Unless your last name is Van Winkle and you’ve just awoken from a really good nap, you’ve probably heard the term “inbound marketing.”
My business partner Pascha Apter and I recently attended INBOUND 2015, Hubspot’s annual conference where inbound marketing geniuses gather to learn and connect regarding best practices in the industry. We were excited to hear from thought leaders like Seth Godin, Brené Brown, Darren Rouse and Brian Clark.
(Giant Voices, our strategic marketing firm, is a certified Hubspot Partner Agency.)
If you’re new to inbound and get a sinking feeling when you contemplate learning yet another marketing skill set, chin up! The ROI of inbound makes learning it well worth the effort.
To get you started in this brave new marketing world, we’ve distilled the most important information you need to know about inbound into three easy-to-swallow insights.
Inbound Insight #1: Inbound begins with a mindset shift.
Inbound marketing is advertising flipped on its head. Rather than – or in addition to – paying to push your message out to target customers, you draw your target customer in with free content that speaks to their problems and desires.
On his blog, Seth Godin once wrote, “Permission marketing is the privilege (not the right) of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them. It recognizes the new power of the best consumers to ignore marketing. It realizes that treating people with respect is the best way to earn their attention.”
He calls this approach permission marketing, but we think it’s a great definition for inbound, too.
Inbound Insight #2: Inbound has a learning curve.
Just as with any other new technology or marketing technique, there’s a learning curve to inbound.
- How do you create content so compelling people will share it – and that will ultimately feed your bottom line?
- How do you design a website strategically to maximize conversions?
- How do you set up automated email workflows?
- What the heck is a CTA, anyway?
Investing in expert guidance as you get started with inbound can help ensure you don’t waste time or money and instead garner a substantial ROI.
Inbound Insight #3: It works.
Hubspot’s statistics speak for themselves. From a Hubspot Marketing blog post called 6 Stats You Should Know About Business Blogging in 2015:
- B2B marketers that use blogs receive 67% more leads than those that do not.
- Marketers who have prioritized blogging are 13x more likely to enjoy positive ROI.
- Companies who blog receive 97% more links to their website.
Conclusion
Giant Voices is a certified Hubspot partner agency.
At Giant Voices, every deliverable we execute for our clients ties back to content that helps drive sales. To learn how inbound marketing and a strategic marketing partner can increase your sales and customer satisfaction, contact the Giants today.
