrated marketing is an effective strategy throughout the year, crafting a marketing campaign that uses both TV and digital channels during the holidays is especially beneficial. You're able to reach shoppers in a cohesive way that allows screen-to-screen flexibility and, most importantly, more opportunities to convert.

Making the Leap From Screen to Screen

While you may find it challenging to reach consumers during that busy time from Thanksgiving through Christmas, an integrated marketing campaign can help you follow them from screen to screen and drive them from the TV to their computer, where they will ultimately purchase. You can craft broadcast ads that advertise limited-time deals, special offers like shipping discounts and event shopping days like Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Green Monday. Forbes points out that sales are now strong across the entire holiday shopping weekend, from Thanksgiving night itself through Cyber Monday, rather than the frenzy traditionally reserved mainly for Black Friday, so make sure you highlight your sales for the entire weekend. Even if all these things don't automatically make customers navigate to your business' website when they log on, digital ads on social networking sites, shopping apps and even on popular deal aggregate sites can help increase ad recall and ultimately drive conversions.

Whether you have a small, single-location business or a growing midsize company, building brand awareness is a vital component of any marketing campaign. It can help turn one-time visitors into repeat customers who not only recognize your business as a provider of certain goods and services, but also see your brand as important in their lives.

TV, radio, and print advertising provides marketers with broad platforms capable of reaching thousands of consumers. Digital display and video help augment these marketing strategies and build brand awareness among targeted demographics with specific messages designed to increase knowledge and familiarity with the brand. These two approaches work particularly well in tandem, since one strategy alone simply isn't effective enough in today's media-saturated world.