Cross-marketing for effective business promotion

In order to attract the attention of the user audience, to convey information about their products and services to potential buyers as effectively and efficiently as possible, business representatives resort to advertising en masse. Today, a huge variety of strategies and methods are used here. And all this has led to the fact that the advertising world has already become extremely cramped. There is huge competition among business representatives. In order to find your client, the one who will come to you again and again for purchases, a huge amount of time and effort is spent. Marketers are forced to constantly search for new strategies, constantly monitor the effectiveness of the launched companies, come up with ways to optimize them.

But even such excessive efforts do not always give the desired result. Every day, more and more often there are situations when even fairly advanced market analysts find themselves literally at a dead end. They do not have fresh ideas, methods that would allow them to stand out from the competition and get an audience. If you find yourself in a similar situation, we recommend that you pay attention to such a direction as cross-marketing. Many rightfully consider this technology to be one that can provide an ideal balance between the reach of the user audience and the depth of impact on the consumer market.

As part of today's review, we will dwell in more detail on what cross-marketing is and what impact it can have on business development. We will highlight the main advantages and disadvantages, and also tell you what types of this technology exist on the market today. We will get acquainted in detail with the tools that are used in this direction and basic recommendations. This is what will allow you to find the best partner for cross-marketing. We will debunk some of the myths that have developed among specialists regarding this technology and tell you how to avoid the most common mistakes. The information provided will allow you to bring fresh trends to your business's marketing campaigns and increase the efficiency of work, minimize potential errors. So, first things first.

What is cross-marketing: getting acquainted with the basic concepts

In literal translation, cross-marketing sounds like cross-marketing. The technology itself has appeared on the market relatively recently, but has already proven its high efficiency in promoting certain goods, services, and the brand as a whole on the market. This strategy is based on the fact that clients of one business become potential clients of another company. Such processes are mutual, which makes them beneficial for both parties. In addition, each of these participants pursues their own interests in the cross-promotions being launched. So, some may bet on increasing the number of users at the expense of a third-party audience, while others are betting on increasing sales, and others are simply determined to increase their recognition in the market.

That is, one of the most important moments of an effective launch of cross-marketing will be the presence of common points of contact of the business. That is, it is important that the companies work in the same or related areas, have an audience that may be interested in the goods and services provided. It is important to ensure the intersection of audiences.

Thanks to such interaction, both companies can benefit. The effectiveness of these works has already been repeatedly proven in practice, which contributed to the mass distribution of this audience. One of the most striking examples from this area is the cross-campaign launched by the BMW Group corporation and the fashion house Louis Vuitton. Its essence was that Louis Vuitton released a set of travel bags ideally adapted to the BMW i8 car. As a result, the BMW concern managed to attract the attention of the audience to the new product entering the market, presenting itself as a company that takes into account the details in detail. At the same time, Louis Vuitton bags began to be actively sold among fans of the BMW brand, even by those who until recently were not familiar with the accessories of this fashion house but, let's say, believed the advertising, believed their favorite car concern.

Advantages and disadvantages of cross-marketing

If we talk about the benefits that a business can get by launching cross-marketing, the most significant of them will be attracting the attention of partners, as well as strengthening reliable relationships, providing comprehensive support. In this case, you can interact with not only one, but also two, three or even more companies, which, first of all, will significantly increase the level of trust on the part of the user audience, will contribute to an increase in the number of orders and, as a result, profits. In addition, you will be able to attract the attention of people who previously did not belong to your potential clients at all. This is all that will give a new start to the development of your business, and in some cases will even allow it to reach a completely new level.

But this is not all the advantages that are typical for cross-marketing. The strengths of this strategy also include:

• a noticeable reduction in advertising campaign costs, minimizing the need for their optimization;
• improving reputation in the market;
• intensifying the promotion of a particular product, service, and the brand as a whole;
• increasing brand awareness;
• increasing the number of user audiences;
• increasing sales of goods, services;
• minimizing business costs to attract a user audience.

That is, cross-marketing — this is the direction in modern advertising, which will allow you to create truly unique offers and have a general positive impact on business development, will contribute to the establishment of partnerships. At the same time, each of the parties to the interaction will receive positive results from this and move systematically towards achieving their goals and objectives.

But, along with the advantages, as in any other method, there are also disadvantages. And they must be taken into account in order to minimize possible errors and ultimately achieve the maximum effect. In particular, when working in a company, there is a possibility of business dilution. In this case, we are talking about the fact that you may have your own values, ideas. And they may not always coincide with the actions of your new partners.

As a result, this can negatively affect your own reputation. Also, the possibility of conflicts of interest and rivalry cannot be ruled out. This is especially true when you choose a company as a partner that works in the same niche as you. Too much confrontation can cause discontent on the part of clients, and then the effectiveness of all your plans will go to zero.

To minimize all possible risks in cross-marketing, it is necessary to build a truly ideal system of resource sharing and management. All actions should be agreed upon in advance, coordinated. That is, a truly professional approach will be required. But the result here may well exceed even the wildest expectations. And do not forget that another, so to speak, secret of success will be the right choice of partners. It is optimal that you come into contact with them in related topics. Direct competitors in this case should be avoided. But we will talk about this in more detail below.

Main types of cross-marketing

Today, there are already quite a few types of cross-marketing. First of all, everything here depends on the field of activity of your company, the specifics of the work, the chosen strategy and real opportunities. So, the following types of cross-marketing have received the greatest application in practice today:

1. Event marketing. This is the area within which joint offline or online events will be prepared and held. Alternatively, this could be a seminar, webinar, exhibition, conference, master class, thematic meetings, festivals and many other events that can attract the attention of the audience. The main thing in this case is to create such an information reason that will appeal not only to your regular customers, but will also be able to interest new ones. Practice has repeatedly shown that event marketing worked great, generating real excitement around a certain product, service or even a brand as a whole, forming something similar to word of mouth.
2. Affiliate marketing. In this case, we are talking about third-party companies with which you agree on mutual cooperation, promoting and even selling your products. True, for a certain fee. Here, everything depends on how you agree with the third-party company.
3. Co-branding. This area of cross-marketing will include the unification of two or more brands for a certain period of time in order to jointly produce a new product that can attract the attention of the largest possible number of user audiences, as well as create an effective system for its implementation on the market.
4. Content marketing. No advertising campaign or technology can do without content today. Cross-marketing is no exception. In practice, this technique is used very actively. We are talking about the fact that at certain intervals, interacting companies will post publications on their websites, social network accounts and other online representations of their business containing links to the resources of their partners.
5. Sponsorship. A cross-marketing strategy that has proven itself in practice as a way to loudly declare your business, put your own values, ideas on public display, and build a positive reputation. The essence of the method is that one of the companies becomes a sponsor of another within the framework of a certain event, competition, or special offer. Thanks to this, the level of involvement and brand recognition as a whole increases, and authority is formed.
6. Loyalty programs. This method can be called one of the most transparent among all possible cross-marketing options. In this case, one loyalty program is developed for all partners, within the framework of which the products will be promoted on the market. Alternatively, a person buys your product, and in return he receives an additional discount on the products of your partners.
7. Resale. A classic method, within the framework of which one company buys the products of another, and then resells them. That is, in this case, so to speak, intermediary relations are formed, which also contribute to attracting new clients largely due to the expansion of the range of products offered.
8. Influencer marketing. This method involves the interaction of companies, among which at least one can be called an opinion leader in its field. That is, it is important that at least one of the partners has a reputation as an expert in its field. As a result, his experience, his reputation will spread to related companies, attracting the attention of an increasing number of user audiences.

To increase the efficiency of your work in the market, you can choose one or more of these strategies for yourself. And everything depends on what goals and objectives you set for yourself. All this can be implemented in practice using various tools. And we will now dwell on this in more detail.

Cross-marketing tools: choosing the best options for yourself

To implement cross-marketing as effectively as possible, you need to be well versed in what tools you can use in this case in practice. Now we will give some of the most common and popular solutions:

• Working with influencers. In this case, we are talking about attracting opinion leaders to unobtrusive advertising of your products, services or business in general. Those who have already earned their reputation as experts in the market. It turns out that you pay a blogger for telling their subscribers about you, thereby attracting their attention to your company and, accordingly, to all those products or services that you supply to the market.
• Launching joint events. In this case, we are talking about organizing certain meetings, exhibitions and other events together with a partner to attract people's attention, involving them in activities. This is what will help you increase your brand awareness, launch original joint promotions, promote both your products and the products of the company you work with in this area. And all this with a noticeable reduction in costs, a 2-fold increase in coverage. Here, the bet is on the fact that you share the material costs with your partner in half, and the events attract a common audience.
• Launching sweepstakes, competitions. These are the activities that have always attracted the attention of the user audience. People simply like to receive some prizes or any other additional benefits out of nowhere. And this means that you can attract the attention of both old and new customers. Again, remember that all these activities are aimed at two audiences at once: yours and partners. That is, you can safely launch joint lotteries, sales and be sure that in practice they will show themselves well.
• Preparing advertising videos. At the very beginning of our review, we already talked about how cross-marketing was used by BMW and the fashion house Louis Vuitton. That is, in this case, we are talking about preparing classic advertising, in which there is a mutual presentation of goods and services. It turns out that you double the audience reach.
• Guest posting, podcasts. In this case, we are talking about posting materials on partner sites in order to increase the recognition of your own company and develop the brand as a whole. At the same time, you can use various platforms of your partners, conduct joint presentations, discussions. At the same time, mutual notification of subscribers is launched, which ultimately increases the reach and expands the audience.
• Co-packing. This tool involves the use of joint packaging for all products of partner companies. This is relevant for both physical goods and digital, including various software products, training courses and much more. The essence of this method is to develop an automatic perception of two companies as a single whole in the target audience, thereby redistributing the values of each of them, ensuring mutual influence.
• Webinars. Together with your partners, you can launch a large-scale online event to introduce the audience to your products, services, values, thereby unobtrusively promoting products or services.
• Native, banner advertising. In the first case, we are talking about unobtrusively promoting your partner's company and its products, services among your subscribers. But banner advertising will involve placing advertising material on your pages, be it a website, social networks and other online representations.
• E-mailing. In this case, it is assumed that materials are sent to the existing client bases of each of the partners. The effectiveness of this idea will directly depend on how many people open the received letters. Unfortunately, this figure has been declining lately, which automatically reduces the effectiveness of email marketing.
• Messenger marketing. This is a tool that is systematically displacing email newsletters from the market, eliminating one of its most significant problems - low open rates. In this case, this figure will be higher. The technology itself involves mutual promotion of partner companies, their services, and products through social networks and messengers. Chatbots are very actively used in this area today, which can effectively promote customers through the sales funnel and minimize the physical involvement of the manager.

In principle, all these methods are quite effective, time-tested, and reliable. But still, in order for your cross-marketing strategy to work and you to get the desired result, it is important to choose the right partners for yourself. Again, this can be either one company or several. We will talk about this further.

Cross-marketing: choosing a reliable partner

A partnership in such a direction as cross-marketing is what will allow you to realize your ideas for brand promotion, increasing its recognition, attracting the target audience. With its help, you will be able to transfer the work of your business to a completely new level, discover new opportunities. But from the very beginning, you must understand that all this must be mutual. That is, a reliable partnership is possible only if both participants benefit from it, namely, what they expected.

In order to select a suitable partner for cross-marketing, it is necessary to thoroughly study the market. In most cases, you will be able to work together only with those companies that share your interests and values. But it is also very important that your audiences intersect either in one or in related market areas. You can perform these works as efficiently and without risk as possible if you use our recommendations. Follow these steps step by step:

1. Determine your own goals. To find a person who can share your desires, you need to clearly understand what exactly you want. It is also important to assess what exactly you lack in order to get what you want. And now look for a partner from those who can provide you with this. So, let's assume that you want to increase the recognition of your own brand, attract as many people as possible to the business. This can be realized if you find a partner with a similar audience. If you are initially focused on increasing sales, then look for a company that supplies related products to the market. Thanks to mutual advertising, you can reduce the cost of attracting customers, easily organize certain events that attract people. Is the main goal of your business at this stage to generate leads? Then you need a partner who has their own landing pages for collecting contact information.
2. Collect as much information as possible about your target audience. In any case, you should understand what audience your business is primarily focused on. Alternatively, these could be young mothers, property owners, representatives of developing businesses, fitness clubs, etc. Additionally, you can structure and divide your target audience into separate groups. Dividing into smaller segments will allow you to make the most accurate offers to customers. Those that they will not be able to refuse.
3. We select a partner who shares your values, has a similar user audience. The first 2 stages were primarily aimed at ensuring that you determine the main goals, objectives of your own business, who it focuses on. Now it's time to directly select a partner. The easiest way here is to start communicating with your own clients and find out what other companies they interact with, what products and services they have already purchased and remained quite perfect actions. Alternatively, you can also take advantage of the opportunities provided by social networks. Just pay attention to those who work in niches similar to yours. At the end, you should get a list of companies. Once again, review it in detail and evaluate which of the business representatives may be more inclined to cooperate with you. The last point at this stage is to determine what you could offer your cross-marketing partner. Remember that the benefit must be mutual and proportionate.
4. We draw up a common partnership strategy. This is the stage where all the nuances are agreed upon, common directions are developed, and the tools and methods that will be used in cross-marketing are determined. Interaction can be based on a verbal agreement or you can conclude an official contract, specifying the obligations of the parties and mutual responsibility. As a result, you should receive a common strategy that will satisfy the needs of both parties. Only if you clearly understand what benefit you will receive, you can start working. And this is true for all partners. Again, mutual benefit is the secret to the success of the whole idea.

Despite the fact that the work ahead is quite large-scale, there is nothing complicated or impossible about it. The main thing is to move towards the implementation of your idea step by step and not to forget that the effect of cross-marketing should be felt by all parties involved in the cooperation.

Myths and reality in the field of affiliate marketing

Despite the fact that this technology did not appear yesterday, there are still controversial opinions around it. Moreover, many of them are very different from reality. And if you believe in them, you can miss a fairly promising opportunity to develop your business, promote goods and services. Now we will highlight a number of stereotypes that have literally overgrown the topic of cross-marketing. This is what will allow you to really understand what tool we are talking about and personally evaluate the prospects of its use.

1. Cross-marketing is simple and easy. Unfortunately, it is not as it may seem at first glance. It is necessary to understand that you and your partners may have different views on the strategy of joint work, different interests, goals. And it is really difficult to find a common point of contact, something on which all cooperation will be based. Here you will have to make concessions, adapt to your partner. And this is true for absolutely all parties. If at least one company insists on its own, fruitful cooperation will not work. Also, during the work, it will be necessary to monitor the results to understand how correctly everything works and, if necessary, always be ready to make adjustments.
2. Cross-marketing is unstable. Like any other marketing strategy, it is also important to achieve the set goals. This can be attracting the target audience, increasing brand awareness, increasing the number of sales and much more. But in any case, the essence is one: if the goal is not achieved, neither you nor your partner receives money. But still, if you compare cross-marketing with other advertising campaigns, it will still be more stable and predictable. And what is important is that your initial investment will be significantly less than when launching a separate advertising campaign. That is, from the point of view of risks, we have the safest model. Perhaps you will not get the desired result, but you will not spend serious money on it.
3. Cross-marketing is only for large businesses. A completely stupid assumption that has nothing to do with reality. Absolutely anyone can take advantage of this offer, even a start-up business, since there is practically no initial investment required here. You just need to find a partner who will be in the same situation as you. That is, he will look for ways to improve the efficiency of his work. Remember that you have a huge number of tools and approaches at your disposal. Even more - companies that would like to launch joint work with you.

Is it worth thinking further about the topic of affiliate marketing or can we already move directly to work? If you are leaning towards the second option, then the last point we would like to dwell on in more detail is the most common mistakes that businesses make in practice today. If you know, you will be able to minimize all possible risks and get the most out of the joint campaigns launched.

The most common mistakes in cross-marketing

Despite the fact that affiliate marketing does not require significant financial investments from you, you cannot approach the implementation of this idea carelessly. You must think through your own strategy down to the last detail, rely only on those decisions that are obviously correct. Remember that it is always more difficult to correct mistakes than to avoid them. And here is what we are talking about:

• Mistakes made at the stage of forecasting advertising campaigns. Even if you have good intuition, have been working in the market for many years, you should first of all focus on statistics and analytics, and not on internal feelings (although sometimes this works). That is, if your strategy is not based on real facts, figures, in reality it may turn out to be ineffective. And all that traffic exchange or any other activities that you will undertake in the course of implementing your ideas will not lead to the fulfillment of the task and, accordingly, will not contribute to increasing your income. Focus on statistics and approach everything with a sober assessment of the situation.
• Using weak creatives. Regardless of what tasks you have set for yourself at this stage, you must focus on the target audience. This means that you must offer people the goods or services that they are interested in, ideas, creatives that may interest them. Too intricate, difficult to implement solutions that require time and effort from consumers - this is what will never work in practice. Moreover, with the wrong approach, you can even alienate the audience that your business already has. That is, we carefully plan and think through everything to the smallest detail. Alternatively, if you want to offer an additional discount, then just offer it. There is no need to make any additional conditions, such as subscribing to a channel, installing a mobile application, registering on a website, etc. All your creatives should be intuitive and implemented literally with a couple of clicks. Don't ask people for more.
• Lack of control over the actions of partners. This is the moment when you can say a too hackneyed, but nevertheless true phrase: trust, but verify. Let's say you launched some kind of joint campaign with your partners, for example, offering a 20% discount on a certain category of products. But one of your partners decided to cheat a little and increased the discount to 30%. What do we get as a result? The entire audience that you managed to attract together makes orders where it will be more profitable for them. It turns out that the more cunning partner gets the maximum, and you end up in the red. Obviously, this should not be allowed.
• The presence of technical problems on your site or with a mobile application. You must always be sure that all the interaction channels that you launch for the user audience must be available. Perhaps some technical difficulties with the site will arise and buyers simply will not be able to get to it, you will lose both time and money from this.

That is, here you must understand that within the framework of cross-marketing you will have to perform quite an impressive amount of tasks and constantly. And only if you treat this work with all seriousness and competence, the result will fully meet your expectations, or even exceed them.

Let's sum it up

We hope that now you have really figured out all the intricacies and nuances of cross-marketing and clearly understand what you will have to implement in practice if you launch such a company. Many experts agree that partner interaction will continue to develop, that new tools will appear in this market segment that simplify these works, increasing their efficiency. This means that you can expect increased sales volumes, new sources of income, and increased competitiveness of your product on the market.

To further intensify these works and get the most out of them, connect mobile proxies from the MobileProxy.Space service. You can find out more about what they are at the link https://mobileproxy.space/en/user.html?buyproxy. Now we will only note that with their help you will get a reliable assistant that can provide you with high rates of anonymity and security of work on the Internet, protection from any unauthorized access, as well as access to sites, services, companies from different countries of the world, including those that are blocked in your region at the legislative level. You will also be able to use tools to automate actions on the network, which will significantly simplify and speed up all your work within the framework of affiliate marketing.

If you have additional questions, need advice and help from specialists, contact the technical support service, which operates around the clock. You can also take advantage of a free two-hour test to check the efficiency of mobile proxies. You might also be interested in the proxy manager browser extension.

Share this article: