Category: Inbound Marketing

3 Things Every Business Owner NEEDS to Know About Inbound Marketing

Unless your last name is Van Winkle and you’ve just awoken from a really good nap, you’ve probably heard the term “inbound marketing.”

My business partner Pascha Apter and I recently attended INBOUND, Hubspot’s annual conference where inbound marketing geniuses gather to learn and connect regarding best practices in the industry.

We were excited to hear from thought leaders like Seth Godin, Brené Brown, Darren Rouse and Brian Clark.

(Giant Voices, our strategic marketing firm, is a certified Hubspot Partner Agency.)

If you’re new to inbound and get a sinking feeling when you contemplate learning yet another marketing skill set, chin up! The ROI of inbound makes learning it well worth the effort.

To get you started in this brave new marketing world, we’ve distilled the most important information you need to know about inbound marketing into three easy-to-swallow insights.

What You Need to Know About Inbound Marketing

Inbound Insight #1: Inbound marketing begins with a mindset shift.

Inbound marketing is advertising flipped on its head. Rather than—or in addition to—paying to push your message out to target customers, you draw your target customer in with free content that speaks to their problems and desires.

On his blog, Seth Godin once wrote, “Permission marketing is the privilege (not the right) of delivering anticipated, personal and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them. It recognizes the new power of the best consumers to ignore marketing. It realizes that treating people with respect is the best way to earn their attention.”

He calls this approach permission marketing, but we think it’s a great definition for inbound marketing, too.

Inbound Insight #2: Inbound marketing has a learning curve.

Just as with any other new technology or marketing technique, there’s a learning curve to inbound. 

  • How do you create content so compelling people will share it—and that will ultimately feed your bottom line?
  • How do you design a website strategically to maximize conversions?
  • How do you set up automated email workflows?
  • What the heck is a CTA, anyway?

Investing in expert guidance as you get started with inbound marketing can help ensure you don’t waste time or money and instead garner a substantial ROI.

Inbound Insight #3: Inbound marketing works.

Hubspot’s statistics speak for themselves. From a Hubspot Marketing blog post called 31 Business Blogging Stats You Need to know in 2021

  • B2B marketers that use blogs receive 67% more leads than those that do not.
  • Marketers who have prioritized blogging are 13x more likely to enjoy positive ROI.
  • Companies who blog receive 97% more links to their website.

Elevate Your Inbound Marketing with Giant Voices

Giant Voices is a certified Hubspot partner agency.

At our strategic marketing firm, every deliverable we execute for our clients ties back to content that helps drive sales. To learn how inbound marketing and a strategic marketing partner can increase your sales and customer satisfaction, contact the Giants today.

3 Giant Inbound Marketing Insights

While I don’t travel much for work these days, I do appreciate when I have the opportunity to get out of our Giant headquarters and explore what’s happening elsewhere in the world.

I am currently in Boston, MA, for INBOUND 2014, HubSpot’s annual conference where inbound marketing geniuses gather to learn something and connect regarding best practices in the industry. 

I’m looking forward to hearing from acclaimed thought leaders like Simon SinekGuy Kawasaki and Malcolm Gladwell.

Inbound 2014: Come Together. Get Inspired. Be Remarkable | Giant Voices

On my way to Boston, I read the second edition of “Inbound Marketing – Attract, Engage and Delight Customers Online,” by the cofounders of HubSpot, Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah.

It was an easy, meaningful read. A few things resonated with me that I want to share:

  1. If you own, manage or market in a B2B business and you don’t know the term “inbound” as it refers to marketing (not call centers), we need to talk.
  2. If you’re not engaged in social media marketing (especially LinkedIn marketing), there’s still time to start.
  3. Marketing and advertising effectiveness in today’s environment is less about the size of your budget and more about the magnitude and caliber of the content you’re creating.

At Giant Voices, every deliverable we execute for our clients ties back to content that helps our clients drive sales. It’s not just about pretty pictures (although we do craft amazing strategic creative for our clients).

The same is true for you entrepreneurs, solopreneurs and marketers that report internally. If you are not thinking about inbound marketing as a successful lead generation strategy—about how you can drive sales through engaging, meaningful and educational content—you’d better start polishing your resume.

For those of you that know me personally, you know I’m a modest yet competitive woman.

After reading “Inbound Marketing,” I’m incredibly proud to say that we have a team of Giants that is strategically on target to help our Giant Clients reach their revenue ambitions.

My wicked-smart (I am channeling Boston) business partner, Pascha Apter, and I are on the right track with our investment in HubSpot.

We are versed in the inbound methodology as part of a larger marketing strategy. We create compelling content. We help our Giant Clients strategize on the most appropriate channels to push messages out through. And, the best part: our Giant Clients can measure and attribute their increase in sales to our actions.

That’s truly a Giant accomplishment for our team.

Lisa Bodine, Giant Partner + President

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