If you are looking for new strategies to position your company and get a larger number of clients and, therefore, increase the sales of your products or services, you have surely already heard of Inbound Marketing. In any case, for those who are not yet familiar with this type of relational marketing, we are going to briefly define it as an introduction.
This is a process that coordinates numerous non-intrusive marketing and advertising techniques, the ultimate goal of which is to establish contact with users from the beginning of the purchasing process, leading them through the process until the final purchase. In addition, another objective of this type of marketing is to build customer loyalty once they have completed the purchasing process.
Inbound marketing makes some sense in B2B marketing cases where Account Based Marketing strategies are not the most appropriate. There are usually few circumstances where Inbound is more worthy vp maintenance email lists than ABM , and we have talked about it here, because, generally, Inbound strategies are not focused and involve wasting a lot of resources and efforts on non-ideal accounts. Even so, it can make sense when the product or service is massive and when personalization or differentiation are not key elements of our value proposition.
Advantages of Inbound Marketing for companies that apply it
You're probably wondering now, but why should I implement certain Inbound Marketing strategies instead of other options? Well, the answer is very simple, and it is that if we apply this methodology correctly we will be able to achieve a series of extremely beneficial advantages for our company.
On the one hand, it is capable of increasing marketing qualified leads (MQL). We are referring to those users who have shown interest on more than one occasion in the published content of your company, and who are already in the middle phase of the conversion funnel, that is, they have already realized their need and are looking for solutions for it.
In addition, Inbound Marketing is also capable of increasing leads, that is, those records that are still in the first stage of the conversion funnel and that have already provided us with their data in exchange for some type of content, as we will see later.
On the other hand, the proper use of Inbound Marketing strategies leads to an increase in visits received by the website, creating greater user traffic and directly affecting the two previous points. The greater the traffic of potential clients, the greater the number of possibilities of obtaining registrations and, in turn, the greater the probability of ending up with qualified marketing contacts.
In addition, Attraction Marketing provides assets. The money spent to implement these techniques works as an investment, since this method also creates a series of elements, which have their own monetary cost and are capable of providing returns after a certain time. Among these active elements we can find:
Reach: the content generated by the company reaches a greater number of users, increasing its audience and thus increasing both the value and visibility of the company.
Database: As we mentioned earlier, through Inbound Marketing you get a greater number of registrations, which increases your database with qualified leads.
Branding: techniques used to enrich the brand image in order to increase advertising impact, making an ever-larger place for itself in the market.
Lead acquisition channel: this is carried out independently of payment methods and increases the company's visibility in internet search engines, thereby increasing the number of visits to the website and making it possible to acquire a greater number of quality registrations.
Content: A company generates content on its website, blog or social media in order to generate traffic. It also helps the company position itself as an experienced brand in the sector.
Marketing automation process: a series of mechanized techniques capable of guaranteeing the acquisition of new qualified records, which can later be converted into clients.
How Attraction Marketing Works and Phases
Inbound Marketing is divided into four distinct phases that fit directly with the four stages of the purchasing process: Concentration, Research, Decision and Action. In this way, and in an orderly manner, the four points of Attraction Marketing are the following:
Attraction: through numerous advertising and marketing methods, such as Facebook Ads, television commercials, or any other technique we can think of, the user is guided to the website where they will find all the information they need to learn about the brand, the products and services, and find out if this way they can satisfy their need.
Conversion: Once the user has been brought to the company's website, it is time to take action by creating techniques through which a simple observer of the page can be converted into a record that can be dumped into our database. How do we do this? Very simple, by offering interesting content for potential clients that can be downloaded in exchange for filling out a form with their data. Among the content that is usually offered we find ebooks with relevant information for the consumer, webinars and videos, or checklists and templates. Any type of content that can be useful and attractive for users is welcome at this point in the journey.
Education: Once the conversion has been completed and the email address of the transformed users is available, they are sent relevant information for each of the stages of the purchasing process they are in. In this phase we can talk about two marketing automation processes:
Lead nurturing : This technique takes into account the stage of the purchasing process in which each user is, as well as their profile and specific behavior, and uses this information to automatically send personalized content to each person.
Lead scoring: used to study the level of the records obtained, that is, at what point in the purchasing process they are and whether we can count on them as potential customers.
Closing and loyalty: as we mentioned before, Inbound Marketing not only seeks to obtain leads and buyers, but is also interested in them once the final transaction has been carried out, that is, it seeks to build customer loyalty, retain them and ensure that they are completely satisfied. In addition, at this point it is important not only to maintain those users who have become final customers, but we also want to take care of those leads who are loyal to the brand's content, even though they will never become customers, but who can help us get more traffic to the website, for example by sharing news and content on social networks.
