When you think about marketing your services and products you probably think about advertising, social media profiles, and sales funnels, but if inbound marketing isn’t a big part of your marketing strategy you’re leaving web traffic (and money) on the table.
Why is inbound marketing so important and how can it possibly future-proof your business? First, let’s ensure we’re all on the same page.
What is Inbound Marketing?
Inbound marketing is simply a form of marketing that uses content to attract new customers to you. This is also often referred to as content marketing, as it involves putting content out into the world to help, inform, or entertain your audience — who are your potential and current customers.
The best thing about inbound marketing is unlike outbound marketing, where you essentially throw content at your audience they don’t want (think of those 3–5-minute “ads” when you’re watching videos on YouTube), inbound marketing attracts an audience that is actively looking for your content.
Why is Inbound Marketing Important?
Inbound marketing is incredibly important because your customer takes the first step toward you. In almost all other forms of marketing, you chase your customers, trying to find the few who will actually love your brand and your product or service enough to buy again and again.
Content marketing allows you to put something out into the world that helps potential customers and attracts them to you — meaning once that content is up, it’s a magnet for potential customers. The more content you have that serves them, the stronger your magnet. When that customer is finally ready to buy, they’ll come to you.
Ads have a magnet effect too, but the major difference is that you have to continue to pay for the ad for its lifetime, after which it is no longer useful. While this is great for short-term campaigns and to increase traffic over a shorter time, it doesn’t do anything for you over the long term.
In other words, ads are a magnet you have to turn on and pay to charge, while content works on its own. Set it up once, and it’s good to go.
What are the Benefits of Inbound Marketing?
It’s Highly Targeted
If you’re doing your content marketing right, it speaks directly to your ideal customer profiles. Not every piece of content has to speak to the same type of customer or at the same place in the customer journey, but it should speak to them overall. Know your areas of expertise and what your customers are interested in and don’t stray away — even successful pieces of content are useless if they aren’t relevant to your customers.
It’s a One-Time Cost
If you’re not yet using inbound marketing for your business, now is the time to do so!
