inbound marketing Archives

More than 6,200 marketing experts from 99 countries coming from various industries, company sizes, and seniority or rank levels have spoken on the current state of Inbound this 2018. See what they have to say on this report from Hubspot.

69% of the respondents prioritize converting leads to customers, 54% aims to grow website traffic, 44% wants to increase revenue derived from existing customers, 42% would like to prove the ROI of marketing activities, 37% target sales enablement and 29% would want to reduce the cost of contact acquisition.

Here’s more, another study vouched on the strength of inbound: inbound marketers believe in their efforts more than outbound marketers with 68% inbound marketers and only 48% of outbound marketers claim their marketing efforts to be ‘effective’, 46% reported inbound marketing gave higher ROI, and only 12% reported for outbound. While discussion on higher quality leads for sales, 59% were positive for inbound and 16% for outbound; and when asked if which marketing tactic has improved in the last two years, 59% noted increase on inbound marketing and only 16% for outbound.

Looking at the reports, inbound marketing seems to be overbearing with potentialities and tenacity, yet marketing challenges are still encountered along the process which hamper achievement of the above goals: 61% of the respondents are challenged on generating traffic and leads, 39% on proving the ROI of their marketing activities, 27% on securing enough budget, 25% on managing website, 24% on identifying the right tools for their marketing goals, 23% on training the team, 22% on hiring top talent and 20% on targeting content for an international audience.

The sales funnel has a wide opening which means that it can accommodate a large number of leads, but this does not mean however that marketers could freely pour in just any amount into it. In order to maximize time, effort and costs for a lead generation program, one must ensure quality right from the start point of the process – generating quality leads that are highly sales-convertible.

Here are three major ‘responding to inbound leads’ tips that will not only generate more quality leads but decrease chances of marketing challenges:

Utilizing The Right Tool

Marketing automation is the trend and has proven effectivity on many accounts because of its qualification capabilities. However, marketers must couple their automation tool with the right lead scoring and grading to screen leads before they move down to the sales team to follow up.

Lead Response Time

A study from Harvard Business Review showed that sales reps are seven times more likely to have substantial conversation with prospects if they respond to them within the first hour; 60 times more to qualify a lead that if waited for 24 hours to follow up a lead.

Profiling The Prospect

The CRM may contain all pertinent information about the prospect but that won’t suffice the quality required. With careful probing and asking the right questions, reps will be able to profile the prospect’s demographic and psychographic data, his buying behavior and the business need.

Marketing strategies are interesting. The fact that drafting an approach is a volatile task allows for a variety of options that B2B telemarketing companies could follow. There is simply no linear formula to follow as there are two vital forms of marketing which you can pursue, inbound and outbound.

For a campaign to earn its success, it is important for a business decision-maker to know which method would prove the best. Would you use the inbound techniques in SEO and social media, or would you put more focus on the outbound methods of traditional advertising, direct mail and phone calls?

The following considerations will guide you in creating a successful marketing plan:

Cost Efficiency. Gauging the success of a campaign should also be reflected in the ROI. And profitability is too dear to lose. Nowadays, companies are making great strides by engaging communities through blogging and social media platforms such as Facebook and LinkedIn for lesser costs compared to using traditional media. And once you have established an online presence, customers may contact you for more information on your offers.

Content Engagement. Once you get your message to your audience, there is no telling how well the message is absorbed. Both inbound and outbound marketing suffer such uncertainties, rendering ROI forecasts difficult if not ambiguous. With this in mind, you would have to churn out quality content. Whether designing an engaging blog or starting a direct mail campaign, one must not neglect that content is relative to sales volume.

Market Diversity. The challenges faced by B2B and B2C marketing lies in the diversity of business prospects. The reality is that there are as many kinds of consumers as there are marketing strategies. And it does a great service to know your targets well. In this respect, businesses must attend to pertinent data on their target demographic. It is easy to assume that tech-savvy individuals who spend a large slice of their daily time blogging and accessing their social media accounts can be easy pickings for quality online content. But then again, one should also consider people who are less exposed to inbound messages. For this, PR activities and trade shows can be employed to reach out to a wider audience.

We can see that inbound and outbound marketing seem to oppose each other. But in many cases, they go hand in hand. Businesses must make use of the advantages of both methods in order to expand their reach.

For example, a business may send direct mails containing links to the enterprise’s blogsite and social media pages. Freebies and discounts can be offered once the recipient agrees to subscribe to a regular newsletter or supply contact information for potential offerings.

Integrating the two will prove to be indispensable in translating marketing leads into actual sales.