About 80% of marketers say generating more quality leads is now their top priority. But unfortunately, about 19% of marketers say lead generation is a challenge.
Another 21% of marketers struggle with converting those leads into paying customers.
Do ongoing lead generation and lead conversion have to be such a challenge?
Absolutely not!
For most small service businesses, a strategic balance of both inbound and outbound marketing is appropriate and effective.
Not sure where to get started?
Well, what follows are seven inbound marketing tips for beginners. These tips should provide some insight into at least the inbound marketing side of the digital marketing strategy equation.
➊ Know Your Target Market
Before anything else, it’s vital to gather research. The more you know about your target market, the more likely you’ll appeal to their needs.
Be crystal clear on exactly who you’re trying to reach. For example, you can define potential clients based on demographic, psychographic, and/or geographic information. The more you know about your ideal client, the better. Some examples of information you may want to gather could be:
- Location
- Gender
- Age
- Marital status
- Household income
- Buying behaviors
- Pain points
- Interests
- Hobbies
- Education
- Language
- Etc.
If you’re focused on more than one target market (e.g., accountants and IT firms… 2 very different markets with differing challenges, terminology, buying habits, etc.), consider creating separate buyer personas.
Then, determine what questions your target market(s) are asking. You can gather keyword research using SEO tools such as SEMRush or Google Keyword Planner, to name a few. The trend in SEO is to focus on longtail keywords that are phrased as questions. That’s more in alignment with how people are searching online.
Use this research to develop your content marketing strategy.
➋ Update Your Brand
If you want to develop an effective inbound marketing funnel, it’s critical to make sure your brand stands out. Unfortunately, there’s a lot of competition out there for all of us… no matter our industry!
Strong Brands Rank In The Search Engines
Don’t allow your brand to fade into the background. Remember… out of sight, out of mind! Consumers won’t choose you if they either forget you are there and/or don’t understand that you can solve their problem.
Take the time to develop a distinct, powerful brand that includes your:
- Unique value proposition
- Voice
- Tone
- Personality
- Logo styles
- Image styles
- Font styles
- Color palette
- Etc.
Keep your branding consistent and persistent on every marketing platform that makes sense to play on. This will help brand awareness and recognition grow.
➌ Optimize Your Website
Once you update your branding, consider updating your website as well.
Make sure your website is fast and mobile-optimized. Then, make it easy for site visitors to take the next step with you.
First, add an eye-catching call to action button to your navigation bar or at least somewhere above the fold. Then, use a compelling call to action that’s direct and urgent. Maybe add a form above the fold of your landing pages, too. Or, how about a chatbot to engage visitors. There are lots of options here for you to choose from.
Creating more than one conversion opportunity can help you generate more leads. However, it also determines which lead generation tactics work best with your target market.
Your website will become the backbone of your inbound marketing strategy. Create a positive experience on your site to encourage visitors to linger. Consider working with an experienced web design team to make the necessary changes.
➍ Create Informative Content
Why create content?
To educate, inform, and lead… Thus becoming the only obvious choice when it comes down to who to buy from when they (the prospects) are ready.
Studies show that companies that blog over 11 times a month get more than four times as many leads as businesses that blog five times a month. Targeting customers with content relevant to their position in the sales cycle will significantly improve your conversion rates.
Remember, blogging isn’t the only game in town for content marketing. There are lead magnets, emails, texts, and much more. The key is to strike the right balance between the mediums that make sense for you and your target market.
Unfortunately, about 59% of marketers say creating content is one of their top lead nurturing strategy challenges. It doesn’t have to be that way for you, though. Be strategic about it. Let your audience guide you. How? We’ll touch on that in tip number seven. In the meantime, let’s talk about getting started.
First, look at your keyword research. What questions are your customers asking? Create content that answers their questions and appeals to their search intent. You can create:
- Blog posts
- eBooks
- Infographics
- Polls
- Quizzes
- Videos
- Webinars
Regardless of the marketing medium used, always, well, almost always, inform your audience that the logical next step is… Your call to action. For example, you can encourage people to contact you for help. Then, link them straight to a form!
Try turning some of your content into lead magnets. For example, you can encourage people to provide their email in exchange for a helpful eBook.
You can also encourage people to subscribe to your email newsletter for deals, coupons, and exclusives.
Inbound content marketing can help you draw in leads you can nurture into sales.
➎ Optimize For SEO
Writing blog posts and other content for your website is one thing… optimizing that content for the search engines is a whole different animal, an essential step in maximizing the effectiveness of your writing efforts. How valuable is that beneficial content if no one knows it exists?!
Search engine optimization (SEO) can help your website rank higher on search engine result pages. As a result, your website could appear when someone searches for your product or asks a question.
This is one area where you may want to consider working with an experienced inbound marketing agency. They will best be able to help you maximize these inbound strategies.
➏ Stay Social
Use social media to remain top of mind and engage your target audience regularly.
Reformat, or pull excerpts from your blog posts on social media. Consider using live Q&A videos to engage your audience, too. Answering their questions will help you demonstrate your experience and expertise.
Consider joint venture partnerships with influencers (someone who already has influence over and access to your target market) as they can help you expand your reach. For example, an influencer can promote your product or service, then direct customers to your website.
Don’t forget to keep up-to-date with any social media marketing trends. Tracking the trends will help you remain relevant.
Be careful not to fall into the Flavor of the Day Marketing trap. The marketing you do must make sense! Keep reading to learn more about that.
➐ Analyze And Optimize
Any proper inbound marketing strategy must include a means to monitor its performance. It would be best if you had a way to determine what’s working and what’s not working based on the performance goals you have set. Then and only then can you properly analyze and optimize your marketing campaigns.
Remove the guesswork here! If you don’t, it’s essentially gambling… who knows… maybe you’ll get lucky. I highly do not recommend that approach, though.
Know your numbers, and you know your business!
Do more of what’s working and less of what is not. Let the data guide you.
That’s a lot to digest… I know. There was a point in time for Online Marketing Muscle where we had to do the same. I only wish we knew then what we know now!
So here’s a quick recap for you. NOTE: You can click on any of the items in the list below to revisit that specific benefit.
Inbound Marketing is simple… however, don’t let anyone tell you that it’s easy. It takes the willingness to deep dive into understanding your target market, almost better than they do themselves, and then consistently and persistently providing them with the content needed to move them through the buyer journey effectively.
Remember, customers, buy when they are ready, not when you want them to. This is why Inbound Marketing is crucial for attracting and wowing your target market. Be willing to take their hand and walk them through the buyer journey and into the solution they seek.
Additionally, I’ve tried to show you a bit here that Inbound Marketing can be pretty formulaic. Use these seven Inbound Marketing tips to set yourself up for success. With these tips, you can bring more customers to your business.
You can demonstrate your experience and expertise before converting more leads and sales. This will also lessen that dreaded buyer’s remorse that leads to bad Clients, returns, bad reviews, and all the other bad stuff we don’t like to deal with.
So… Are you ready to attract and wow your customers?
Would you like some help with that?
Give us a shout today to see whether or not we are a good fit for one another.
