GrowSocially inbound marketing

Grow Socially helps businesses and associations with their strategic marketing efforts that include online, content, and inbound marketing.

Grow Your Business with

Inbound Marketing

By John Foley, Jr CEO CMO – Grow Socially

Contents

The Inbound Marketing Low-Down 3

Starting Your Inbound Marketing Strategy 5

Tools and Techniques to Succeed with Inbound Marketing 6

Inbound Marketing and Lead Generation 8

Content is King in Inbound Marketing 9

About John Foley, Jr 13

About Grow Socially 14

The Inbound Marketing Low-Down

Every business dreams of “easy” sales - the sales where customers virtually fall into your lap!

We all want to find that customer who nods at everything we say When that happens, we can feel confident that they believe that we are the experts and that we have the best solution for their needs

The reality is you likely work hard for every customer you get to that point of the sale But what if that hard work really involved laying the ground work so that over time, those customers really do fall into your lap? With inbound marketing, you can lay that groundwork to establish your business as a resource, as a wealth of information and the right solution to your target market’s needs And while it takes some work, it does not require the outlay of cash that many other marketing strategies take, such as massive ad campaigns

In traditional marketing, you send your message out to the masses And hopefully, it gets to your target market and that target market responds With inbound marketing, you are still sending a message out, but it’s less intrusive and much more authentic

Think about it: when you go to a party, do you want to seek out all the cool kids and chat them up, hoping they will like you? Or would you like to be the cool kid and have everyone come to you?

Attracting Leads to Your Business

By providing relevant and interesting content, you become the cool kid Your target market wants to get to know you They want to

read your articles They

want to download your

audio tips They want to

watch your video clips As

you develop your content

and make it accessible in various formats, you get your name and expertise in front of your target market in various ways

Or course, you do have to make sure your content is optimized for the search engines You want your

informational pieces to be found via free searches This doesn’t mean you stuff your content with fluff and keywords over and over again In fact, doing so will turn a potential customer off You have to find the right balance between using those keywords while providing relevant and readable information

How Social Media Fits In

You should be sharing your information across multiple platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube and

so on Your target market isn’t going to be hanging out in one place

They’re laughing at the latest tweet Checking out the most recent status update Sharing that video clip By establishing your business identity via several social media platforms, you get the chance to seize the interest

of many more potential customers, and continue to establish your business as a resource Another benefit is the ability to interact with those in your target market on a more personal level Social media invites dialogue and interaction By being responsive as well as proactive with your information dissemination, you are

becoming the friendly resource that your target market wants to work with

Inbound marketing isn’t for the lazy business It takes time It takes knowledge It takes dedication You need

to provide good, quality content You need to be search engine friendly and keyword wise And you need to establish your business identity across multiple social media platforms But in the long run, inbound marketing can take your business sales to a whole other level

Starting Your Inbound Marketing Strategy

You already know that the internet is a terrific playing field It’s the great leveler in that any business can have

a web presence and in many cases the internet reader would never know whether a business is a mom and pop shop or a million dollar company in a penthouse suite downtown Any business can and should have a good-looking, easy to navigate website that appeals to its target market This website becomes the base for your inbound marketing strategy

First up, you need to decide how you will provide information to your target market Blogging or regular article posts should be a given If you don’t have a blogging platform built into your website, you should have that added Then you can schedule your posts Will they be weekly? Daily? You want consistency and timeliness So you should establish a schedule that you know you can keep

Then you need to create a list of blog topics What kind of information do you want to provide? Think about what is relevant to your target market What will they want to read? What will establish you as the expert? Not a writer? Not to worry You have several options Look to someone within your company or perhaps a

trusted colleague You can also look into ghostwriters to write the content for you You want someone to write for your company with a voice that fits Not everyone is a wordsmith And that’s okay An outsider can write in your voice and your posts will still be relevant and authentic

It’s tempting to buy a bunch of articles that are touted to be laden with key words and optimized for the search engines But these articles can be found all over the net And you’ll lose your authenticity if the internet reader figures out that your information is not yours

Start thinking about how you can provide information that utilizes other mediums How about some audio files that are chock full of tips? Or what about getting a guest spot on an internet radio show? An audio question and answer session can be provided

as a downloadable link on your website or posted on your social media profiles

Don’t forget that amidst all this information dissemination, you need to portray your business personality It’s okay to have a post that isn’t all business Want to post a shout out to a customer? Do it Want to whip up a quick video clip showing a couple minutes of your employees hard at work? These sorts of things make you only that much more real to your target market And it can give you a definite edge So as you implement your inbound marketing plans, don’t forget to show your target market a bit of personality here and there

Tools and Techniques to Succeed with Inbound Marketing

Now that we’ve defined what inbound marketing is, and what an inbound marketing strategy should consist

of, it’s time to talk about specific tool and techniques that you can use to put it into action!

Your Blog

When you set inbound marketing into motion, you will soon find it is a strategy that thrives on consistency The most powerful tool in your arsenal is your company website blog You control how much information you

disseminate, what information you provide and how often you distribute that information

Ideally, your blog will consist of multiple short (but not too short) articles on relevant topics that set you up as

an authority in your field The goal is two-fold:

1 You get readers who learn to seek you out for your expertise and

2 You get others to link to your material…thereby bringing more readers who will learn to seek you out for your expertise

Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an integral part of inbound marketing You don’t have to become an expert in SEO yourself, but you do need to know what the right keywords are and how to use them effectively The goal is to increase your search rank You want to be on that first page of Google and bing results when internet users search for your keywords

The great thing about SEO is that it is something that can be tweaked and worked on to help your visibility Over time, you will be able to determine what your effective keywords are – what words are bringing visitors

to your site And you will be able to track links leading to your site

You can also track links from within your site Perhaps your current blog post has a hyperlink to an older post

on related material Instead of using a direct link, you can use a tool that will allow you to shorten the link and also see the traffic reports on that URL For example, we use ilnk.me and get a special shortened URL Later we can obtain the information on how often the link was clicked, the highest traffic times and so on Remember, information is power and you want that information to know what is working and what is not

Social Networking Platforms

A bit overwhelmed by all the social media platforms out there? Start with two Perhaps it’s Twitter and

Facebook Maybe it’s LinkedIn and YouTube But start with two and build from there

Don’t assume more is better

You should only have as many social media profiles as you can manage to maintain And while your main goal with social media may be to promote your brand and distribute content, don’t forget that these platforms are interactive They invite a conversation with the internet visitor That’s something you never want to lose sight

of

Online Marketing Audit

Yes, you’ve got a business to run But even if you use tools to automate as much content as possible, you should schedule regular “checkups” on each platform to make sure there isn’t a question or comment

lingering

Also, the technology behind online marketing can change quite frequently and at a faster pace than traditional media

Thus, having an online marketing audit conducted regularly may help alert you to new features that you should be taking advantage of to promote your business

Integrating Inbound Marketing into the Sales Process

The reality is – visitors are not customers It’s up to you to turn them into your customers

As you integrate the SEO aspect with the content and the social media visibility, you will find that you will get those visitors

In order to turn them into customers, you need to cultivate them into leads Content can also play a big role in that! Your company should have a stash of content in hand that can support the Sales team at each step in the buying cycle

Whether you are trying to convert a visitor into an inquiry, an inquiry into a lead, or a lead into a sale, you will need specific content to help move people through each step

By doing that, you will be working to ensure that your inbound marketing efforts prove to be a success!

Inbound Marketing and Lead Generation

The whole point of inbound marketing is lead generation You are taking internet visitors and hoping that they lead to eventual sales But you can’t take gigantic steps to get there You need to take one step at a time in order to lay the proper groundwork

Here are a few points when it comes to inbound marketing and lead generation:

 You need to create terrific offers You have to offer something that your visitors want It’s like dating What do you have to offer your date? Do you have a tip sheet? A white paper? Some worksheets?

 The value of your offer should be more than the cost to the internet visitor Now you’re thinking,

“Wait He just said to give free offers So how is it costing the internet visitor anything?” The point here is that your offer should be something of value And the internet visitor should not be thinking about the “cost” of providing a name and email address

 It’s easy to get in the rut of providing information But you cannot forget your calls to action You can’t

assume your internet visitor will click on a certain link or indiscriminately cough up that email address You have to make a call to action Tell your visitors what to do And tell them what they will get when they do it Never let them guess and never let them wonder

 Make it simple Do not make your visitors jump through hoops of fire to get information from you That’s a huge turn off If you ask for their name and email address, then leave it at that If you mention

a short survey, keep it short Don’t sneak in a twenty question and answer session

 Don’t give them a quick out While you’re creating that form for your visitors to become leads, don’t build in back buttons or clear and cancel buttons Your form should be above the “fold” so that the visitor does not need to scroll down to enter anything And there shouldn’t be buttons that cancel out the lead form – either on accident or on purpose

Not all leads are created equal Remember, long term generation is the goal You are not in this for a quick and easy turnaround Inbound marketing typically results in a slower, but more organic way of filling the sales funnel You are providing information and being the resource that your leads need in order to convert into customers

Content is King in Inbound Marketing

One of the great things about inbound marketing is that it is inherently less expensive than outbound

marketing Even if you need to hire a ghostwriter to create content, it’s still likely to be leaps and bounds less costly than efforts through other channels However, that does not mean that content creation is a process that can be skimped on

Your Content Must Contain Solid, Helpful Tips

If you are going to publish content under your brand’s name, you do need to know your stuff (or your writer does), and you need to take the time to show others that you know your stuff This is not the time to load your website up with fluff

The reality is – people are looking for facts They want answers They want solutions They have the power of the internet at their fingertips, whether that is on their computers, their tablets, or their smartphones

Lackluster information becomes obvious and it’s a turn-off

Do Not Click “Publish” on the First Draft

As you develop content for your website, flesh out your topics

Break them down into readable chunks Too long and your reader will start to yawn Too short and it may just lack substance

By taking the time to review what you’ve typed up before you share it with the world, you will most likely identify simple changes that can greatly increase the effectiveness of your content

Talk in a Human Voice About Relevant Topics

Make your content balanced; don’t get swayed by “shop talk” of creating content that is heavy on the

keywords

Yes, keywords are important — but if you overdo it, your content will not read well

Your information needs to be relevant It needs to be timely and helpful You can do this while still getting those keywords in there

Be Willing to Share Specifics

With inbound marketing, you are in control of how much or how little information you share

Don’t make the mistake of assuming that providing “too much” information is akin to giving away your

grandmother’s top secret cake recipe Sure, you don’t want to give away the whole kit and caboodle of your business, but you want to be transparent

You want to display your expertise No customer will decide against doing business with you because you provided “too much” relevant information But you can bet that many a potential customer is lost to the business that fails to provide adequate and transparent information

Have a Strategy to Build Links

One of the pluses when you post great information is that it gets linked from other sources Links are great They provide yet another way to get internet users to come to your site They are a subtle referral and nod to your expertise

So, the more links to your site, the better In addition, it will help with your search engine rankings, making you more visible in those keyword searches In addition, it will help with your search engine rankings, making you more visible in those keyword searches

Using Content to Generate Sales

Content reigns supreme with inbound marketing, as it helps with search engine optimization and displaying your expertise When you provide relevant content you are becoming a resource that the internet reader can rely on This empowers your reader to make the right decision - to work with you! Of course, a visitor doesn’t immediately turn into a customer You need to work that lead first