Inbound Marketing is marketing aimed at getting found by customers.
In conventional marketing (outbound marketing) companies focus on hunting customers. They use techniques that are poorly targeted and that interrupt audience. They use cold-calling, print advertising, T.V. advertising, junk mail, spam and trade shows, exhibitions etc.
Changes in technology is making these initiatives less effective and unaffordable. Companies use caller ID to block cold calls, TiVo makes T.V. advertising less effective, spam filters block mass emails and tools like RSS are making print and display advertising less effective. It's still possible to get a message out via these channels, but it definitely costs a hell of a lot of money .
Inbound Marketers flip outbound marketing on its head. Let me explain how:
Instead of interrupting people with television ads, they create videos that propects want to see. Instead of buying display ads in print publications, they create their own blog that people subscribe to and look forward to reading. Instead of cold calling, they create useful content and tools so that people call them looking for more information and updates.
Instead of driving their message into a crowd over and over again like a sledgehammer, they attract highly qualified customers to their business like a magnet.
The most successful Inbound Marketing campaigns have three key elements:
(1) Content - Content is the essence of any Inbound Marketing campaign. It is the information or tool that attracts prospects to your site or your business platform.
(2) Search Engine Optimization - SEO makes it easier for propects to find your content. It is the practice of building your site and inbound links to your site to maximize your ranking in search engines, where most of your customers begin their buying process.
(3) Social Media - Social media amplifies the impact of your content. When your content is spread across and discussed on networks, communities,groups, it becomes more authentic and nuanced, and is more likely to draw qualified customers to your site.This increases web traffic
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Hi Pankaj, Nice n quick is what you have offered here, I think inbound marketing prevails due to the social structure of almost everything now, I am trying to forget social media and learning that all these activities finally would do form a social business altogether, where customer servic, sales, marketing all are getting social.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing your thoughts....