Inbound Marketing – why it’s worth it

Hey guys! Here is part four in the series of posts I’m publishing dealing with the different options I discussed about social media in relation to small businesses. So in case you missed my first few posts, you can find them here, here, and here. Each week, I will release a more comprehensive discussion, followed by a review of different services the following week.

This week, I am discussing inbound marketing and what benefits small businesses can receive from this form of social media. Firstly, to answer a few questions I am sure you’re wondering right now: 1.) what is inbound marketing, and 2.) how is it social media? Well, I certainly am glad you asked because I want to answer that for you!

Inbound vs. Outbound Marketing – Inbound Marketing Defined 

As people began charting the new frontier of the internet, when  Web 2.0 standards were being defined (and still are, today), businesses grew their customer base through outbound marketing. This old form of marketing meant relying on a wish and a prayer – businesses would purchase ad space in search engines and would purchase email lists, and hope for leads for their business. However, this is becoming an outdated way to build your clientele. So, what now? In walks Inbound Marketing. Fresh, shiny, and new, inbound marketing is becoming the up-to-date and current way to increase your brand’s awareness and to rake in new customers. How do businesses do this? By creating quality content online that reflects their brand and their brand’s desires. This seems one-sided, but if done properly, the idea is that customers will eventually take over and market the brand/business for you through online word of mouth. To better explain, here is a visual representation of what inbound marketing looks like/ways to go about doing this, as well as a link to the page I am referencing to better explain the concept.

As this graph shows, there are four steps to inbound marketing:

• Attract the customers through different social media platforms
• Convert them from impassive visitors to leads
• Close the deal by turning them from leads into customers
• and finally, delight, which basically is various ways of turning your customers into business promoters by keeping up good online content, and by offering them perks every once and a while.

One major theme to take away from inbound marketing:

Content is EVERYTHING. Without good content, you won’t be able to keep the customers you do have engaged, you will potentially be missing out of new customers out there, and actually bad or no content could hurt your business through bad word of mouth or even by never being able to raise brand awareness by getting your brand out there and putting your business on people’s maps.

How is Inbound Marketing Considered Social Media? 

Glad you asked again, I was just about to answer that. It is considered social media because of the various platforms that are available for use (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, blogs, email, etc.), and the importance of interacting with them through these media. I mentioned that the importance of content is a major theme that goes with inbound marketing. Well, there are others, as well, and I’ll break them down for you below (note: these are in a nonconsecutive order, one is not more important than that others).

1. Content Creation This ties into the concept of content is king. It’s not just about creating content, it’s also about the type content that you’re creating. Your content needs to be targeted to your specific audience(s), and it needs to address the basic answers and needs of the customer(s)/audience(s). Also, the content needs to be shared both far and wide.
2. Lifecycle Marketing This is just the simple realization that there are various levels of interaction with your brand, and their needs to be content based on these levels because each level will have different needs and questions that should be addressed (this simply means that marketing for potential/new customers should not look the same as marketing towards long-standing customers, brand promoters, etc.).
3. Personalization As a business begins to learn its leads and customers and their behaviors, it can begin to tailor its messages/content in a bit more of a personal way.
4. Multi-channel This is important what I’m about to say, so come in closer and listen well…DO NOT stick to one channel/medium if you’re hoping to grow your customer base. Inbound marketing is used so that businesses and people can find each other on the channel that they want to interact with you! This is important so you don’t feel limited to one medium outlet.
5. Integration Use whatever publishing and analytics tools you wish to help you focus on producing the right content on the right channel at the right time.

I hope this gave you a better understanding of inbound marketing and its importance. Sometime this week, I will publish a post continuing this discussion of inbound marketing and how to optimize this tool to reach out to potential clients.

Until then, cheers y’all!