What is Inbound Marketing?

The main focus of Inbound Marketing is attracting customers through relevant and helpful content and adding value at every stage in your customer’s purchasing journey. With inbound marketing, prospective customers find you through channels like blogs, search engines, and social media.

But unlike outbound marketing, inbound marketing does not need to fight for potential customers’ attention. By crafting content designed to address the problems and needs of your ideal customers, you attract qualified prospects and build trust and credibility for your business.

The Proven Methodology for Growing Your Business

In the last few years, the same change in buying behaviour that sparked the inbound movement has also spread throughout the whole customer experience. How people communicate and what they expect from your business has changed.

The good news? The inbound methodology continues to help businesses adapt to fast-changing needs – not just with marketing, but with the entire customer experience.

With the inbound methodology, you have the advantage for growing your business and getting customers who buy more, to stay with you longer, refer their friends, and tell the world they prefer you.

The Four Phases of the Inbound Methodology

1. Attract — Turn Strangers Into Visitors

You don’t want just any randoms coming to your site. You want people who are the most likely to become leads, and, ultimately, happy customers. How do you get them? You attract more of the right customers with relevant content at the right time whenever they’re looking for it.

Blogging

Your best bet to get started on Inbound marketing starts with content. A blog is the single best way to attract new visitors to your website. In order to get found by the right prospective customers, you must create educational content that speaks to them and answers their questions.

Content Strategy

Your customers begin their buying process online, usually by searching to find something they have questions about. So make sure you’re showing up when and where they search. To do that, increase your presence with tools that help you define and implement your content strategy.

Social Media

Successful inbound strategies are all about remarkable content and social media allows you to share that valuable information, engage with your prospects, and put a human face on your brand. Interact on the platforms where your ideal buyers spend their time.

2. Convert — Turn Visitors Into Leads

Once they’ve visited your website, the next step is to convert those visitors into leads. You do this by opening up a conversation in whatever way works best for them, forms, meetings or live chat. Once you’re in touch and they’re now a part of your CRM, you can answer questions and provide relevant content that is interesting and valuable and continue the conversation.

Forms

In order for visitors to become leads, they can fill out a form and submit their information. Optimize your form to make this step of the conversion process as easy as possible.

Meetings

To win new deals, you’re going to have to speak with people one way or another, via phone or a virtual meeting. Give prospects an easy way to book meetings without the back and forth. Your calendar stays full, and you stay productive. Show up, engage, and win a new customer.

Live Chat

Chat with site visitors, connect with the right people at the right time, and make chat conversations a natural part of your sales process. Close more deals with a live chat tool. This helps sales teams connect with the right people right when they’re most engaged.

CRM

Keep track of the leads you’re converting in your CRM, a centralized contact database. Having all your data in one place helps you make sense of every interaction you’ve had with your contacts and optimize your future interactions to more effectively attract, convert, close, and delight your ideal customers.

3. Close — Turn Leads Into Customers

Awesome, you’re on the right track! You’ve attracted the right visitors and converted them into leads, but now you need to transform those leads into customers. How can you most effectively do this? The sales tools available at this stage to make sure you’re closing the right leads at the right time, faster and easier.

Pipeline Management

How do you know which marketing efforts are bringing in the best leads? Is your sales team effectively closing those best leads into customers? Using a CRM allows you to analyze just how well your marketing and sales teams are playing together.

Lead Nurturing

Each lead you have should be nurtured according to their interests and lifecycle stage. Pages they’ve visited, content and whitepapers, these all indicate shifting interests. Good nurturing adapts messaging to stay relevant and makes winning new customers faster.

Email

What if a visitor clicks on your call-to-action, fills out a landing page, or downloads your white paper, but still isn’t ready to become a customer? A series of emails focused on useful, relevant content can build trust with a prospect and help them become more ready to buy.

Lead Scoring

Lead scoring is a great way to handle growth at your company. As your business grows and you generate more leads, it doesn’t always make sense to get in touch with every single lead. You want to make sure sales is prioritizing their time based on the most qualified leads.

4. Delight —  Turn Customers into Promoters

Provide a remarkable experience for your customers, they have much higher expectations of your business and how they’re treated. It’s even more important to engage with, delight, and make your customers successful. If you do, they will buy more, stay with you longer, refer their friends, and be happy to tell the world they prefer you.

Social Media Monitoring

Social media monitoring. Keep up with your customers on social media, so that you can identify an opportune time to connect. Did your customer just win an award? That’s a great time to send a note congratulating them. Did they just hire a new employee? Maybe that’s a clue that they need more of the products and services that you offer.

Smart Content

No one wants a sales pitch when they’ve already bought. Smart content makes sure you don’t show loyal customers CTAs or content meant for first-time buyers. And with smart calls-to-action, you present different visitors with offers that change based on buyer persona and lifecycle stage.

Conversations

Manage, collaborate, and respond to customer messages, from any channel. Keep track of potential deals, questions, comments, and requests – and start having better, more meaningful customer conversations.

For more information, learn more about outbound marketing, lead generation, lead nurturing or lead scoring.

Or, check out the following blogs focusing on lead generation:

Nurture Your Leads With 7 Effective Lead Nurturing Tactics

Outbound Marketing or Inbound Marketing for Lead Gen?

Lead Generation – Ideas

Beyond the Lead Score: Qualify a Lead in 60 Seconds

Combining Inbound & Outbound Marketing Strategies

 

RAVEN5 is a contest marketing agency, that works with clients in developing and administering consumer programs in Canada and the United States. RAVEN5 works with clients to develop strategies and tactics with a focus on both traditional, digital and online coupons as well as redemption solutions that work for both B2B and B2C consumers. RAVEN5 Ltd. are leaders in Consumer Promotions that produce results.