In recent years, inbound marketing has emerged as a critical customer acquisition strategy for companies eager to grow. According to a recent study, as of 2017, 76% of marketers leverage inbound marketing tactics as part of their primary strategy. This trend is in accordance with the facts that over 68% of B2B clients prefer to conduct their own research online and the overwhelming majority have no particular brand loyalty prior to searching. Clearly, it is vital for the modern B2B business to not only understand, but also effectively leverage inbound marketing tactics in order to survive in the new on demand economy.
Inbound marketing involves creating and sharing content online through a variety of mediums such as blogging, social media, and search engine optimization (SEO). By leveraging these tactics, a business crafts its digital footprint, allowing for potential clients to learn as well as engage with the business’s brand in order to create an overall better client experience.
Inbound marketing is often contrasted with outbound marketing, which may include paid advertising, cold calling, telemarketing, sending email blasts to purchased lists, and attending trade shows. Outbound marketing is an effort to get your message out to as many prospects as possible, in the hope that it will resonate with them and generate leads.
While this approach can still be effective and useful, your prospects are already inundated with countless outbound marketing messages every day, so it can be difficult to get your message through. Also, it is clear that the majority of potential clients are not receptive to unsolicited marketing and prefer to initiate the conversation and the research for themselves.
To address these inefficiencies and obstacles, inbound marketing takes a different approach. It aims to engage and build a meaningful relationship with potential clients who are already seeking information and shopping online for solutions relevant to your offering.
There are a few core strategies and tactics that inbound marketers typically use to accomplish this:
- Increase brand awareness by creating content, participating in social media and online discussions, and conducting search engine optimization (SEO)
- Capture leads with useful, informative content, attractive offers, and effective landing pages
- Convert leads with content marketing, nurturing campaigns, and sales force automation
- Analyze results, adjust strategies and content, and apply lessons learned
At its core, inbound marketing is all about generating and converting qualified sales leads. Once you have been discovered and built an ideal client experience through your marketing content, SEO, and social media, you can then capture qualified leads by offering prospects something of value—such as free products or services, discounts, or access to useful content such as newsletters, webinars, or white papers—in exchange for signing up and sharing their contact information. Once registered, your leads can be nurtured to move them through your sales funnel through follow-up sales calls, emails, demos, and additional content.
An
Ongoing Investment with Phenomenal ROI
As opposed to outbound marketing, which often involves a temporary or
short-term campaign, inbound marketing is a continual process. It requires an
ongoing commitment to invest in both talent and resources in order to build
your brand online, create content, conduct successful campaigns, and
continuously refine and improve your efforts.
However, this does not mean that inbound marketing is more expensive or less effective than traditional outbound marketing. In fact, inbound marketing is much more cost effective than outbound marketing.
In surveys conducted by HubSpot, businesses consistently reported that the cost per lead for inbound marketing is at least 60% lower than the cost per lead for outbound marketing. In fact, regardless of company size or marketing spend, inbound efforts achieve higher ROI than outbound marketing.
Inbound marketing is even more cost effective for smaller businesses, with a savings of over 62% in cost per lead for companies with 1-25 employees and 68% for those with 51-200 employees.
This phenomenal edge in ROI is one of the main reasons why inbound marketing has become the marketing approach of choice. More than 75% of B2B, B2C, and non-profit organizations now favor inbound over outbound marketing.
Understanding
and Exploring Inbound Marketing for Your Business
From building brand awareness to generating and converting leads, managing your
brand reputation, and retaining customers, inbound marketing is a vital strategy
that no company can afford to ignore. Executed properly, it will not only drive
new business but also continue to pay dividends as you build your brand and
audience, maintain an active presence on social media, and continue to share
content and engage in conversations with prospects and current customers
online.
However, the key to understanding inbound marketingand using it to grow your sales is to gain a deeper awareness of how it works, the steps and strategies required to implement it, and the resources required.
To help you in your effort, our M2C team has assembled a Beginner’s Guide to Inbound Marketing, which offers a quick guide to inbound marketing, an overview of best practices and strategies, and an outline for how to build a successful program for your business. Or, to talk to one of our marketing experts and learn more about inbound marketing and how you can use it to grow your sales, contact our team directly to request more information and schedule a free marketing consultation.
In recent years, inbound marketing has emerged as a critical customer acquisition strategy for companies eager to grow. According to a recent study, as of 2017, 76% of marketers leverage inbound marketing tactics as part of their primary strategy. This trend is in accordance with the facts that over 68% of B2B clients prefer to conduct their own research online and the overwhelming majority have no particular brand loyalty prior to searching. Clearly, it is vital for the modern B2B business to not only understand, but also effectively leverage inbound marketing tactics in order to survive in the new on demand economy.
Inbound marketing involves creating and sharing content online through a variety of mediums such as blogging, social media, and search engine optimization (SEO). By leveraging these tactics, a business crafts its digital footprint, allowing for potential clients to learn as well as engage with the business’s brand in order to create an overall better client experience.
Inbound marketing is often contrasted with outbound marketing, which may include paid advertising, cold calling, telemarketing, sending email blasts to purchased lists, and attending trade shows. Outbound marketing is an effort to get your message out to as many prospects as possible, in the hope that it will resonate with them and generate leads.
While this approach can still be effective and useful, your prospects are already inundated with countless outbound marketing messages every day, so it can be difficult to get your message through. Also, it is clear that the majority of potential clients are not receptive to unsolicited marketing and prefer to initiate the conversation and the research for themselves.
To address these inefficiencies and obstacles, inbound marketing takes a different approach. It aims to engage and build a meaningful relationship with potential clients who are already seeking information and shopping online for solutions relevant to your offering.
There are a few core strategies and tactics that inbound marketers typically use to accomplish this:
- Increase brand awareness by creating content, participating in social media and online discussions, and conducting search engine optimization (SEO)
- Capture leads with useful, informative content, attractive offers, and effective landing pages
- Convert leads with content marketing, nurturing campaigns, and sales force automation
- Analyze results, adjust strategies and content, and apply lessons learned
At its core, inbound marketing is all about generating and converting qualified sales leads. Once you have been discovered and built an ideal client experience through your marketing content, SEO, and social media, you can then capture qualified leads by offering prospects something of value—such as free products or services, discounts, or access to useful content such as newsletters, webinars, or white papers—in exchange for signing up and sharing their contact information. Once registered, your leads can be nurtured to move them through your sales funnel through follow-up sales calls, emails, demos, and additional content.
An
Ongoing Investment with Phenomenal ROI
As opposed to outbound marketing, which often involves a temporary or
short-term campaign, inbound marketing is a continual process. It requires an
ongoing commitment to invest in both talent and resources in order to build
your brand online, create content, conduct successful campaigns, and
continuously refine and improve your efforts.
However, this does not mean that inbound marketing is more expensive or less effective than traditional outbound marketing. In fact, inbound marketing is much more cost effective than outbound marketing.
In surveys conducted by HubSpot, businesses consistently reported that the cost per lead for inbound marketing is at least 60% lower than the cost per lead for outbound marketing. In fact, regardless of company size or marketing spend, inbound efforts achieve higher ROI than outbound marketing.
Inbound marketing is even more cost effective for smaller businesses, with a savings of over 62% in cost per lead for companies with 1-25 employees and 68% for those with 51-200 employees.
This phenomenal edge in ROI is one of the main reasons why inbound marketing has become the marketing approach of choice. More than 75% of B2B, B2C, and non-profit organizations now favor inbound over outbound marketing.
Understanding
and Exploring Inbound Marketing for Your Business
From building brand awareness to generating and converting leads, managing your
brand reputation, and retaining customers, inbound marketing is a vital strategy
that no company can afford to ignore. Executed properly, it will not only drive
new business but also continue to pay dividends as you build your brand and
audience, maintain an active presence on social media, and continue to share
content and engage in conversations with prospects and current customers
online.
However, the key to understanding inbound marketingand using it to grow your sales is to gain a deeper awareness of how it works, the steps and strategies required to implement it, and the resources required.
To help you in your effort, our M2C team has assembled a Beginner’s Guide to Inbound Marketing, which offers a quick guide to inbound marketing, an overview of best practices and strategies, and an outline for how to build a successful program for your business.
Or, to talk to one of our marketing experts and learn more about inbound marketing and how you can use it to grow your sales, contact our team directly to request more information and schedule a free marketing consultation.