However, simply highlighting the need to combine channels to the consumer belies the complexity of the task. Different media have different penetration levels. As 51% of British homes now have broadband connection, it follows that a company is trying to reach a typical cross-section of the UK population, making a website the principal outbound advertising or inbound response method immediately restricts access to half of the target audience (dial-up connections are only really useful for email marketing). On the other hand, mobile phone penetration is over 110% (many people have more than one phone), yet campaign experience tells us that response rates remain relatively low to outbound campaigns through this channel.

The ability to communicate with consumers across a range of channels does not mean simply adding channels by which to bombard them with irrelevant communications, it is a vital part of a highly efficient personalisation strategy. Finding out which channel each consumer is most responsive to requires perfectly integrated data and analysis facilities. More often than not, experience shows us that the best way to contact consumers is by a combination of channels such as a piece of direct mail with a choice of channels for the response mechanism, or an SMS with an online voucher code, all these possibilities help hone in on our understanding of what makes the customer tick.

It would seem then that with consumers so far advanced in their use of different channels that individual habits are getting entrenched, organisations would have at least started to offer greater multichannel communication options if not individually targeted ones.

Recent research by CDMS however shows that UK marketers are well aware that consumer requirements have not been met. In fact, when asked to state which industries they believed were effectively exploiting multichannel communications, not one sector achieved more than 70% of votes with the average coming in at a disappointing 46%.

Which of the following sectors do you rate as effective or very effective at combining different marketing media/channels to achieve significantly higher response rates?
Travel	66.8
Mobile phone	64.1
Banks	60.8
Insurance	60.8
Retail	58.0
Credit card	57.3
Automotive	50.9
ISPs	49.7
Mail order	49.1
Building Societies	46.0
Leisure	45.6
Utilities	44.6
Hotels	42.2
Restaurants & Pubs	38.4
Government (local & central)	31.8
NHS	31.6

The Travel and Mobile Phone industries were felt to be the most successful probably indicating that multichannel marketing and service provision has been taken as differentiator in highly competitive markets. Intense use of web-commerce and high churn rates are all likely to have influenced the decision to deploy multichannel technology.

In particular, the ease of switching travel operator or mobile phone provider makes it imperative for these sectors to communicate with customers and prospects effectively. Consumers can now effortlessly compare package holiday, airline, hotel and car rental offers at the click of a mouse and with mobile telephone numbers easily transferable from one network to another and the constant supply of new mobile phone designs, operators are clamouring to reach out to those whose contracts are up for renewal – whether they be existing or prospective customers.

The good score achieved by Banking is not surprising as the sector is renowned it investments in CRM systems. Other financial services providers that have had to react to a raft of online comparison sites that have sprung up in recent years, not only on their own behalf, but also providing their intermediaries with effective multi-channel support are Insurers and Credit Card issuers.

Retail’s good, but in no way brilliant, score on the other hand is probably due to the long term benefit of installing loyalty schemes and reveals that the industry has not been as quick to embrace multi-media messaging as its customers. Automotive, ISPs and Mail Order companies all hover around 50% efficiency. A disappointing score was achieved by Mail Order which enthusiastically grasped online as a sales channel but hides a vast polarisation between best practice and muddlers.

This same polarisation is likely to be the reason that Building Societies, Leisure, Utilities, Hotels, Restaurants and Pubs also failed to bring in good scores. In contrast, the public sector sectors – Government and NHS – received consistently low ratings from respondents indicating that much is still to be achieved in terms of eGov standards.

Consumers are loudly demanding to be able to access relevant information through the channel of their choice, which means that the more channels an organisation offers their customers, the better response they will get. The results however show that whether delivering multi-channel communications for effective prospect and customer campaigns or CRM initiatives, there is still significant improvement to be made across the UK industry.

Anecdotal evidence hints to the lack of expertise and technological investment needed to carry out ongoing data capture, insight and delivery of communication as an obstacle to the realisation of true multi-channel messaging. Even larger multi-national organisations are unable to carry out the entire process in-house. Demand however makes it clear that headway needs to be made by UK industry to bridge the gap between those that can and are delivering and those that are not.

CDMS