What Are Marketing Channels? 17 Effective Marketing Channels

Marketing channels consist of the platforms, tools, and distribution methods entrepreneurs and businesses use to reach and ultimately convert their target audience. For example, 91% of marketers use social media, making it one of the top marketing channels globally, according to a 2024 survey. But social media is one of more than a dozen channels businesses employ to market a product or service. 

In fact, 75% of marketers use five or more different channels, according to Hubspot’s 2026 State of Marketing Report. Your channel choice might vary by persona or by stage of the marketing funnel.

With so many possibilities, it can be difficult to know where to start. Ahead, learn what a marketing channel is, the most productive channels for brands today, and how to choose the right ones for your business. 

What is a marketing channel? 

A marketing channel is an avenue or pathway to reach your target audience with content or promotions. It can be online or offline, free or paid. 

Free channels can be owned, meaning your brand has complete control of the channel, like your website and email. Or, it may be earned, meaning your brand gets distribution based on merit, without directly paying for it, like with public relations (PR). 

If a journalist publishes a profile on you and your brand because you have a genuinely interesting founding story, that’s earned.

You can use multiple marketing channels to help get customers through the buyer’s journey. For example, you may use organic social media (like TikTok) for the awareness stage, your blog and email for the consideration stage, and retargeted social media ads for the conversion stage. 

How you use each channel, including specific tactics, is a strategic part of your overall marketing ecosystem. 

Marketing channels vs. strategies vs. content 

A marketing strategy is a high-level vision that aligns with your business goals. It outlines how you will position yourself in the market, who your target audience is, and how you plan to reach them. This may be an integral part of your strategic business plan.

Your marketing channels are the avenues you use to reach the buyer personas in your target audience. 

Content is the material you create and distribute via marketing channels. This includes digital content like blog posts, videos, podcasts, emails, webinars, and more. 

Content aligns with your overall marketing strategy and is tailored for the specific channel you’re using. 

17 most effective marketing channels

1. Email marketing
2. Digital ads
3. Out-of-home advertising
4. Organic social media marketing
5. Affiliate marketing
6. Influencer marketing
7. SMS marketing
8. Push notifications
9. Blogs
10. Podcasts
11. Organic search
12. Referral marketing
13. Word-of-mouth marketing
14. Event marketing
15. Public relations
16. Partnership marketing
17. Direct-mail marketing

You don’t need to use every available option to find channel marketing success, but finding the right mix can help you drive conversions. Learn more about how and when to use each channel: 

1. Email marketing 

Email marketing can be a very effective channel. According to a 2025 survey from email marketing company Litmus, two-thirds of companies see a return on investment (ROI) of 10:1 or more.

Email’s impact on your business depends on the size and quality of your email list. To build a robust list, you need to give people a good reason to sign up for it. Consider offering a discount for first-time customers and tease what kind of content you’ll send via email. For example, entice your ideal customer with early access to new product launches and sales or tips to get the most from your product from experts. 

Los Angeles–based skin care store Thirteen Lune offers 15% off to new email subscribers on their first order, and promises to send exclusive promotions to them. 

Jacob Sappington, director of strategy at growth agency Homestead Studio, suggests starting with a “micro yes.” Meaning, instead of immediately asking a visitor for their email, ask if they want a discount (for example, “Do you want 10% off?”). 

Once someone’s signed up for your emails, keep them engaged with a regular content program. 

Jacob suggests four flows: a welcome email series (you can use marketing automation to send a set of four to five emails over a defined period of time), a browse abandonment, abandoned checkout, and a post-purchase email series.

“With the post-purchase sequence,” Jacob says, “You can set the expectations, teach them how to use your product, and how to care for your product. You have this opportunity to talk about anything about your product that helps them use it better.” 

2. Digital ads

Paying to show advertisements on online channels can help you grow your business by bringing a stream of visitors to your website. Digital advertising accounts for about 70% to 75% of the global advertising market, according to global management consulting firm Bain & Company. 

Digital ad formats can take on any form, such as text, videos, and audio. Digital paid advertising includes:

• Audio ads, like on podcasts or digital radio

• Display ads, like pop-ups or banner ads

• Native ads, which seamlessly blend in with other content (like a promoted listing on Amazon or a sponsored article on a publisher website)

• Search ads, or paying a search engine like Google to show up above all other results

• Social media ads on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest

Digital ads allow you to target people based on their demographic (like age and location) and online behavior. You can even segment your audience to deliver personalized ads to different groups.

Outdoor brand Stratus’s core audience is serious skiers and snowboarders. But it also wants to reach an adjacent audience: people who travel to ski once or twice per year. 

“These travelers are willing to spend a lot of money for their trip,” founder Ricky Jones says on an episode of Shopify Masters. 

That’s where digital advertising comes in. 

“The [advertising] platforms now are so advanced that they can target the individual that is adjacent, and maybe a bit less niche,” Ricky explains. “We can rely on Shopify’s integration with Meta or Shopify Audiences with Shopify Plus, which really get us in front of the right consumer.” 

3. Out-of-home advertising

Out-of-home (OOH) ads are seen by people in the real world, such as traditional and digital billboards, posters, and bus wraps. 

Showerhead brand Jolie, for example, launched an out of home campaign by advertising on laundry delivery trucks in New York City. The ads were designed to make the trucks look dirty, with the words “Clean me” scribbled on them to show passersby how powerful its showerheads are. The campaign was so successful the brand took it to additional metropolitan areas. 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jolie (@jolieskinco)

While OOH advertising costs vary based on the location, length of time, and method, it has some of the lowest CPM rates when compared to television, print, and online streaming, according to Solomon Partners. 

Out of home advertising can also be digital, with screens placed in public spaces like transit stations. According to a 2024 Out of Home Advertising Association of America survey, 73% of participants said they viewed digital out of home (DOOH) advertising in a positive way. Additionally, 80% said that they would likely take action if they saw entertaining or visually interesting DOOH ads.

4. Organic social media marketing 

Organic social media marketing involves posting content to social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram, or Facebook, without paying to promote the content. Social media is the second-most used type of media, with 93% of internet users 16 and older on social media, according to a 2025 Data Reportal report. 

Establishing a presence on social media can help you both build a primary audience and sell products directly, via ecommerce features now available on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. Most brands use a mix of organic and paid activity on social platforms.

You don’t need to post on every social media platform to achieve your marketing goals. For example, the team behind hydration brand Waterboy decided to focus on TikTok because TikTok’s algorithm can make it easier for new creators to break through. 

“It felt like that was the [platform] where your content reach was not dependent on how big of a channel you have,” cofounder Mike Xhaxho says on an episode of Shopify Masters. 

@waterboycan should we make her strawberry lemonade dreams come true? #waterboy #hydration #starbucks ♬ original sound - Waterboy

Mike experienced this firsthand when one of his first videos for Waterboy—“It was my story of why I drink Pedialyte after a night out”—went viral on TikTok.

“I posted that video on a Thursday night at 6 p.m. and went out with friends around eight, and I was like, ’Oh my God, this video has like 200,000 views.’” 

5. Affiliate marketing 

With affiliate marketing programs, people with large audiences—like social media influencers or popular bloggers—earn money through commission when they advertise a product or a service on their website or social media pages. 

For example, a food blogger might list their favorite baking sheet, stand mixer, or type of flour within a recipe blog post. If a reader clicks through and purchases any of the items, the blogger gets paid a commission. 

Affiliate marketing lets brands reach their target audience through the creators they follow and already trust. 

In 2024, affiliate marketing accounted for $113 billion in ecommerce sales, or 9.4% of ecommerce sales in the US, according to Performance Marketing Association. 

Brands can use affiliate marketing platforms, like Shopify Collabs, CJ Affiliate, or Upfluence, to manage their affiliate partnerships. On these platforms, you can integrate with your ecommerce store to monitor code usage, find content creators, set a commission structure, and measure results. 

Skin care and makeup brand Ilia manages its affiliate program through impact.com. It promotes the program on its website and includes some of the benefits, like a 10% commission rate on sales and exclusive offers for affiliates’ readers and followers. 

6. Influencer marketing

With influencer marketing, brands tap influencers to promote their company, products, and services to their audience. 

Influencers hold significant sway over purchase decisions. According to a 2025 Sprout Social study, 86% of consumers surveyed made at least one purchase a year inspired by an influencer. 

There are a few different strategies for working with influencers. Beauty brand Three Ships relies on seeding.

“Seeding is where you’ll send out your product to an influencer or a content creator with no expectations,” explains cofounder Laura Thompson on an episode of Shopify Masters. “They can post about it if they like the product, or they don’t have to post about it. But you’re not paying anything.”

“[Seeding] works very well because it’s authentic,” Laura says. If a creator decides to post about the product they received, Three Ships offers them an affiliate code so the creator can start earning commission. 

@hey.itsbel Canadians If you haven’t tried Three Ships yet what are you waiting for. Being able to support a female founded, Canadian and natural skin care brand is a no brainer. I’ll put a discount click though on my other stories. @Three Ships Beauty #threeships #skincare #toronto #canadian #beldoesstuff ♬ original sound - Bel

7. SMS marketing

SMS marketing is when brands send direct text messages to customers. This marketing channel often requires a sign-up incentive because of how personal a channel it is. 

But the direct and immediate nature of SMS is what makes it so effective. According to a 2024 research from marketing platform Klaviyo, 72% of consumers made a purchase after receiving a text message from a brand. 

The key is to reach out to your audience sparingly, and only when you have something important to say. For example, soda company Olipop uses SMS marketing to announce new flavors and limited edition releases. 

Its SMS strategy sees great traction: The channel generated around $30,000 in 15 minutes for a product launch.

8. Push notifications

Push notifications are brief, pop-up messages that appear on mobile devices and desktops. These text notes often feature a title, message, and URL. They might also include images, videos, and GIFs. 

To receive push notifications, customers either need to download an app or visit your website with push notifications enabled. Regardless of how brands send these messages, users must opt-in to receive push notifications. 

But according to a Batch survey, consumers are often willing to sign up for them. Across iPhone and Android users, 61% of users opted in to receive push notifications. 

For example, the Shop app uses push notifications to inform buyers of their completed purchases and shipping information. It also makes personalized recommendations and encourages browsing. 

9. Blogs

Blogging is an owned media channel that, combined with search engine optimization (SEO), can drive organic traffic to your website and strengthen your site’s domain authority (DA). It’s the third most-used media format in brands’ content marketing strategies, according to Hubspot’s 2026 State of Marketing Report. 

High-quality blog content can also build trust with your audience, establish your brand as an expert or leader in the industry, and answer common questions about your products. 

For example, olive oil brand Graza uses its blog, branded as its “Glog,” to share recipes using olive oil and product information. 

A good way to organize ideating, producing, and consistently publishing blogs is to create a content calendar. You can use a calendar (like Google Calendar), spreadsheet, or project management tools like Trello or Asana to document ideas and outline steps to execute them.

To help make the content planning process easier, many brands are turning to AI. A 2025 report by Coschedule revealed that 85% of marketers use AI tools, particularly writing tools, to create content. However, it’s still important to include humans in the content workflow process because AI doesn’t possess first-hand experience or human expertise. 

Read: 15+ Best AI Marketing Tools for Ecommerce Now

10. Podcasts

Brands use podcasts as a platform to have conversations relevant to their products or brand values and purpose. The channel has experienced threefold growth in the past decade. 

As of 2024, 55% of adults in the United States had listened to or watched a podcast within the last month, according to Statista. 

Like blogging, a podcast nurtures brand trust with your audience and establishes your expertise. It can also be a source of material to repurpose across other content amplification channels, like cosmetics brand Fluff. 

“We knew the types of conversations we wanted to have, and we felt they would be valid conversations that our audience wanted to hear,” founder Erika Geraerts says on Shopify Masters. 

“It’s also another form of marketing to reach new audiences. And for us, it’s all about repurposing that content. We film all of our podcasts so we can put them up as Reels or on TikTok or repurpose it into blog content. In a way, our podcast is our influencer program because the people we talk to generally repost that content themselves and that gives us access to their audiences and communities.” 

For example, in one episode, podcast guest and nano-influencer Kayla Moon talks about wanting to get Botox in an effort to look younger. Both Fluff and Kayla shared a clip of the interview on their Instagram.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Fluff: Casual Cosmetics™️ (@itsall.fluff)

11. Organic search

SEO, or search engine optimization, is the process of tailoring website content to answer the search intent of a specific search term, or keyword. If you follow SEO best practices and your page offers the best answer to the searcher’s query, Google’s algorithm will rank it highly in search engine results. The higher Google ranks it, the more traffic you could get.

While AI is affecting the way that people find products, with some using LLMs like ChatGPT instead of a search engine like Google, the impact to organic traffic is minimal, but subject to change. According to growth agency Graphite, which analyzed 40,000 of the largest websites using Similarweb, organic traffic was down only 2.5% as of October 2025. That said, many brands are also attempting to optimize for visibility in answer engines, spawning the new channel referred to as AEO (answer engine optimization) or GEO (generative engine optimization). 

Read: The GEO Playbook: How (& Why) to Optimize for AI Discovery

SEO marketing can be a powerful channel because it targets people who have clear intent to make a purchase. For example, a person scrolling through Instagram might come across a paid ad in their feed for fun socks but have no interest in that product. This is a passive scenario where brand awareness might be the goal.

But someone actively searching for something like “fun socks” has some level of purchase intent. That could lead them to a brand like Sock It To Me, which uses keyword phrases like “fun and funky socks” in its website copy.

12. Referral marketing

It’s common to trust a recommendation from a friend or family member more than other sources. A 2024 Marketing Charts survey found that 89% of consumers trusted friends and family over expert reviewers (74%), sales associates in a store (65%), and AI tools informed by their purchase history (51%).

That’s why referral marketing is such a powerful tool: if successful, your best customers can become your biggest advocates. 

Typically, businesses use referral programs to incentivize their customers to recommend their products to others. To make it more effective, 78% of referral programs reward both the referrer and the person they refer, according to Impact’s 2024 State of Referral Marketing Report. 

For example, athletic apparel brand Girlfriend Collective offers 500 points (the equivalent of $25) to customers who refer a friend. The referred friends also receive $25 off their first order of at least $125. 

13. Word-of-mouth marketing

Word-of-mouth marketing encourages customers to share positive experiences online and in-person with their personal networks. Similar to referral marketing, it’s an effective strategy because customers say friends and family are their most trusted source of product recommendations. 

Word-of-mouth marketing relies on personal recommendations but is more organic and doesn’t require incentives, like referrals. 

Instead, businesses generate word of mouth by creating positive experiences, such as by sending thank-you notes with orders, hosting workshops, and sending curated product recommendations.

Founder Gaby Bayona credits this customer-focused approach with helping her wedding dress brand, Truvelle, receive positive reviews on Google. 

“You want to make sure that you’re giving everybody a really beautiful experience,” Gaby says on an episode of Shopify Masters. “Then, they might tell their friends. They’re going to be posting photos on their social media. If they really love their experience, they’ll be building that community within their friend group. I think giving a good experience is why my stores get 4.9 or 5 [stars] on Google. We’ve got a really good reputation.” 

14. Event marketing 

Whether it’s at a workshop, a panel, or a dinner, personal connections with your customers create opportunities to hear real-time feedback. These interactions provide a better idea of what marketing messaging works and the chance to better understand your target audience. 

Bluboho started hosting monthly events. “Events help bring your brand to life,” says Natalie Westlake, president of the jewelry company, on an episode of Shopify Masters. “They show what you value, and there’s an opportunity to bring product to life in a different way.” 

At first, Bluboho tried to squeeze in several activities during its monthly events. 

“It didn’t work really well because we couldn’t speak to all of those different events on the same day,” Natalie says. “So what we’ve done is we have a sound bath every single full moon. There’s a journaling experience. It speaks directly to our product and really brings to life the intention behind everything we build.”

Creating an experience like this can speak directly to what many audiences want. According to a 2024 report, 64% of event attendees would rather have immersive experiences than ones that prioritize apps or digital displays. 

15. Public relations 

Public relations, or PR, ideally results in earned media. Unlike advertising, this is coverage or promotion of your business you didn’t pay for. It’s so important that in 2025, Cision reported 38% marketers planned to prioritize earned media more than the year before.

Public relations efforts often include sharing a press release to announce new products or company milestones. It’s supported by “pitching” the news and your brand story to relevant publications in the hopes that they’ll cover your business or product. 

Danielle Close, the founder of sustainable beauty brand My Skin Feels, has been covered by many publications, including Vogue, Elle, and GQ. Danielle worked in social media and PR at luxury skin care brand Charlotte Tilbury. There, she made close connections with members in the media industry, which helped her brand gain more visibility as a new business. So did having a compelling story. 

Danielle started My Skin Feels because she wanted the beauty industry to make more progress when it came to sustainability. The brand makes beauty products out of tomato skins, organic orange juice, and breakfast oats that might have been turned to waste otherwise. This story helps her brand stand out.

“Your brand has to be different,” Danielle says on Shopify Masters. “If you’re launching a brand today, please make it as different as possible, as weird as possible—that’s what people want to see.” 

If you receive press coverage, highlight the publications on your website to help give your brand more authority and social proof.

16. Partnership marketing 

Partnership marketing involves collaborating with another brand to capture the attention of that business’s audience. According to a 2024 Foundry report, 68% of businesses believe partnership marketing is an essential, valuable tactic. 

For ecommerce stores specifically, this could include product collaborations, where you create a product with another business and both sell it in your shops. Or you could work with a founder or creator whose audience is similar to yours to host a livestream.

Tinned fish brand Fishwife regularly partners with other businesses to create new flavors and unique offerings. In 2025, the brand partnered with Bixby Chocolate for a fish-shaped chocolate treat. 

The product was so successful that the two brands brought it back for Valentine’s Day 2026. With both brands posting about the collaboration, it allows each brand to tap into each other’s audience, or cross-promote. 

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Bixby Chocolate (@bixbychocolate)

17. Direct mail marketing

Sending people a physical item through the mail is called direct mail marketing. Direct mail can vary in style and scope. Some direct-mail marketing campaigns feature a postcard with a coupon code; others might announce a new product or a sale. 

According to Postcard Mania, which sends postcards on behalf of US-based businesses, its weekly mail volume increased nearly 50% between 2019 and 2024. 

Many brands still opt to send full catalogs. For example, Marine Layer sends colorful catalogs that feature selections from the brand’s new seasonal collections. 

The decision to use this channel depends on your primary audience, your product, and your strategy. Some demographics may respond more to a tangible catalog, for example, over another email in their inbox.

How to choose marketing channels

• Consider your product’s price point
• Diversify your channels
• Conduct market research
• Determine ROI

The marketing channels you focus on depend on your business model, your resources, your strengths, and what your product is, according to Alex Greifeld, ecommerce growth adviser. 

Here are a few tips for choosing the best channels:

Consider your product’s price point

Alex says the unit economics of your product can determine what channels you’ll use. 

“Will it work on the channel? If you’re selling a $500 handbag, it might be hard to sell that at scale on Facebook or TikTok, just because of the nature of the channel,” Alex says. 

Higher price point items might take longer to sell or require more relationship-building on the brand side, as opposed to the immediacy of social channels. 

Diversify your channels

As with financial management, savvy marketing management also involves diversification: You want to have a portfolio of multiple channels that work in different, complementary ways, rather than relying solely on one or two. 

“The way that I like to think about my marketing, which is something I took with me from my tech career, is something I call surround sound marketing,” says Elle Liu, founder of bedding brand Eucalypso, on an episode of Shopify Masters. 

“The idea is: Whether you are on Facebook or you are listening to a podcast or you are Googling something, we’re able to reach you. I think that you can even do that even if you have a very small budget. It’s just putting a little bit of everything into your marketing.” 

Elle credits this holistic approach for helping the brand get to the seven figures in sales.

Conduct market research

Doing market research can also help inform what your channel mix should be. Sit down with current customers or people in your target audience to better understand what motivates them, what they use your product for, where they spend time online, and how they first heard about you. 

Determine ROI

The best marketing channel is one that provides a high return on investment (ROI). Do some trial and error over six months to see which channels work best. Don’t just guess and invest in other marketing channels because that’s what everyone is doing.

Coming up with marketing objectives and ways to track performance metrics will help you understand if your channel strategy is working. This analysis is key to profitable growth and not running out of money at the end of the month.