Inbound marketing is about customers finding you organically and paying you for your services. No more cold calling, manual reaching out, or persuading customers to do business with you.
It’s a strategy that has been around for a while, but in recent years it’s been getting more attention from companies who want to create a sustainable customer base. In this way, companies can build a customer base by providing customers with what they want before they even know they want it!
What is Inbound Marketing
Inbound marketing is the process of attracting customers through different pull strategies. This is typically done through blogging, social media posts, search engine optimization, and more. The idea behind this marketing strategy is to attract customers who are interested in what you have to offer with relevant content so that when they are ready to buy, they come directly to you. As an example, think about a customer finding your website and contacting you through your form or phone number. This user has found you on their own accord and opted to reach out to you based on the value shown via website, socials, etc.
Of course, not all of your business will come from your website or blog. You may find customers through cold calling, print ads, or other traditional forms of advertising. However, inbound marketing is a great way to attract a consistent stream of new customers and create a loyal customer base.
How To Get Started With Inbound Marketing
There are a lot of steps that go into creating an inbound marketing strategy. But here’s a quick breakdown of how to track and the steps of the strategy.
How Do you Track The Success of Inbound Marketing?
Since there are so many moving parts to inbound marketing there is no clear-cut way to track the success rate. For the most part, people use a combination of indicators. Including;
- website traffic
- domain authority
- organic acquisition
- page ranking
- organic leads (contact form submissions, emails, phone calls)
- social media
- engagement
- click through rate
- impressions
- followers
- email list size
- conversion rates
You would take these indicators and compare them to your previous months, your three month average and your overall goals. So what does this look like?
The Steps
One
The first step in getting started with inbound marketing is to decide what you want your customers to do. This might be opting in to your email list, subscribing to your blog, downloading one of your ebooks, etc. Once this is decided, write or produce content that will provide customers with an easy way of doing what you want them to do. For example, if you want customers to subscribe to your newsletter, create a page on your website that has an opt-in form and some valuable content for new subscribers. You’ll determine the success of the opt-in page using the change in your email list size, number of opt in forms and changes to your website traffic.
Two
The difficult part is getting people to your website and asking them to actually download your eBook or sign up for your newsletter. This is where having an SEO strategy comes in. Find a keyword that is relevant to the material you’re producing and optimize the specific page for it. This means having proper headlines, meta descriptions, and titles, etc., that include your keyword. If you’ve done your research and the piece of content you’re giving away is valuable to your potential customers, they’ll have no problem giving you their email in exchange for the content.
We have a blog that goes in-depth on how to increase your website’s traffic, which you may check out here.
Three
Once a new lead or customer comes in, it’s important to remember them! How do you do this? It takes a little bit of work but a big part of what makes inbound marketing successful is sending relevant emails to your customers that include helpful content or new offers. Continuing with the previous example, send them a monthly newsletter email that has some information on what you mentioned in your blog post and ask them if they have any questions. If they did download your eBook, follow up with them after a few weeks to see what they thought about it and encourage them to share it with their friends if they found the information valuable.
Here’s a quick visualization of what the touchpoint can look like.
That’s really all there is to it. Don’t be discouraged if you don’t see results right away. Having an inbound marketing strategy and seeing results will take longer than outbound marketing efforts. However, as more and more people become aware of this strategy, it becomes a great way to build a sustainable customer base.
Examples of Inbound Marketing Strategies
There are different types of inbound marketing strategies that companies use.
One of the most popular is blogging. Blogging is one of the best ways to attract people and provide them with immediate value. Like this blog right now! You would have clicked on this blog because you’re looking for more information about inbound marketing. Our job would then be to give you the most value possible ie. explain what inbound marketing is and how to use it.
Email Marketing is another strategy. Email marketing is especially helpful when it comes to lead nurturing. Once you get your lead’s emails you can create an automated email series that introduces your brand and then provides them with helpful content every few days or weeks.
A lead magnet can also be a great strategy. Some of the most popular types of leads magnets are eBooks, templates, case studies, and webinars. This strategy is usually combined with an email strategy as the lead would give you their email in exchange for the content.
Social media is an important part of inbound marketing. With social media, businesses can get creative and create a following that has a genuine interest in what you have to offer. It allows businesses who are creating content to get exposure for their material. Social Media is one of the most important parts of inbound marketing because of its ability to build brand awareness through user-generated content!
The Reality of Inbound Strategies
In reality, all these strategies are intertwined and work together to create one big inbound marketing strategy. If you have a lead magnet you’ll need an email strategy to nurture the leads. You’ll also need socials in order to advertise your lead magnet. As you can see you can’t have one without the other. Inbound strategy is about building your customer base for the long term. It can’t be done within a few months. It requires consistency and dedication.
Inbound marketing is a powerful way to attract customers who are interested in what you have to offer. In this article, we’ve explored the different types of inbound marketing strategies that companies use and how they work together to create one big strategy for sustainable customer base building. Whether you want more leads or want to build a strong brand, these techniques can help your company succeed!