Multichannel marketing is a marketing strategy that includes multiple channels. Multichannel marketing encourages engagement within the steps of the shopping experience, building connections between the different channels of your brand. These connections are how your brand then reaches your customers.

For example, a multichannel marketing strategy could include emails reminding customers that they left an item in their shopping cart. Multichannel marketing could also lead to omnichannel marketing, a more holistic approach, which we’ll explore later.

Multichannel marketing works by fostering the connections between the various interactions of your customers. Think about the various ways your customers interact with your brand: in stores, while shopping online, in advertisements during entertainment. These are the places you can begin integrating your multichannel strategy and messaging.

Next, strategize how to make the experience both seamless and engaging for customers, while also efficiently using your time and resources. It’s also important to make sure your multichannel messaging, or the information presented in your marketing campaigns, is not repetitive during the customer experience. The goal is to improve the experience between channels such as social media, streaming ads, and physical stores.

Omnichannel marketing is a strategy that integrates all of your brand’s channels into a holistic experience for customers. Omnichannel marketing covers all touchpoints of the customer experience, beginning at the top of the marketing funnel and continuing all the way through post-purchase activities. It’s a more comprehensive version of multichannel marketing, incorporating all channels in a holistic strategy.

In marketing, omnichannel refers to a customer-centric approach that integrates all channels, delivering a unified and consistent brand experience across physical stores, apps, and websites. It ensures customers can seamlessly interact with the brand across different platforms, enhancing their overall brand experience.

“Omnichannel strategy” refers to a brand’s holistic approach to every customer touchpoint across channels. With omnichannel strategies, brands strive to give customers a consistent, cohesive experience across both digital and brick-and-mortar touchpoints. By approaching every channel as part of a single brand experience, all the pieces work together to reach audiences across the customer journey.

In addition, an omnichannel strategy encompasses the entire customer journey, from brand discovery at the beginning of the marketing funnel, all the way through to purchase, customer loyalty, and beyond. A good omnichannel strategy makes the buying journey smooth and frictionless because audiences are having the same experience with your brand, across channels.

While omnichannel and multichannel sound similar, it’s important to understand the key differences to ensure you’re implementing the right strategies for your brand. Multichannel is more of an umbrella term to include any strategy that involves more than one channel. Omnichannel, on the other hand, goes a step further to include or account for every single channel—it’s all-encompassing. Let’s dive into a few key differences that this distinction creates.

First, omnichannel experiences are a bit more complex and nonlinear. They match the nonlinear nature of most modern customer journeys. Multichannel strategies are more straightforward—they create an unswerving line between channels.

Next, while an omnichannel approach can act as an entire business model, multichannel is more operational. Consequently, a multichannel approach may lack back-end system integration – one channel can’t transfer information about audience engagement to another channel. For example, channels in omnichannel strategies can make live updates, such as sending an email reminder of items a customer showed interest in on their website, to enable more useful and relevant customer experience across these channels. A multichannel approach doesn’t allow for this type of seamless experience.

As customers engage with a brand on different channels, an omnichannel strategy gets smarter. Multichannel is static, but omnichannel is fluid. Similarly, omnichannel strategies tend to focus more on customers, while multichannel often puts the brand at the center.

Your strategy decision should be based on your overall business goals. If you’re seeking to improve specific brand objectives, multichannel strategies could help. Alternatively, if you want to improve the overall customer experience, an omnichannel strategy can help you improve the bigger picture.

Additionally, your choice also depends on your resources. It may be difficult for a smaller brand to launch a fully comprehensive omnichannel strategy, so starting with smaller steps in the multichannel approach is a good way to build momentum over time. It’s not necessary to immediately launch a website, email newsletter, social media, and marketing campaigns all at the same time, for example, and it can be beneficial to initially focus on individual silos and add updates later. In summation, there is not one right answer, nor do you have to choose only one: Multichannel and omnichannel strategies can work in conjunction too.

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