Guest blog by Steve Brown, Owner of ROI Online and client of WT Enterprise Center.
Does My Company Need Inbound Marketing?
Despite the widespread adoption of inbound marketing, some companies are still not adopting this successful marketing method. If your business is one of them, you may be wondering if you need it.
What exactly is Inbound Marketing?
To decide if your business needs inbound marketing, first, you should understand what inbound marketing is. This term covers any marketing method that relies on earning a consumer’s interest instead of buying it. An inbound marketer will educate, entertain, and engage their audience by adding value through content. Traffic comes via search engines, social media, and referrals.
The opposite is outbound marketing, which covers just about any traditional marketing technique such as TV, radio, and print ads. Banner ads are an online version of this marketing. The marketer does very little to educate, entertain, or engage the audience and provides little to no value. This type of marketing is also referred to as interruption-based marketing.
Is Inbound Marketing a good fit for your business?
HubSpot has gathered a number of data points around inbound marketing that illustrate just why you should make inbound marketing a part of your marketing strategy. Take a look at these facts and judge for yourself.
- Inbound marketing generates more leads than outbound marketing at a lower cost. Leads generated by inbound marketing cost 61 percent less than those generated by outbound marketing. That has a real impact to the marketing budget, and means getting more leads for the same investment in marketing.
- Your competition is likely using inbound marketing right now. Sixty percent of marketers have adopted inbound marketing strategies. Forty-eight percent of CEOs report their companies have made inbound marketing an integral part of their marketing strategy.
- An active blog will increase your lead generation rate. Companies that have an active blog generate 126 percent more leads than those who do not. Yes, that number is correct: 126 percent. Forty-three percent of marketers who blog generate customers as a direct result of that blog. For those who blog every day, that number jumps to 82 percent.
- SEO is alive and well, despite rumors to the contrary. With recent Google updates, like Hummingbird, there is a sense among some marketers that SEO is dead. The fact is that SEO is evolving and maturing. It remains a major part of an effective inbound marketing strategy. For the effort put out, SEO still gets the highest conversion rates compared to social media, blogging, and email marketing. Plus, leads generated via SEO have a 14.6 percent close rate, compared to a mere 1.7 percent close rate of leads generated by outbound methods (direct mail, trade shows, telemarketing).
- Marketing automation will increase your revenue inside a year. HubSpot has found that companies that automate their marketing lead management see a revenue boost of 10 percent within six to nine months. That is a result almost any business wants to duplicate.
How is marketing changing?
The world of marketing has changed forever. Consumers have found that they have the power, and they are not buying into outbound marketing techniques as much as they used to Smart companies have already made the switch to inbound marketing.
Are you ready to start integrating inbound marketing into your company’s marketing strategy?
To read more articles about internet marketing, please visit the ROI Online blog.