Inbound Marketing: The Most Effective Tool for Business Growth
Source - yourdigitalresource.com
Change is the only constant. The widespread idea does only apply in our personal lives, but when it comes to business development, the design is just perfect. Be it the business policies or the marketing strategies; certain changes are required to make sure your business is in sync with the current trend. Over the past few years, the changes in marketing techniques and methods have become quite prominent than it was before. The changes in business trend have eventually opened its way for new experimentations and inventions to take place. As a result, the relationship between business and its potential customers have become much stronger than ever.
If looked upon the emergence and interpretation of the marketing, the history of evolution will be much prominent. The term is derived from a Latin word “Mercatus”. Initially, during the start of the twentieth century, marketing was not taken so sincerely by the business owners now it is in the current era. At the first stages, marketing was nothing but some promotional tactics where pamphlets and other visual materials were used for any business announcements. The whole idea of the strategy was focused on designing some methods to emphasize on generating awareness.
Whenever any company organizes a special event or decides to promote their commercial products, the print media was utilized as one of the strongest marketing tools. Be it fruits, vegetables or any other beauty products, the promotional language and visuals are made differently with a direct message on it. If you decide to make a comparison between the then marketing strategies with the ones that are utilized today, some apparent differences will come out. But, before that, it is essential to highlight different types of marketing techniques that remained consistent despite the change in the rules.
Based on the characteristics, two prime types of marketing can be marked the most important among all. One of those is inbound marketing while the other kind is outbound marketing.
Outbound Marketing – A few facts
Outbound marketing can be perceived as the most conventional and traditional forms of marketing that we have been witnessing over the time. Print media, radio, television and newspaper, are some of the most common media through which marketing was taken place, and those strategies were categorized as an outbound marketing technique. Trade shows, direct emails and exhibitions are also counted as the media of outbound marketing.
When evaluated the significance of this marketing technique, it has become quite clear that outbound marketing has some limits. Firstly, it could successfully appeal a particular section or the viewer-audience, and secondly, these marketing strategies are not relevant in the era of digitization and technological advancements. Analytics and studies have brought out some of the drawbacks that were there in outbound marketing technique:
As the marketing principle did not leave an impact on a large section of consumers, therefore the chances of conversions got automatically mitigated.
The marketing strategies are quite traditional and can become dated over the time
It cannot incorporate the newest and most efficient social and other digital platforms to impart the marketing to an advanced level.
It never experimented with other marketing forms, and as a result, a major section of people have always left there beyond the reach of any particular business.
Inbound Marketing – the present and the future
Inbound marketing has opened a new era of marketing opportunities in front of the business owners so that they can get the real value of their money spent on the marketing methods. Formally known as content marketing, the inbound marketing techniques involve the aspects that are often overlooked in the outbound process. It aims to utilize every digital platform available to strengthen their marketing process. Some of the instruments involved in the inbound marketing technique include blog marketing, social media marketing, SEO, Webinars Email marketing and info graphics.
The marketers have taken a close look to find out the digital platforms that are most used by people in the recent times and decided to spread their message utilizing the media. While outbound marketing methods are often questioned for its aggressiveness, in the digital platform everybody has got their share of space to make sure those can utilize in the right way. Additionally, the digital platforms are minutely separated from each other, and for every platform the marketing policies become different. The best part of inbound marketing is it involves the target market in the process, giving the consumers a chance to offer their feedback and suggestion right away. A perfect source of free traffic, every business has got numerous advantages through this particular marketing technique. Here is a list of some extensive benefits inbound marketing has offered to its target market.
Money saving
The business owners always look for options for cutting the cost and by incorporating inbound marketing in their activities, they have taken a step ahead to achieve it. The cost of a newspaper ad or any traditional form of marketing is much higher than that of the money you will spend for giving advertisements in the digital media. Including the strategy in your promotional plan, you are sure to save a reasonable amount of money and that too without compromising on its impact in any way.
Targets relevant viewers
Traditional marketing options have not become successful in giving the privilege to the business owners by exposing their business to a wide yet relevant target market. While you decide just to put a billboard or banner in a particular area, a lot of people will see it eventually. However, it will not be able to impress all of them as a significant chunk of them may not get what you are trying to convey. On the contrary, the digital platform will give you the privilege of segmenting your target market comprehensively and then deliver the marketing message to them who will provide value to your brand and that of the information. It will be widespread and efficient at the same time.
Enhance organic search
Bringing your website to the first page of Google is going to give you a lot of advantages. All you need to do is to publish relevant and unique content on your website and create a social media profile with regular uploads in it. Search engine optimization will never be a huge problem again if you become successful in choosing as well as putting relevant keywords in the right place within the content.
Bind consumers with trust
The best part of inbound marketing is it involves the customer with the business by letting them give their insight into the firm and services. As they find applicable discounts, coupons and promotional in the websites and social media pages, the consumers will instantly feel connected with your business and start relying on your service once they get the advantage. Once they start enjoying the benefits of your products or services by paying an affordable price, the competitors will have a task job for them ahead.
Influence quick decisiveness
Promptness is surely an inevitable part of your business especially when you are making some tactical business decisions. The immediateness of online campaigns enables the business owners to take effect yet quick decision to make the marketing strategy successful and enhance the quality of business.
A Success Story through Inbound Marketing
No matter how big or small your business is, inbound marketing strategies ought to take the limelight when it comes to effectiveness. The story of Natasha will help you understand the relevance of inbound marketing more carefully. Natasha started her business of jewelry production and selling with a small budget. She initially started with making some jewelry, and by displaying them to friends, she got some orders. As soon as, her jewelry becomes popular, she decided to start her business website and take orders from the online. She has further decided to make sure her presence is felt in the market and therefore incorporated some of the most effective inbound marketing strategies.
Natasha opened accounts with the name of her brand in various social media platforms and invited other communities and groups to like and share it.
She has started posting relevant articles and blogs about jewelry on her website
Natasha focused on particular keywords like DIY, Jewelry, Handcraft to make sure it reaches to people who are looking for jewelry online
She made sure the words she has chosen are the same individuals often put in Google search boxes so that they can find her website at the very first search
Consistency to the strategy helped her crack the SEO and reach out to relevant target customers.
As she continued with the process and incorporated other related inbound techniques in the process as well, Natasha’s business becomes successful, and she started materializing the jewelry designs that kept on popping in her head and that too with her own hard earned money. The story of Natasha surely gives a clear picture of the fact that how effective marketing strategies can eventually help in business growth.
