If you haven’t implemented an inbound marketing strategy to improve your company in 2016, then now is the time! It doesn’t matter if you’re the CEO or the CMO, this blog is for you. I bet there are sales people knocking at your door and flooding your email with different services that they offer to give you the strategy and internet services to help your business. But who do you trust? This is where an inbound marketing consultant can help you.
What Is Inbound Marketing?
If you want marketing for your company that people will love while increasing your return on investment then inbound marketing is what you're looking for. This methodology focuses on knowing your customers and providing useful content, products and services that will help them solve a problem or need they have. The process looks something like this:
Whether it be writing a blog on apartment living tips or sending emails to your leads with familiar language that they can relate to, your company should always be helping current and potential customers. This concept increases trust in your brand, which means that you will most likely have recurring customers. Now that's something all companies should want in 2016!
What to Expect When You First Implement Inbound
Let’s say you want to start practicing the inbound marketing methodology immediately. It's good to know what to expect and have a basic understanding of what it takes to implement such a strategy. Then you can try to decide if your team can do this or if you should look at an inbound marketing consultant to help.
Here's a blog article that gives you an idea of what your first year with inbound marketing will look like:
5 Things To Expect During Your First Year of Inbound Marketing
1. Lots of education and learning
Inbound Marketing seems like a relatively simple methodology, but it’s not easy to implement. There are a lot of moving pieces, and the technology landscape is constantly changing. Plan to spend a significant amount of time learning fundamentals and best practices before diving into execution.
- Everyone on your marketing team should get Inbound Certified—including developers, writers, graphic designers, and project managers.
- If you’re using marketing automation software like HubSpot, you should also plan to get trained and certified in the use of the software.
- Expect to spend time educating your sales and leadership team about Inbound Marketing, because you will need their cooperation to create great content.
2. Alignment between sales and marketing teams
Inbound marketing draws its power from the quality of the content you’re producing for the target buyers you have defined. You’ll need to spend time working with your sales team to make sure everyone is on the same page.
- Plan to work with your sales team to understand your buyer personas and behavior, and the information they need to decide to buy from you.
- As prospects interact with your marketing material, you’ll need to connect the data you’re gathering to the CRM system your sales team uses to track and close opportunities.
- Expect to establish a regular meeting pulse between your sales and marketing teams to collaborate on strategy and content, and review results to make adjustments to your tactics.
[To read the rest of the article by Business2Community, click here].
Why Hire a Consultant?
I know that you might be questioning, “Can my workload in this current state handle developing and implementing a new strategy to my company?” Hiring an inbound marketing consultant might not only save you time but it will save you the potential stress of incorporating inbound marketing. Leave it to the marketing professional so that you can focus on what you do best - running your company.
So what are you waiting for? Contact us at Half a Bubble Out and we can help you get started. Leave this transition to the professionals and hire an inbound marketing consultant. It will be the best decision that you make in 2016.
Since 2002, Half a Bubble Out has been dedicated to providing marketing, advertising and small business consulting that meet the needs of our clients. We specialize in powerfully telling stories through Inbound Marketing to grow your business filled with more passion and provision. Based in Chico California, we serve clients throughout Northern California and across the country to New York.
