Marketing Channels and AI: How to Optimize Their Performance in Your CRM Strategy

With Black Friday approaching, here are 7 channels to manage, 5 real-world use cases, and 3 AI tools to help CRM managers drive conversions without overwhelming their customer base.

Why has choosing a marketing channel become a strategic CRM decision?

For a long time, CRM optimization has focused on the message: what offer, what content, what level of personalization, and when to send it. But conversion also depends on other factors, particularly the choice of channel.

Each channel has its own strengths, costs, attention level, optimal time for use, contact frequency, opt-out risk, and expected business contribution. An Email marketing can nurture the relationship, an SMS can trigger immediate action, an RCS message can enhance the mobile experience, WhatsApp can start a conversation, and print can create value when targeted at the right segment in the right context.

For CRM managers, the challenge is therefore no longer just to orchestrate campaigns, but to decide where to place each message to maximize impact without damaging the customer relationship.

That’s exactly where AI becomes a true co-pilot for CRM managers:

• Predictive AI prioritizes audiences and channels,
• Generative AI tailors messages,
• Agent-based AI helps CRM managers make informed trade-offs.

By analyzing customer data, engagement history, purchasing behavior, contact preferences, product interests, and the level of engagement already established with each contact, AI enables more effective management of investment in marketing channels.

For CRM managers and CMOs, the challenge is to increase conversions without overwhelming the customer base, in order to build long-term customer loyalty and retention.

What role does each marketing channel play in the conversation?

Optimizing your marketing channels doesn't mean choosing between email, SMS, RCS, WhatsApp, print, app push notifications, or wallet push notifications. It means understanding the role each one plays in the customer journey.

• Email remains the channel of choice for established relationships: it’s ideal for promoting an offer, showcasing a product selection, fostering loyalty, or supporting a longer purchasing cycle. In France, industry benchmarks show that email remains an important channel but is highly susceptible to saturation. Its effectiveness therefore depends on the quality of targeting, the timing of delivery, personalization, and the ability to hold the recipient’s attention.
• SMS is the channel for urgent messages and quick actions. According to af2m, 15.26 billion push SMS messages were sent in France in 2025, with e- retail s leading the way among user sectors. This is a strong indicator, as SMS remains a key channel for private sales, limited-time offers, alerts, shopping cart reminders, and major sales events. But its effectiveness comes at a cost, so it should be reserved for messages that are useful, expected, and truly urgent.
• RCS marks a new era in mobile marketing. More feature-rich than SMS, it allows for the integration of branding, visuals, carousels, call-to-action buttons, and quick replies. In 2025, af2m reported 52 million RCS-compatible smartphones in France, 738 active brands, and 200 million messages sent. For brands, RCS is becoming an attractive tool for creating a more engaging mobile experience, particularly for product launches, “ retail ” campaigns, and drive-to-store initiatives.
• WhatsApp is more aligned with a conversational approach. This channel is effective when a brand wants to build rapport, guide a decision, confirm information, or extend the relationship within an environment that consumers already use extensively. Recent studies on business messaging show that consumers increasingly expect to be able to interact with brands through their everyday messaging apps.
• Print should not be seen as the opposite of digital. When targeted effectively, it can capture attention, reward loyal customers, support a premium campaign, or re-engage an audience that is less responsive to digital channels. La Poste also points out that addressed direct mail can remain effective—particularly in building customer loyalty—when integrated into an omnichannel strategy and measured as a true CRM channel.

1️⃣ Choose the best marketing channel for each sales campaign

Not all campaigns are suited for the same channel. A private sale, a new collection, an abandoned cart follow-up, a loyalty offer, or a reactivation campaign do not all have the same level of urgency, the same acceptable cost, or the same business value.

Predictive AI can help identify not only the customers most likely to respond to a campaign, but also the most relevant channel for engaging them: email to provide details about an offer, SMS to prompt immediate action, RCS to enhance the experience, WhatsApp to build closer relationships, or print to re-engage an audience that is less responsive to digital channels.

The goal is not to use all available channels, but to choose the one that maximizes the campaign’s impact without overusing the most intrusive or expensive channels.

2️⃣ Reduce marketing pressure without sacrificing performance

Marketing pressure has always been a key concern for CRM managers. With too many messages, too many channels, and too many solicitations, even the best customers can lose interest if the relationship becomes too intense.

With AI, CRM teams can better gauge the pressure on each contact and decide which campaigns to send, postpone, or not send at all.

• A customer who is already receiving a high volume of emails may be excluded from a low-priority campaign.
• A customer with a strong interest in a particular product may receive a more direct promotion.
• Another one could be saved for a more strategic campaign.

There are two benefits: maintaining customer engagement and improving the performance of the campaigns that are actually sent.

3️⃣ Tailor the channel to the customer's level of engagement

Not all customers have the same relationship with a brand. Some regularly click on emails, while others only respond to text messages; some use the app, while others respond better to print communications, push notifications, or loyalty programs.

AI helps us better understand these engagement signals and tailor CRM orchestration accordingly.

• An active customer can be engaged through customer relationship channels.
• A customer whose engagement is declining may need a more engaging channel.
• A loyal customer can receive more personalized communications.
• A dormant customer can be reactivated using a different approach.

The right channel then becomes a tool for personalization in its own right, just like the message or the offer.

4️⃣ Re-engage customers through the channel that generates the most attention

Reactivation is one of the most sensitive use cases in CRM. When a customer has not made a purchase, visited the site, clicked on a link, or responded to campaigns for several months, continuing to send them the same messages through the same channels rarely yields better results.

AI can help detect early warning signs of disengagement and select the most appropriate channel for re-engagement.

• A former buyer e-commerce can be contacted again via email with a personalized recommendation.
• An inactive loyal customer may receive a text message or WhatsApp message about an exclusive offer.
• A high-value customer can be re-engaged through print to create a breakthrough effect and bring the brand back into their awareness.

The challenge isn't to follow up with each customer in a smarter way.

5️⃣ Manage channels based on customer value and business potential

Not all contacts have the same potential. Some customers are high-value, others are likely to make repeat purchases, and still others have a preference for a specific product category.

AI makes it possible to incorporate this business logic into channel selection.

• The most expensive or engaging channels can be reserved for high-potential audiences.
• Relationship channels can foster brand preference.
• Fast-moving channels can support key sales events.
• Enriched channels can support higher-value customer journeys.

For CMOs, this is a significant change because omnichannel orchestration is no longer driven solely by volume but by business contribution.

Measuring the Right KPIs to Manage the Right Channels

The right channel isn't necessarily the one with the highest open rate or click-through rate. It's the one that maximizes conversion at the right cost, without compromising engagement or customer value.

This is especially true for email. The open rate can no longer be considered the primary performance metric, especially when tracking pixels are blocked and their use for personalized optimization requires a higher level of compliance. CRM managers must therefore shift their focus to more robust metrics: clicks, conversions, revenue generated, unsubscribes, opt-outs, repeat purchases, retention, contribution to revenue, and marketing pressure.

The goal isn't just to measure what happened. It's to understand which channel is worth using, for which customer, in what context, and with what expected business return.

Overview of Marketing KPIs by CRM Channel

Co-manage Your Marketing Channels with a Customer Intelligence Agent

The true value of a customer intelligence specialist isn’t to produce yet another report, but to help the CRM manager understand which channel is performing well, which channel is wearing down the customer base, which segment is falling behind, and which audience deserves an SMS, an RCS message, an email, a WhatsApp message, an app push notification, a wallet push notification, or a print campaign.

By interacting with the CRM data, the agent makes channel decisions clearer, faster, and more actionable for teams. It doesn’t replace marketing expertise, but it reduces the friction between analysis, decision-making, and execution. This is often where the real gains in omnichannel performance begin.