Marketing isn’t about singular tactics, tools and channels anymore, each managed neatly in its own silo (as if it ever was). Don’t limit your perception of digital marketing to adding the latest Web 2.0 gadget to your site or playing in the newest online community. It’s not about figuring out the newest tactic or technology although there are plenty, ranging from YouTube to Twitter to video, blogs, Facebook and Second Life, and then going on to the next one on the list.

Instead, successfully generating interest, engagement (the hot new goal for 2010), buzz and new customers is now about creating  marketing fusion – integrating a fluid and growing constellation of components together in an intentional ordered chaos I call “digital convergence”. It’s about creating – or allowing or both – a whole greater and more influential than any of its individual parts, and certainly greater than their simple sum on a list.

And yet, a thorough understanding of how to not only use but maximize the value of the singular components is a prerequisite to recognizing the possibilities for fusing them together.

So, taking two specialties near and dear to my heart – email marketing and social networking – here are just a few ideas for how to optimize them in tandem:

1. If you have an e-newsletter, Tweet the link to each issue as it is published.  Consider tweeting links to specific articles if they’re hosted on unique pages.
2. On Twitter, always come from a place of service or inquiry rather than blatant self-promotion. How can you help? Share information? Say something that will improve someone’s life – even if it’s with just a laugh?
3. Include the link to your email sign-up page on all social media Web site profile and fan pages.  (Twitter, for example, allows you to upload your own custom background design where you can do this).
4. Include your Twitter handle and URL to Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace or other environments in your email template(s).
5. Use reader praise, questions and experiences (with permission) gathered from social networking sites in your emails, marketing materials and on your site.

Marketers and business owners who have put these and other simple steps into practice begin to notice exponential rather than linear increases in subscribers, brand recognition, leads, buzz and sales – increases which can’t be attributed to a single digital channel or tactic.  It’s as though once given enough space, digital marketing sprouts shoots and branches we can’t anticipate.  Plant your seeds, nurture them regularly, and watch them grow!