Back in 2006, Hubspot termed the coin “Inbound Marketing”.
According to Hubspot Inbound Marketing methodology involves these three stages – Attract, Engage, and Delight.
Through using various types of content at different stages of the buying cycle, the ‘inbound methodology’ is “the best way to turn strangers into customers and promoters of your business.”
Inbound marketing helps you attract customers. The content is designed to attract qualified prospects, convert them into leads and customers, and grow your business.
It mainly focuses on building trust and valuable customer relationships with your audience.
People search online for every bit of information.
They look for solutions to their problems, purchase products, review products, and look for details on any products before buying, and whatnot.
They can get answers to any of their queries in minutes at their fingertips.
Inbound Marketing can be used as a powerful tool by providing exactly what the searchers are looking for.
You just need to focus on creating quality content for your target audience. This builds trust and authority in your brand.
Inbound Marketing uses the methodology to build trust, credibility, and momentum.
It’s about adding value at every stage in your customer’s journey with you.
1. Attract
You want to attract the right people that are the right fit for your business.
So how do you do this?
By providing the right content they are looking for. Content may be of any type of blog, video podcast, etc.
Content Strategy
Use content strategy to build authority.
Rank for the search topics which matter to you the most.
Deliver the right content in every stage of the buyer’s journey.
It is very important to understand the buyer’s journey.
Hubspot defines a buyer journey as
The buyer’s journey is the process buyers go through to become aware of, consider and evaluate, and decide to purchase a new product or service.
The buyer’s journey consists of the following three stages:
Awareness Stage: In this stage, the buyer identifies the challenge they are facing.
Consideration Stage: The buyer here researches online to solve his challenge.
Decision Stage: The buyer chooses.
Blogging
Blogging should definitely be part of your marketing strategy.
It adds more value to your business. It plays a very crucial role in driving traffic to your website.
According to the studies
- 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.
Videos
Videos have become important for every channel and platform.
It can be used in blogs, landing pages, social media, video platforms and all these are part of Inbound Marketing.
So videos are definitely a part of marketing strategy and it’s not new.
The question is how important are videos for every channel and platform we use.
Some Benefits of using videos to attract customers
- Video content on social media is making the most impression.
- Videos can increase your search engine ranking.
- Blogs with video content are more engaging.
- Using videos in landing pages can increase conversions by 86%
Social Media:
67% of online adults use social media to share information.
You definitely can’t afford to neglect widely popular online communities such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.
Many content Ideas can be found through social media.
Any content can go viral here which helps you in content promotion.
2. Engage
After customers arrive at your webpage engage them with the platform they prefer maybe through email, chatbots, messaging apps, etc.
You can here use the conversion tools to capture the information of your customers visiting your webpage.
Group a specific audience based on their behavior on the website. Build your brand loyalty by targeting them with social content and ads.
You can use all the customer information to create smart content to give him the best user experience.
Nurture those leads by sharing the most informative and relevant content.
Follow up the lead with workflows, emails, and other best practices and sales tactics to convert those leads to new business.
3. Delight
You want to do this to create higher lifetime values and loyal customers.
It is incredibly important to be sure to continue to communicate with customers, even after they are converted.
Create amazing content that is very valuable that they can easily share with friends and family.
By doing this they are promoting your brand which can increase your brand popularity.
Send valuable information even though they are your existing customers.
This can help you to continue to work with them in the future.
Some of the ways to continue to delight your customers are social media monitoring, trigger marketing, surveys, and analytical reports.
Benefits of Inbound Marketing
Helps in search engines
The goal of Inbound Marketing is to build a valuable and long-lasting relationship.
Create blog posts with great content that provides valuable information to your audience with the best SEO practices.
SEO is a slow process.
Once if it is ranking better you will have enough traffic for your website for a long period of time.
And same with social media, once you have a good amount of followers you can easily engage with them anytime.
It’s cost-effective
Inbound Marketing is much cheaper than outbound marketing.
You just have to invest time rather than money.
Inbound Marketing can generate leads by just creating quality content.
And make sure those contents are reaching the right people by choosing the right platform to promote that particular content.
Educates your audience
People are doing research online. They are looking for solutions.
The latest statistic by CEB says that most B2B buyers are 57%-70% through their buying research before first contacting the seller.
Spend some time on what the buyer is looking for, and distribute your content strategically.
Build brand trust and authority
Sales are not only the marketing goal of the company. Building a brand name and raising awareness about the products should be done. And this, in turn, helps in sales directly or indirectly.
With the help of inbound marketing strategies, we can make use of social media, blogs, videos, infographics, etc to build a brand name, trust, and authority.
Bring traffic and qualified leads
If the Inbound strategies are correctly followed you will drive enough traffic.
You generate qualified leads, the part you have been waiting for.
The lead will be later converted to sales if it’s properly nurtured.
Conclusion:
I guess now you have an understanding of inbound marketing.
Keep inbound marketing always mainstream if your marketing strategies. This will always help you to build your brand and attract potential customers.