What is inbound marketing?

Simply speaking inbound marketing is the art or strategy of attracting customers to a business. There are a myriad of ways through which to accomplish this effect including content marketing, social media marketing, search engine optimization, and other methods that provide value to potential customers.

Inbound marketing distinguishes itself in that it is designed to help businesses draw in customers who are already looking for products or services like those offered by the business, rather than interrupting people’s lives with unwanted advertisements a la traditional marketing.

The key here is relative and helpful content as opposed to interruptive ads.

The end goal of inbound marketing is to attract potential customers to a company’s website and convert them into customers through a variety of techniques, such as email marketing, lead generation, and content marketing.

Inbound marketing as a way to turn marketing campaigns more profitable

There are several different ways in which solid inbound marketing can help increase the profitability of your digital marketing campaigns.

First, by providing potential customers with valuable and relevant information, inbound marketing can help to build trust and credibility with those potential customers. This can make them more likely to do business with a company and can lead to increased customer loyalty.

Second, inbound marketing can help to generate more leads and convert those leads into customers more effectively than other forms of marketing because it focuses on engaging the customer naturally. Naturally, this leads to increased revenue.

Third, inbound marketing can be less expensive than other forms of marketing, such as running banner ads, which can make it a more cost-effective way to reach potential customers.

Finally, inbound marketing can help to create a more positive and popular brand image for a company, which can lead to increased brand awareness and customer loyalty.

How to improve your inbound marketing strategy

We’ve compiled a list of cost-effective ways to improve your marketing strategy through inbound marketing. Think about what makes sense for your business and then try implementing one while analyzing its effects.

Create custom landing pages

Custom landing pages allow companies to provide a tailored and personalized experience for potential customers, changing depending on what channel the lead arrives from. 

By creating separate landing pages for different marketing campaigns or offers, companies can ensure that the content on those pages is highly relevant to the specific audience that the campaign is targeting. This can make it more likely that potential customers will engage with the content and can increase the effectiveness of the marketing campaign.

Create compelling video and audio content

Spend any amount of time in society and you will quickly discover that the vast majority of people don’t want to read. Video and audio content such as how-to guides, product reviews, podcasts, interviews, and video essays are many times more digestible, shareable, and engaging to the masses than articles and blogs.

Video and audio content that is actually helpful and interesting is a stellar way to attract the demographics that might be interested in your product or service. Once a connection to your brand is established, converting that lead to a customer is much easier.

Use live chats as an alternative to static forums

A live chat service on a website allows for real-time communication between the customer and the company, whereas forums are typically asynchronous and require users to check back for responses to their questions or comments. This means that live chat can provide faster and more efficient customer service, improving the customer experience.

The real time assistance that a customer support representative can provide on a live chat, such as sending links or guiding the customer through a website, goes a long way to reduce frustration.

Turn your blog into a valuable asset

Many businesses have blogs, but the vast majority are not as valuable as they could be in terms of inbound marketing benefits. Blog posts should be helpful and relevant. Needlessly wordy and insubstantial filler posts waste your customers’ time. 

Be sure to optimize your blog for search engines to increase its visibility and generate organic traffic to your website.

Your blog isn’t going to sell itself unless it’s really, really good. Promote your blog on social media channels and email marketing to attract more potential customers. Track the performance of your blog and use the data from those insights to improve it.

Photo by fauxels 

Implement effective calls to action 

Across all your written, video, and audio content, it’s key to include effective calls to action. 

Encourage visitors to leave their contact information, sign up for your newsletter, visit another page, or purchase your product. The specific prompt depends on your business and what performance metric you’re currently looking to stimulate. 

Use tools to automate and streamline your processes

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software makes it easier to track leads, book meetings, and check in with your customers through the power of automation. 

QikChat has some of the best inbound marketing tools. Leads are automatically distributed to the sales team, whose calendars are automatically sent in return. All the lead needs to do is pick a time and the meeting is booked instantly. This helps rope in those customers who are put off by the back-and-forth hassle of setting up a meeting.

Analyze and optimize your lead generation efforts regularly

It’s critical to understand what is working and what is not, or else you’re shooting blind. By tracking the performance of your lead generation campaigns, you can gain valuable insights into which tactics are generating the most leads and which ones are not. This can help you to focus your efforts on the most effective tactics and can improve the overall performance of your lead generation efforts.

You can also identify the types of leads that are most likely to convert into customers. This can help you to prioritize your efforts into those avenues that lead to high-quality leads – the ones that make the difference when it comes to revenue.

Conclusion

There are many complicated facets to inbound marketing, but it is a core pillar of how commerce is conducted online nowadays. If you want your online business to stay competitive in a time where digital marketing is more important than ever, it’s crucial to use the best lead generation techniques to gain the upper edge.