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  • Inbound Marketing Methodology Helps You
    Create Marketing that People Love!


Inbound Marketing: How to Keep Your Sales Funnel Full

funnel-illustration-whole

Attracting attention on the Internet can be a full-time job. Inbound marketers will plan, automate, and execute a content marketing strategy that includes, blogs, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and social networking to steal the show. It’s no longer easy just to put up a website and expect traffic from it. Neither is it a viable long-term strategy to assume that outbound marketing strategies, like cold calling, will work in an age where people can screen calls or put their names on a "Do Not Call" list. Similarly, fewer people are buying newspapers or watching television. Thus, in the near future, if you’re not in the inbound marketing game, you’ll probably be out of the game entirely.

Inbound vs. Outbound Marketing

Outbound marketers are intent on blasting the marketplace with their product offerings, to get the most attention. Inbound marketing isn’t about pushing out your message to the masses to find new customers arbitrarily. It is a way to make your message so attractive that it creates a magnetic environment where people actively seek you out online because they like what you have to offer. In other words, they come to you.

The Consumer is the Focus, Not the Product

Inbound marketing research will know who the perfect consumer and will attract their attention via interesting content that appeals to search engines as well. That’s why social networking is an integral part of inbound marketing. You are trying to generate more of a genuine one-on-one connection with website visitors so that you earn their trust early in the sales process. Once you have a large group of friends and followers, you will find they can also be your biggest advertisers through online word-of-mouth.

Inbound Methodology: Attract, Convert, Close, Delight

The methodology aims to time the customer in the buying process so that they are most likely to convert. Initially, the idea is to generate content that will attract the exact demographic that has the highest potential for converting. Each stage will provide opportunities to market, as follows:

Attract

 

Attract
It begins with attracting potential customers through content like blog posts, whitepapers, eBooks, infographics and engaging on social media. This is where many consumers will perform research and contemplate whether or not they want to make a purchase from a business. It’s important to understand that 80 – 90 % of visitors on your site are not ready to make a purchase right away. Accordingly, it’s necessary to provide leads with quality content that’s educational, interesting or entertaining. 
Get More Traffic
Convert

 

Convert
Once you attract, you need to convert them into leads through Call-To-Actions. Tell them what they need to do next after they find you. Guide them through the content and provide a logical next step that helps them achieve their goal – which in most cases will be a helpful resource that they can download. On the website, use proper CTAs to tell them what they should do next and what they will get in return – premium content offers such as eBooks, whitepapers, etc. help with this conversion process. Ensure you have the right kind of offer that is relevant to your buyer personas in order to improve chances of successful conversions.

 Get More Leads

Close

 

Close
After qualifying a lead, gaining trust and proving that you have the product or service that they want, it’s time to close. During the nurture stage, some initial interest is established and rapport is built. By going through this “self learning” process, you should have a higher conversion rate than you with traditional outbound techniques.

Get More Sales

Delight

 

Delight
But don’t stop there. Your customers are you greatest assets, nurture them and get them to become your promoters. Why? Because:
  • A happy customer can be your brand ambassador, your evangelist that can help promote your business for you. Word of mouth is still huge in marketing, and this is how you can get word of mouth going for your business.
  • Upselling to existing customers is far cheaper than getting new customers. A happy customer will buy more from you, bringing in repeat business.

The New Sales and Marketing Funnel

New-Sales-Funnel-R1The modern buying cycle is driven mostly by the customer. Today’s buyers will educate themselves about the solutions they need by performing their own research online at their own pace. By the time they reach out to sales, they will have completed a significant portion of the journey into the buying cycle and are very close to making a decision. This means that businesses now need to focus on creating enough content online to educate their customers about the solutions they offer and how they help the buyers instead of spending time finding prospects.

Understanding this phenomenon and getting your business on track is crucial for consistently generating fresh leads, making solid conversions and getting repeat business.

 

Raise Awareness – During the content marketing stage, they can focus on educating the public by setting up expert panels, online events, or even “how to” videos that exemplify the benefits of the product lineup while advertising an introductory offer. Ideally, inbound marketers will attempt to interact with their audience to increase participation and generate the needed buzz to go viral, through comments, likes, and shares.

 

Consideration – To convince someone you are worthy of their consideration, you have to create a persona with some authority. This is also useful for the Google search engine, which will be scouring the web to find articles that you authored and on what topics to determine your standing in the Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs). Use white hat SEO strategies to help your online reputation with search engines. Provide high-value initial offers to tempt your audience and issue a call to action to get the sale and convert the buyer and close the deal.

 

After the purchase – The aim of inbound marketing is to make sure that your customers are delighted with the purchase enough to go out and tell all their online friends. You can nudge them to do that by offering them incentives for sharing via online contests for those who commented the best or shared the most.

Inbound marketing will aim for a less-centralized presence on the web, with a defined content marketing strategy in place to draw attention to multiple venues as a means to increased sales.