Inbound Marketing is, in short, the process of helping potential customers find your company. It may sound simple, but Inbound Marketing is a set of several strategies that put your brand in the spotlight. This usually happens even before the customer is ready to make a purchase!
Making contact with potential customers in advance is an excellent strategy, as it can turn your brand into a reference for the consumer, generating new leads and revenue in the future. This is because Inbound Marketing is a strategy that uses many forms of attraction marketing – content marketing, blog posts, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), newsletters, social networks, and much more. All this to create brand awareness and attract new business.
While Outbound Marketing is a process of finding customers – i.e., active prospecting – Inbound Marketing focuses on increasing the visibility of the brand to ensure that potential buyers come to it. In this way, instead of actively seeking customers, Inbound Marketing focuses on methods that raise the prospect’s awareness and develop relationships to generate new leads.
Why invest in Inbound Marketing?
Inbound Marketing strategies invest in methods that are attractive to customers, which is a positive point, because it is not an aggressive and unwanted approach. The type of content provided by Inbound Marketing is educational, attention grabbing, interesting, has the potential to solve problems, and is usually something the customer is looking for – that is, it answers questions that the potential consumer may have.
When applied correctly, Inbound Marketing strategies can achieve very significant results for brands. And the best thing is that this type of strategy generates organic leads and does not depend on large financial investments to be applied.
By knowing your audience and creating content that meets the needs of each consumer, the chance of attracting new customers through Inbound Marketing increases. Furthermore, with the analysis of the results obtained, it is also possible to identify points for improvement in the strategies.
The 5 stages of Inbound Marketing
Inbound Marketing is divided into 5 well-defined stages, which is a great advantage because it allows for adjustments at each stage of the process as needed. Check them out:
Step 1: Attract
The first stage of Inbound Marketing is attraction. At this point, the goal is to attract potential customers by offering educational content. Always according to the interests of the consumers! The contents of the attraction stage does not have a commercial characterbut must offer solutions to the customer’s problems. In this way, it is possible to show that the company is a reference in the subject.
The main tools used in the attraction stage are blog articles, social media content, e-books, instructional videos, and infographics, for example.
Step 2: Convert
In the second stage, known as conversionthe objective is to bring the potential customer a little closer and move him forward in the buying process. This way, he goes from being just a visitor on the site to becoming a lead. This change happens when the potential customer voluntarily gives up information to the company, such as email, or phone number, in exchange for some rich material (like e-books, infographics, and webinars, for example) or information that interests him, such as discount coupons. This is how the relationship with the customer begins!
Step 3: Relate
At this stage, the company is already closer to the potential customer, who became a lead in the previous stage. In the relationshipThe key is to nurture the lead with information about your company until he is ready to make a purchase. This process is shaped by sending email marketing, newsletters, and customized content. But it is important to build this relationship well, with good content and the right amounts, otherwise the lead may get tired of the amount of information received and unsubscribe from your contact list.
Step 4: Selling
After a lot of work, we have reached the stage that most interests companies: sell. After being nourished with relevant information in the previous step, the lead is ready to consume the product. This is where Inbound Marketing convinces the consumer that the company offers the best product/service. The road traveled so far has demonstrated the company’s authority, but at this point, the potential customer just needs a final push.
Good materials to use in this step are success stories, customer testimonials, and results presentations, for example.
Step 5: Analyze
As with all strategies, the final step in Inbound Marketing is the results analysis. As mentioned before, one of the advantages of Inbound Marketing is the possibility to analyze actions and strategies separately. In this way, it is possible to continue what is working and reevaluate actions that did not bring the expected results.
Benefits of Inbound Marketing
By applying Inbound Marketing strategies, it is possible to achieve results such as:
- Increased business visibility;
- Attraction of contacts with buying potential;
- Optimization of efforts in the sales process;
- Improved relationship with the public.
All this in an organic way and with the use of techniques to create relationships with potential customers.
Check out some problems that can be solved with Inbound Marketing
When talking about long-term strategies, Inbound Marketing is an investment that helps increase brand awareness, make it preferred by customers, and ultimately resulting in revenue growth. Want to check out some problems that can be solved by applying Inbound Marketing? Check it out:
- Brand awareness: According to a survey by the Confederação Nacional de Dirigentes Lojistas (CNDL), in partnership with the Serviço de Proteção ao Crédito (SPC Brasil), 97% of consumers look for information online before buying any product . This way, if your company appears at the top of search engine results, such as Google, you can organically increase your brand awareness. The application of strategies such as SEO are essential in this process!
- Increase brand preference: By educating, entertaining and interacting with potential customers before they think about making a purchase of your product, you build trust and increase the likelihood that they will choose your brand.
- Generate leads organically: Inbound Marketing is a long-term investment that pays off over time. By investing in this type of strategy, the results multiply little by little, because the more quality content is created, the more leads will be attracted organically to your business.
Want to know more about Inbound Marketing and how these strategies can help your company? Click this link and talk to us! We would love to help you.
