Inbound Marketing Basics
What is Inbound Marketing?
Have your marketing efforts sometimes felt like screaming into the void, or has your business struggled for visibility among a sea of other similar B2B companies? We understand and want to put forth inbound marketing as the solution you’ve been looking for.
Inbound marketing is a strategy that uses valuable and personalized content to attract and retain consumers. In contrast to outbound marketing, which often interrupts and annoys consumers with generic or even unwanted information, inbound marketing draws in the people most likely to buy.
The Inbound Marketing Methodology
The inbound marketing methodology consists of four stages: Attract, Engage, Delight, and Retain. The core of inbound marketing is personalized messaging. Since the customers in each stage have different circumstances, each stage requires distinct content.
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Attract: You have two goals during the Attract stage. First, pull people to your business, and second, establish your business as a thought leader in your niche.
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Engage: Now that you’ve begun to convert strangers to prospects, it’s time to personalize. The goal is to continue to build the relationship between business and consumer. Your firm should provide answers to your prospects’ questions and (ideally unique) solutions to their problems. Additionally, work to minimize barriers. You should make it easy for consumers to contact your business or buy your product/service.
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Delight: The goal of inbound marketing is to convert prospects into customers. In the Delight stage, your business should support prospects in solving their problems or achieving their goals. The key is to convince potential customers how and why a purchase is beneficial. To illustrate, highlight the benefits of your products and services and what differentiates you from your competitors.
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Retain: Now that you’ve begun to convert strangers to prospects, it’s time to personalize. The goal is to continue to build the relationship between business and consumer. Your firm should provide answers to your prospects’ questions and (ideally unique) solutions to their problems. Additionally, work to minimize barriers. You should make it easy for consumers to contact your business or buy your product/service.
Four Components of Inbound Marketing
Contacts:
Your Most Valuable Resource
Think of the contacts in your phone. They are the link to your inner circle and acquaintances. It’s the same scenario in inbound marketing. Your contacts can include both current customers and prospects (of course, you’ll want to differentiate between them). By creating and maintaining strong relationships through the four stages of inbound marketing, your business can turn contacts into loyal customers and advocates.
Buyer Personas: Helping You Visualize Your Target Audience
One thing implicitly suggested within the four stages of inbound marketing is the importance of knowing your target audience. It’s a waste of advertising dollars to attract a customer who would never need or want your solution.
A tool to help your business understand your target audience is buyer personas, which are semi-fictional representations of your ideal customers. They help acquaint your marketing and sales teams with the people or organizations that can benefit from your business. Personas should help identify your desired customer’s background, needs, goals, challenges, etc. Descriptions of these personas might also include business titles and their roles and/or likely concerns about a purchase decision.
Buyer’s Journey: Guiding Prospects to Become Customers
While the four stages of inbound marketing are from the business’s point of view, the buyer's journey model keeps the customer's viewpoint first and foremost. This model outlines the actions a prospect goes through to become a customer. Understanding this path and how it interacts with the stages of inbound marketing allows your business to tailor your content to whatever stage the buyer is in.
Goals: Measuring Your Success
Clear marketing goals, beyond “attract more leads” or “engage more customers,” are essential. The goal could be to gain X number of prospects, increase website traffic by Y visitors, or generate Z sales. Quantifying success is necessary to demonstrate that your marketing efforts are paying off. If they aren’t, you’ll know you must make adjustments.