Aug 1, 2017 - very sophisticated and powerful set of digital tools that work .... Enterprise system such as Salesforce.c
AUGUST 1, 2017
THE POWER OF INBOUND MARKETING ENGAGING AND CONVERTING GUEST PROSPECTS
COMMUNICATION LINKS Scottsdale, AZ
INBOUND MARKETING OUTBOUND MARKETING – SHOUTING THE MESSAGE The traditional thesis in marketing and advertising has been that “outbound marketing” moves unaware customer prospects into the sales funnel. With a variety of outreach media options, the typical marketer could sit in Corporate HQ, create a budget, allocate media spend across various vehicles, and generate “demand” using interruptive push media techniques. One problem: the company’s traditional sales funnel has always been a relatively nebulous concept, in which many different people within that company would be engaged in different functional roles that somehow moved prospective customers through a process of awareness, conversion, sale and post-sale “delight.” Tracking these touch points has been more about the actual aggregate performance metric of the individual components of the outbound marketing-generated sales funnel, rather than the more holistic reference point of measuring success of EACH individual prospective buyer moving through the funnel.
Today, that original marketing mantra has shifted 180 degrees. So, instead of pushing interruptive messaging out to customer prospects, the essential goal is its opposite: magnetizing or pulling in customer prospects through a very sophisticated and powerful set of digital tools that work interactively to not only increase the number of prospects entering the marketer’s sphere of influence, but which tracks those customers’ moves as they go through the short- or long-term buying process.
INBOUND MARKETING – CHANGING THE CALCULUS IN A DIGITAL WORLD
We believe that businesses of all sizes, whether small/medium businesses (SMB), entrepreneurial start-ups or larger enterprise/divisional businesses, all need to integrate “inbound marketing” into their Digital DNA. While Communication Links still believes that some print advertising assets are useful, the inherent weakness is the inability to track inbound leads as sourced from various print publications. There are some recommended solutions we propose to clients who need print media platforms to help assess the success of print publications. But, our business philosophy has shifted to more digital outreach for finding and converting new customers. The core component of any inbound marketing program is the website. It is typically the company’s website that will help provide information, answer questions, create custom landing pages and move the prospective customer along to some Call to Action: fill out a form, book a tee time, call a phone number or send an email query requesting a call from a company representative. It is available locally and globally, and it never stops working: 24x7x365. The hurdle is that most websites can’t be found if the prospective customer/client/member doesn’t know you exist. They don’t know who you are, where you are located, how to reach you and they certainly won’t trust you without a lot of additional research. To overcome that obstacle requires a series of tools to help attract prospects to your website. The visual image above lists a few of the important pieces of the puzzle. You’ll note these various elements are interlocked, and that’s because the best inbound marketing practices recognize that disparate, silo-oriented tools are neither efficient to manage, nor effective in influencing a website visit. Let’s be candid, the most likely source of inbound website traffic is via Google Search. From our experience working with our clients’ websites over the last 9 years, Google Search delivers between 45% - 60% of all inbound website traffic. The percentage depends a lot on what other methods you may use to generate website traffic. But, Google Search is typically the #1 “source” for website visits. That means you must be relevant to Google’s search engine. Your company’s name and website MUST show up within the first page or two of Google’s Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) based on keywords and search phrases. Google’s algorithm is complex and secret, but what we do know is that these criteria are important: -
High Quality Content Mobile-Friendly Websites Relevant Inbound Links to Websites from authoritative sources Websites Optimized for Page Rendering Speed Websites That Are Secure with an SSL certificate Keyword-Driven Website Pages do better in the Search Engine Results Page (SERPs) than those that do not use keywords. Therefore, Search Engine Optimization is essential in helping your company’s website to be found, and for your company to be in the consideration set for prospective customers.
A FEW EXAMPLES OF THE INBOUND MARKETING STACK
High Quality Content Google recently re-emphasized one of its original ranking signals from its earliest 1990’s era search engine algorithm: high quality content. To Google, strong content helps tell a story to prospective customers by providing answers to search queries. The good news for product marketers is this story is one that you get to shape. From product descriptions, informative FAQs and the company back-story, to trackable Calls to Action, the website content cannot be over-emphasized as an essential piece of the inbound marketing strategy. The expression “content is king” has never been more important. “Static” website content causes websites to get pushed down the SERPs by Google’s search engine crawlers. Dynamic, frequently changing content that uses blogging, news posts, opinion pieces, curated story posts, testimonials, listicles and great visual imagery are welcome additions to any website. If the goal is to create a website that is a magnet for prospective customers, then content is what will engage them, keep them on the site longer and will bring them back time often. It is also an essential element in the sell-buy conversion process. With 25 years of telling our clients’ stories, Communication Links is in the enviable position of knowing what golf consumers find compelling and what content will move the needle in terms of reader interest. Our on-board writers and communications executives don’t just write high quality content, they can also help place that content on your website, and in many different print publications and their respective websites.
Landing Pages We are big believers in making sure different types of customer prospects don’t necessarily see the same website landing pages. That’s why we encourage creative thinking about WHICH website page an inbound prospect should see. Geographically- , Demographically- and Psychographically-targeted customers may be reached via social media, email marketing, third-party referral articles, Google Search or even other websites. If you direct everyone to the same main landing page of your website, you may miss an opportunity to impact these segmented customer types by using different tone, voice or product offer. You can customize landing pages to influence website visitors depending on their personalities, buying stages or other selective criteria. The “source” of the website traffic may tell you a lot about what you need to know about them. And, that enables you to shape the conversion path.
Customer Resource Management (CRM) The database management system you use is a vital repository for managing the prospect’s migration to the buying/conversion stage. Integrating all customer data in a single storehouse is fundamentally important. Whether you have the resources to use an Enterprise system such as Salesforce.com or Oracle’s platform, or an integrated inbound marketing service perfect for SMBs such as SugarCRM, Act On or HubSpot, maintaining a proactive data collection workflow is extremely valuable. These can be as simple as Excel spreadsheets, a Microsoft Access database or even email marketing database list management options found in Constant Contact, MailChimp,
Emma or Vertical Response. A list (or database) of current or prospective customers is a reliable asset upon which the business can grow. We also encourage list buckets to be annotated with meta tags that will help refine the profile of each person in your database, and in turn help you aggregate larger lists into manageable, aggregated lists with similar recipient profiles, without having to resort to “mass blasts” with one message spread across all list buckets. Remember, targeted messages have higher engagement rates than one-size-fits-all email messaging.
Tracking Codes, Analytics and Interpretation Your first interaction with a customer prospect will likely not be “personal.” That is, it won’t likely be a phone call or a face-to-face meeting. As a result, we counsel you on ways to track inbound links from whatever source by using custom-generated codes. Whether links are generated through website on-page forms, email marketing buttons or text links embedded in the emails, digital advertising banners or Google Adwords (PPC) programs and social media, measurement of the volumetrics for each inbound marketing action helps determine how your prospects found you, how much it cost you to attract their attention and, over time, to determine which marketing resources are the most efficient and most effective.
Social Media Social Media requires a lot of work. We generally recommend a focus on top-level social media platforms, and leave the “testing” of second- and third-tier platforms to companies that have greater budgets and plenty of patience. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram are worth considering. There is a caveat in using social media today – it’s not enough to launch a Facebook or Instagram account. You must also: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.
6.
Have something relevant to say Must do more than just “follow” someone you find interesting Post frequently, using the language of the platform (including hashtags, screen names, shortened URLs, etc.). We recommend 1x-2x per day to remain relevant to your followers. Avoid “selling” so you don’t drive people to delete you from their feeds. Remember that if you have 1,000 followers, that does not mean that every post you put up on your social media site will be seen by your 1,000 followers. Facebook, and the other social media platforms, have begun to “filter” your messages so that only the “most interested” of your followers will have your post pushed to their timelines. In many cases, fewer than 10% of your “likes” will even have a chance to see your message. Consider using “boosted posts” to ensure more of your “likes,” and others like them, will have a chance to see and engage with your posts.
FINAL THOUGHTS ON INBOUND MARKETING Inbound marketing is not just a catch-phrase that sounds good on paper. It has rapidly emerged as the best way to put a more formalized structure around a variety of digital customer conversion tools: SEO and PPC (collectively referred to as SEM), Email Marketing, CRM, Landing Pages, Calls to Action, Link Tracking, Analytics and Source Attribution. Regardless of whether you invest in an integrated platform for inbound marketing, or use the a la carte process to integrate standalone elements using a variety of dashboard-driven marketing management reports, Communication Links highly recommends the adoption of inbound marketing in your operation. We can help.
