Inbound marketing is a marketing strategy designed to attract customers to a brand with content and experiences that they derive value from. Inbound marketing utilizes blogs, events, SEO, and social media to create brand awareness and attract targeted consumers. By attracting or “drawing in” a targeted audience, inbound marketing differs from outbound marketing which actively pushes a brand onto consumers who may have no interest in what is being offered.
Aspect
Explanation
Concept
Inbound Marketing is a customer-centric marketing methodology focused on attracting, engaging, and delighting customers through relevant and helpful content at various stages of their buying journey. Unlike traditional outbound marketing, which interrupts audiences with promotional messages, inbound marketing aims to provide value and build lasting relationships. It aligns marketing efforts with the way modern consumers research and make purchasing decisions.
Key Strategies
Inbound marketing employs several key strategies: – Content Creation: Producing valuable, educational, and entertaining content such as blog posts, videos, ebooks, and podcasts that address the needs and interests of the target audience. – SEO (Search Engine Optimization): Optimizing content to rank well in search engine results, making it easier for potential customers to discover the content. – Social Media Marketing: Sharing and promoting content on social media platforms to engage with audiences and build brand awareness. – Email Marketing: Nurturing leads through email campaigns and providing personalized content to subscribers. – Lead Generation: Collecting contact information from website visitors through forms and calls-to-action to nurture them into customers. – Marketing Automation: Using software to automate marketing tasks, segment leads, and deliver personalized content based on user behavior.
Customer Journey
Inbound marketing aligns with the customer journey, which typically includes the following stages: – Awareness: Attracting potential customers by addressing their problems or needs with informative content. – Consideration: Providing deeper insights and solutions, positioning the business as a trusted authority in the industry. – Decision: Convincing prospects that the products or services offered are the best solution to their problem or need. – Delight: Continuing to engage and delight customers after the purchase to foster loyalty and advocacy.
Application
Inbound marketing is widely used across industries for various purposes: – Lead Generation: Attracting and converting website visitors into leads by offering valuable content in exchange for contact information. – Brand Building: Establishing thought leadership and building brand trust through educational and informative content. – Customer Retention: Engaging and delighting existing customers through personalized communications and exclusive content.
Benefits
Inbound marketing offers several advantages: – Cost-Effective: It often costs less than traditional advertising methods like TV or print ads. – Higher Quality Leads: Leads generated through inbound marketing tend to be more qualified and interested in the business’s offerings. – Long-Term Value: Building relationships with customers can result in long-term loyalty and repeat business. – Measurable Results: Inbound marketing efforts are trackable, allowing businesses to measure the ROI of their strategies.
Challenges
Challenges associated with inbound marketing include: – Time-Intensive: Creating high-quality content and nurturing leads can be time-consuming. – Competitive Landscape: As more businesses adopt inbound strategies, standing out and gaining visibility can be challenging. – Consistency: Maintaining a consistent content publishing schedule and adapting to changing SEO algorithms require dedication.
Real-World Application
– Companies such as HubSpot, Moz, and Neil Patel Digital are known for their successful implementation of inbound marketing strategies. – E-commerce businesses often use content marketing and email campaigns to attract and retain customers.
Before the advent of the internet age, outbound marketing techniques such as catalogs, TV advertisements, and cold calls were reasonably effective. However, consumers are now savvier and more empowered.
They see outbound marketing as aggressive, pushy, and most importantly, not tailored to their individual needs. Inbound marketing is the way of the future since it seeks to build a relationship with high-quality leads who have a prior interest in a product or service.
Indeed, a HubSpot study of over 6300 businesses found that 68% of those using inbound marketing strategies believed their marketing strategy was effective. Yet only 48% of those engaged in outbound marketing could say the same.
Inbound marketing is a more effective strategy because it provides solutions to problems that consumers are actively searching out. Indeed, a 2016 Nielsen survey found that adults spend an average of 10 hours a day in front of a screen consuming content.
Businesses who provide helpful content to consumers build trust, reputation, and authority in their niche without being seen as motivated by sales. Importantly, they provide answers where consumers are looking for them.
Principles of Inbound Marketing:
Content Creation: Produce high-quality content that addresses customer questions, challenges, and needs at each stage of their journey.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Optimize content and website to rank well in search engines, making it more discoverable by potential customers.
Social Media Engagement: Use social media platforms to share content, engage with the audience, and build a community.
Lead Nurturing: Implement lead nurturing workflows and email campaigns to guide prospects through the sales funnel.
Advantages of Inbound Marketing:
Higher Quality Leads: Inbound marketing attracts leads who are genuinely interested in the products or services offered.
Cost-Effective: Compared to outbound marketing, inbound marketing tends to be more cost-effective in the long run.
Brand Authority: Regularly publishing valuable content helps establish a brand as an authority in its industry.
Customer Retention: The focus on delighting customers fosters loyalty and repeat business.
Challenges of Inbound Marketing:
Time-Intensive: Creating valuable content and nurturing leads requires time and consistent effort.
Content Quality: Maintaining content quality and relevance can be challenging, as audience expectations evolve.
Measuring ROI: Determining the exact return on investment for inbound marketing efforts can be complex.
Competitive Landscape: Inbound marketing requires businesses to stand out in a competitive online landscape.
When to Use Inbound Marketing:
Startup Launch: Inbound marketing can help startups gain visibility and attract their initial customer base.
Digital Transformation: Businesses undergoing digital transformation can benefit from an inbound approach to modernize their marketing strategies.
Content Marketing: When content marketing is a central strategy, inbound principles can enhance its effectiveness.
Customer-Centric Focus: Any situation where a customer-centric approach is desired or needed.
What to Expect from Using Inbound Marketing:
Increased Traffic: Expect an increase in website traffic and engagement due to valuable content.
Lead Generation: Inbound marketing typically generates a higher volume of qualified leads.
Improved Conversion Rates: Effective lead nurturing and content can lead to improved conversion rates.
Brand Loyalty: Delighting customers through inbound marketing fosters brand loyalty and advocacy.
Long-Term Impact of Inbound Marketing:
Sustainable Growth: Inbound marketing contributes to sustainable and long-term business growth.
Brand Authority: Over time, a brand can establish itself as an authority in its industry.
Customer Lifetime Value: Focusing on customer satisfaction and retention can increase customer lifetime value.
Adaptability: Inbound marketing strategies can adapt to changing customer behaviors and preferences.
An example of inbound marketing methodology
While providing value is essential to any inbound marketing strategy, it is not enough to solve consumer problems and then wait for sales to materialize.
Businesses must have a methodology that moves the consumer from an interested lead into a happy and satisfied consumer. Here is what that might look like.
Attract
Attracting customers is the first step, and it must be done with precision. Businesses need to draw in consumers who stand a good chance of being converted into customers.
Attracting the right consumer means creating content that resonates with a business’s target audience – while also compelling them to move to the next stage of the methodology.
Convert
Once the customer is attracted to a brand, businesses must capture their contact details to begin the process of relationship building.
In exchange for such details – usually an email address – marketing teams must offer something in return. This is usually a free industry report, a chapter of a paid book, or access to exclusive blog posts or webinars.
Close
Closing describes the process of turning a lead into a happy customer through a combined sales and marketing strategy. However, it’s important to note that closing will only be successful if the consumer has been properly nurtured in the previous step and been primed to purchase.
Effective closing marketing strategies include marketing automation, email marketing, and sales promotions or discounts.
Delight
Many businesses abandon their customers once they have closed the sale, but this is to their detriment. In the delight phase, the goal is to establish brand loyalty by showing consumers that you still value them and what they have to offer.
This is achieved through continuing to engage with them and ensuring they are completely satisfied. This is particularly important for businesses that offer ongoing services such as subscriptions, but all businesses should make customer retention and satisfaction one of their main priorities.
Inbound Marketing Best Practices
Marketing has become all about customers today. And it is no surprise since the competition in the market is raging high with hundreds of new businesses opening every day.
This requires established brands to fight that much harder to maintain their stature as well as startups to play on customer’s need for instant gratification for a quick built.
For this reason, inbound marketing tactics have found a brand new place among even B2B companies because it is all about attracting customers “in” instead of pushing your products out.
So the best way to catch the eyes of potential clients is through inbound marketing.
Here are some of the most effective tactics that will help you establish your brand and pump up your conversion rates.
Read on.
The Content
Content always has been and always will be the king when it comes to brand marketing. Conveying the right things, to the right people, in the right way, at the right time is what good content is about.
The best thriving kind of content is the in-depth original research with establishes your expert status in the market.
And everyone listens to and follows an expert. In fact, even statistics prove it. According to data given below by serpIQ, the most preferred length of content among the general audience lies around 2400.
Talking about B2B industries, if you are associated with software or if you are an eLearning content provider, then offering in-depth and original content to your users can boost your brand image fairly quickly.
And thankfully, there are a number of ways to promote yourself outwards in an accessible way to the audience, like email marketing and push notifications.
Bottom line is, content development does not stop after creation. It is, rather necessary to promote your content for enhancing the sales of your company.
So, longer pieces of content are not just good for search engine rankings but users love it as well. And once correctly marketed, it will make your website traffic surge positively and you will have higher chances of converting deals.
Adopt multimedia
There have been numerous studies about how videos, animations, and images are much more effective when it comes to marketing than written content.
This does not negate the usefulness of long written pieces of content but simply add to it.
For instance, if you are thinking about reviving some old articles, you can consider turning them into an infographic or a video and then republish.
Recycling of content is a must to maintain the health of your website and keep it ranking high on SERPs and making that content more interactive will only take the outcome of this exercise many levels higher.
Collaboration is the key
To get visible on the map of the internet, the quickest way is to be seen with the ones who are already on it, that is, the experts and big names of your industry.
Collaboration can come in many ways, you can hire them as an influencer or collaborate with them for content. For instance, if you are creating a webinar or a simple expert video then you can ask them to speak.
It establishes your brand’s reliability as well as the authenticity of your content.
It helps you in building long-lasting relationships within your industry and expand your reach.
Not only this but when you collaborate with bigger brands that yourself and they generally will have a larger set of audience, they will also share the content in which they have contributed among their media channels.
This means that your content will reach a larger audience and help you gain more leads.
Optimization
Anyone who owns a business website knows that not every page and every article will rank high on the search engines and attract traffic.
In fact, sometimes, content is only created to maintain the consistency and activity of your blog and media channels.
For instance, if you are in the eLearning industry, specializing in Sales & Services Training then there is a chance that your compliance training posts might not be able to gain much traction.
Nevertheless, your focus should be the posts which do rank high in attracting traffic and their optimization. From the perspective of inbound marketing, review your old and aged content that is still bringing traffic to your site and find ways of creatively optimizing it.
It can be by updating the facts, dates, or even content itself. What helps greatly here is remarketing that content again through emails and social media channels to increase the traffic.
You must also add a CTA with your marketing ways so as to ensure higher conversions.
Lastly,
As said before, inbound marketing is all about enticing the customer enough to land at your site and stay. So maintaining its health along with the content are the most paramount of practices.
Inbound Marketing Best Practices is a Guest contribution by Suzanne Elly, freelancer and ghostwriter.
Examples
Blog Content: A company in the fitness industry publishes blog posts on topics like “10 Tips for Healthy Eating” and “Effective Home Workouts” to attract health-conscious individuals searching for fitness advice.
Ebooks and Whitepapers: A B2B software company offers a free ebook on “Digital Transformation Strategies” in exchange for visitors’ email addresses, thus generating leads interested in their software solutions.
Social Media Engagement: An eco-friendly fashion brand regularly posts engaging and informative content on social media platforms, attracting environmentally-conscious consumers interested in sustainable fashion.
Email Marketing: A travel agency sends personalized travel recommendations and exclusive offers to subscribers who have shown interest in specific destinations or travel types.
Webinars: A marketing agency hosts webinars on the latest digital marketing trends, attracting marketers seeking industry insights and strategies.
Infographics: An infographic illustrating “The Benefits of Meditation” is shared on social media, capturing the attention of people interested in mindfulness and well-being.
Video Tutorials: An electronics retailer creates video tutorials demonstrating how to set up and use their products, helping customers and attracting potential buyers.
Influencer Collaborations: A makeup brand collaborates with a popular beauty influencer to review and promote their products, reaching the influencer’s dedicated audience of makeup enthusiasts.
Case Studies: A consulting firm showcases case studies on their website, detailing how they helped clients solve specific business challenges, attracting businesses facing similar issues.
User-Generated Content: A restaurant encourages customers to share photos and reviews on social media using a specific hashtag, building a library of user-generated content that showcases their food and atmosphere.
Podcasts: A financial services company hosts a podcast series discussing personal finance and investments, appealing to individuals seeking financial advice.
Interactive Quizzes: An online clothing store creates a quiz titled “Find Your Fashion Style,” engaging visitors and guiding them to products that match their style preferences.
Content Upgrades: A gardening website offers a downloadable planting calendar as a content upgrade to its article on “Growing Your Own Vegetables,” capturing leads interested in gardening tips.
Live Chat Support: An e-commerce website provides live chat support to assist visitors with product inquiries, improving customer satisfaction and potentially leading to sales.
Product Demos: A tech company offers live product demos via video conference, allowing potential customers to see the software in action and ask questions.
Key takeaways
Inbound marketing is a process of attracting and then converting customers through valuable content.
Inbound marketing is an effective way to reach consumers in the modern age. Businesses must cultivate a brand that consumers associate with value first. Only then should the focus move to selling.
A four-step inbound marketing methodology details how a business might attract and then convert consumers in their target audience.
Key Highlights:
Inbound Marketing Definition: Inbound marketing is a customer-centric marketing strategy that focuses on attracting customers through valuable content and experiences. It contrasts with outbound marketing, which pushes messages onto consumers.
Importance of Inbound Marketing: Inbound marketing is crucial in the digital age because it builds relationships with high-quality leads who are already interested in a product or service. It is seen as less aggressive and more tailored to individual needs, leading to higher effectiveness.
Inbound Marketing Methodology: Inbound marketing follows a four-step methodology:
Attract: Create content that resonates with the target audience and compels them to engage.
Convert: Capture contact details in exchange for valuable content or resources.
Close: Use sales and marketing strategies to turn leads into customers.
Delight: Continue engaging with customers to build brand loyalty and satisfaction.
Inbound Marketing Best Practices:
Content is King: High-quality, original content is essential for establishing expertise and attracting customers.
Multimedia: Incorporate videos, images, and animations alongside written content to enhance engagement.
Collaboration: Partner with industry experts and influencers to increase credibility and expand reach.
Optimization: Regularly review and update content that performs well, and use remarketing strategies to boost traffic and conversions.
Case Studies
Inbound Marketing Strategy
Description
Implications
Example
Blogging
Creating and regularly updating a blog with valuable, relevant content that addresses the needs and interests of your target audience.
– Drives organic traffic to your website. – Positions your brand as an industry authority. – Generates leads through content offers and CTAs.
Example: A digital marketing agency maintains a blog with articles about SEO best practices, attracting businesses seeking SEO services.
Social Media Marketing
Utilizing social media platforms to share content, engage with followers, and build a community around your brand.
– Increases brand visibility and reach. – Fosters direct communication with prospects. – Encourages user-generated content and sharing.
Example: An eco-friendly clothing brand shares sustainable fashion tips and engages with environmentally-conscious consumers on Instagram.
Content Marketing
Creating various types of content, such as ebooks, whitepapers, videos, and infographics, to educate, inform, and entertain your audience.
– Provides value to your audience and establishes thought leadership. – Captures leads through content downloads and subscriptions.
Example: A software company offers a downloadable ebook on cybersecurity best practices, capturing email addresses for lead nurturing.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Optimizing your website’s content and structure to rank higher in search engine results, making it easier for potential customers to find you.
– Drives organic traffic and increases website visibility. – Improves user experience and website credibility. – Supports long-term lead generation.
Example: An online gardening store optimizes its product pages for keywords like “organic gardening supplies,” ranking higher in Google search results.
Email Marketing
Building and nurturing relationships with leads and customers through personalized email campaigns that provide value and engage recipients.
– Supports lead nurturing and conversion through targeted messaging. – Encourages repeat business and brand loyalty. – Measures and analyzes campaign performance.
Example: A fitness app sends personalized workout tips and offers to its subscribers, encouraging user engagement and retention.
Account-based marketing (ABM) is a strategy where the marketing and sales departments come together to create personalized buying experiences for high-value accounts. Account-based marketing is a business-to-business (B2B) approach in which marketing and sales teams work together to target high-value accounts and turn them into customers.
Ad Ops – also known as Digital Ad Operations – refers to systems and processes that support digital advertisements’ delivery and management. The concept describes any process that helps a marketing team manage, run, or optimize ad campaigns, making them an integrating part of the business operations.
Venture capitalist, Dave McClure, coined the acronym AARRR which is a simplified model that enables to understand what metrics and channels to look at, at each stage for the users’ path toward becoming customers and referrers of a brand.
Affinity marketing involves a partnership between two or more businesses to sell more products. Note that this is a mutually beneficial arrangement where one brand can extend its reach and enhance its credibility in association with the other.
As the name suggests, ambush marketing raises awareness for brands at events in a covert and unexpected fashion. Ambush marketing takes many forms, one common element, the brand advertising their products or services has not paid for the right to do so. Thus, the business doing the ambushing attempts to capitalize on the efforts made by the business sponsoring the event.
Affiliate marketing describes the process whereby an affiliate earns a commission for selling the products of another person or company. Here, the affiliate is simply an individual who is motivated to promote a particular product through incentivization. The business whose product is being promoted will gain in terms of sales and marketing from affiliates.
The bullseye framework is a simple method that enables you to prioritize the marketing channels that will make your company gain traction. The main logic of the bullseye framework is to find the marketing channels that work and prioritize them.
Brand building is the set of activities that help companies to build an identity that can be recognized by its audience. Thus, it works as a mechanism of identification through core values that signal trust and that help build long-term relationships between the brand and its key stakeholders.
According to inbound marketing platform HubSpot, brand dilution occurs “when a company’s brand equity diminishes due to an unsuccessful brand extension, which is a new product the company develops in an industry that they don’t have any market share in.” Brand dilution, therefore, occurs when a brand decreases in value after the company releases a product that does not align with its vision, mission, or skillset.
The brand essence wheel is a templated approach businesses can use to better understand their brand. The brand essence wheel has obvious implications for external brand strategy. However, it is equally important in simplifying brand strategy for employees without a strong marketing background. Although many variations of the brand essence wheel exist, a comprehensive wheel incorporates information from five categories: attributes, benefits, values, personality, brand essence.
The brand equity is the premium that a customer is willing to pay for a product that has all the objective characteristics of existing alternatives, thus, making it different in terms of perception. The premium on seemingly equal products and quality is attributable to its brand equity.
Brand positioning is about creating a mental real estate in the mind of the target market. If successful, brand positioning allows a business to gain a competitive advantage. And it also works as a switching cost in favor of the brand. Consumers recognizing a brand might be less prone to switch to another brand.
Business storytelling is a critical part of developing a business model. Indeed, the way you frame the story of your organization will influence its brand in the long-term. That’s because your brand story is tied to your brand identity, and it enables people to identify with a company.
Content marketing is one of the most powerful commercial activities which focuses on leveraging content production (text, audio, video, or other formats) to attract a targeted audience. Content marketing focuses on building a strong brand, but also to convert part of that targeted audience into potential customers.
One of the first mentions of customer lifetime value was in the 1988 book Database Marketing: Strategy and Implementation written by Robert Shaw and Merlin Stone. Customer lifetime value (CLV) represents the value of a customer to a company over a period of time. It represents a critical business metric, especially for SaaS or recurring revenue-based businesses.
Customer segmentation is a marketing method that divides the customers in sub-groups, that share similar characteristics. Thus, product, marketing and engineering teams can center the strategy from go-to-market to product development and communication around each sub-group. Customer segments can be broken down is several ways, such as demographics, geography, psychographics and more.
Developer marketing encompasses tactics designed to grow awareness and adopt software tools, solutions, and SaaS platforms. Developer marketing has become the standard among software companies with a platform component, where developers can build applications on top of the core software or open software. Therefore, engaging developer communities has become a key element of marketing for many digital businesses.
A digital channel is a marketing channel, part of a distribution strategy, helping an organization to reach its potential customers via electronic means. There are several digital marketing channels, usually divided into organic and paid channels. Some organic channels are SEO, SMO, email marketing. And some paid channels comprise SEM, SMM, and display advertising.
Field marketing is a general term that encompasses face-to-face marketing activities carried out in the field. These activities may include street promotions, conferences, sales, and various forms of experiential marketing. Field marketing, therefore, refers to any marketing activity that is performed in the field.
interaction with a brand until they become a paid customer and beyond.
Funnel marketing is modeled after the marketing funnel, a concept that tells the company how it should market to consumers based on their position in the funnel itself. The notion of a customer embarking on a journey when interacting with a brand was first proposed by Elias St. Elmo Lewis in 1898.
Funnel marketing typically considers three stages of a non-linear marketing funnel. These are top of the funnel (TOFU), middle of the funnel (MOFU), and bottom of the funnel (BOFU). Particular marketing strategies at each stage are adapted to the level of familiarity the consumer has with a brand.
A go-to-market strategy represents how companies market their new products to reach target customers in a scalable and repeatable way. It starts with how new products/services get developed to how these organizations target potential customers (via sales and marketing models) to enable their value proposition to be delivered to create a competitive advantage.
The term “greenwashing” was first coined by environmentalist Jay Westerveld in 1986 at a time when most consumers received their news from television, radio, and print media. Some companies took advantage of limited public access to information by portraying themselves as environmental stewards – even when their actions proved otherwise. Greenwashing is a deceptive marketing practice where a company makes unsubstantiated claims about an environmentally-friendly product or service.
Grassroots marketing involves a brand creating highly targeted content for a particular niche or audience. When an organization engages in grassroots marketing, it focuses on a small group of people with the hope that its marketing message is shared with a progressively larger audience.
Growth marketing is a process of rapid experimentation, which in a way has to be “scientific” by keeping in mind that it is used by startups to grow, quickly. Thus, the “scientific” here is not meant in the academic sense. Growth marketing is expected to unlock growth, quickly and with an often limited budget.
Guerrilla marketing is an advertising strategy that seeks to utilize low-cost and sometimes unconventional tactics that are high impact. First coined by Jay Conrad Levinson in his 1984 book of the same title, guerrilla marketing works best on existing customers who are familiar with a brand or product and its particular characteristics.
Hunger marketing is a marketing strategy focused on manipulating consumer emotions. By bringing products to market with an attractive price point and restricted supply, consumers have a stronger desire to make a purchase.
Integrated marketing communication (IMC) is an approach used by businesses to coordinate and brand their communication strategies. Integrated marketing communication takes separate marketing functions and combines them into one, interconnected approach with a core brand message that is consistent across various channels. These encompass owned, earned, and paid media. Integrated marketing communication has been used to great effect by companies such as Snapchat, Snickers, and Domino’s.
Inbound marketing is a marketing strategy designed to attract customers to a brand with content and experiences that they derive value from. Inbound marketing utilizes blogs, events, SEO, and social media to create brand awareness and attract targeted consumers. By attracting or “drawing in” a targeted audience, inbound marketing differs from outbound marketing which actively pushes a brand onto consumers who may have no interest in what is being offered.
Integrated marketing describes the process of delivering consistent and relevant content to a target audience across all marketing channels. It is a cohesive, unified, and immersive marketing strategy that is cost-effective and relies on brand identity and storytelling to amplify the brand to a wider and wider audience.
The marketing mix is a term to describe the multi-faceted approach to a complete and effective marketing plan. Traditionally, this plan included the four Ps of marketing: price, product, promotion, and place. But the exact makeup of a marketing mix has undergone various changes in response to new technologies and ways of thinking. Additions to the four Ps include physical evidence, people, process, and even politics.
Marketing myopia is the nearsighted focus on selling goods and services at the expense of consumer needs. Marketing myopia was coined by Harvard Business School professor Theodore Levitt in 1960. Originally, Levitt described the concept in the context of organizations in high-growth industries that become complacent in their belief that such industries never fail.
Marketing personas give businesses a general overview of key segments of their target audience and how these segments interact with their brand. Marketing personas are based on the data of an ideal, fictional customer whose characteristics, needs, and motivations are representative of a broader market segment.
Meme marketing is any marketing strategy that uses memes to promote a brand. The term “meme” itself was popularized by author Richard Dawkins over 50 years later in his 1976 book The Selfish Gene. In the book, Dawkins described how ideas evolved and were shared across different cultures. The internet has enabled this exchange to occur at an exponential rate, with the first modern memes emerging in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Microtargeting is a marketing strategy that utilizes consumer demographic data to identify the interests of a very specific group of individuals. Like most marketing strategies, the goal of microtargeting is to positively influence consumer behavior.
Multichannel marketing executes a marketing strategy across multiple platforms to reach as many consumers as possible. Here, a platform may refer to product packaging, word-of-mouth advertising, mobile apps, email, websites, or promotional events, and all the other channels that can help amplify the brand to reach as many consumers as possible.
Multi-level marketing (MLM), otherwise known as network or referral marketing, is a strategy in which businesses sell their products through person-to-person sales. When consumers join MLM programs, they act as distributors. Distributors make money by selling the product directly to other consumers. They earn a small percentage of sales from those that they recruit to do the same – often referred to as their “downline”.
The Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a measure of the ability of a product or service to attract word-of-mouth advertising. NPS is a crucial part of any marketing strategy since attracting and then retaining customers means they are more likely to recommend a business to others.
Neuromarketing information is collected by measuring brain activity related to specific brain functions using sophisticated and expensive technology such as MRI machines. Some businesses also choose to make inferences of neurological responses by analyzing biometric and heart-rate data.
Neuromarketing is the domain of large companies with similarly large budgets or subsidies. These include Frito-Lay, Google, and The Weather Channel.
Newsjacking as a marketing strategy was popularised by David Meerman Scott in his book Newsjacking: How to Inject Your Ideas into a Breaking News Story and Generate Tons of Media Coverage. Newsjacking describes the practice of aligning a brand with a current event to generate media attention and increase brand exposure.
A microniche is a subset of potential customers within a niche. In the era of dominating digital super-platforms, identifying a microniche can kick off the strategy of digital businesses to prevent competition against large platforms. As the microniche becomes a niche, then a market, scale becomes an option.
We can define pull and push marketing from the perspective of the target audience or customers. In push marketing, as the name suggests, you’re promoting a product so that consumers can see it. In a pull strategy, consumers might look for your product or service drawn by its brand.
Real-time marketing is as exactly as it sounds. It involves in-the-moment marketing to customers across any channel based on how that customer is interacting with the brand.
Relationship marketing involves businesses and their brands forming long-term relationships with customers. The focus of relationship marketing is to increase customer loyalty and engagement through high-quality products and services. It differs from short-term processes focused solely on customer acquisition and individual sales.
Reverse marketing describes any marketing strategy that encourages consumers to seek out a product or company on their own. This approach differs from a traditional marketing strategy where marketers seek out the consumer.
Remarketing involves the creation of personalized and targeted ads for consumers who have already visited a company’s website. The process works in this way: as users visit a brand’s website, they are tagged with cookies that follow the users, and as they land on advertising platforms where retargeting is an option (like social media platforms) they get served ads based on their navigation.
Sensory marketing describes any marketing campaign designed to appeal to the five human senses of touch, taste, smell, sight, and sound. Technologies such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and the Internet of Things (IoT) are enabling marketers to design fun, interactive, and immersive sensory marketing brand experiences. Long term, businesses must develop sensory marketing campaigns that are relevant and effective in eCommerce.
Services marketing originated as a separate field of study during the 1980s. Researchers realized that the unique characteristics of services required different marketing strategies to those used in the promotion of physical goods. Services marketing is a specialized branch of marketing that promotes the intangible benefits delivered by a company to create customer value.
Sustainable marketing describes how a business will invest in social and environmental initiatives as part of its marketing strategy. Also known as green marketing, it is often used to counteract public criticism around wastage, misleading advertising, and poor quality or unsafe products.
Word-of-mouth marketing is a marketing strategy skewed toward offering a great experience to existing customers and incentivizing them to share it with other potential customers. That is one of the most effective forms of marketing as it enables a company to gain traction based on existing customers’ referrals. When repeat customers become a key enabler for the brand this is one of the best organic and sustainable growth marketing strategies.
360 marketing is a marketing campaign that utilizes all available mediums, channels, and consumer touchpoints. 360 marketing requires the business to maintain a consistent presence across multiple online and offline channels. This ensures it does not miss potentially lucrative customer segments. By its very nature, 360 marketing describes any number of different marketing strategies. However, a broad and holistic marketing strategy should incorporate a website, SEO, PPC, email marketing, social media, public relations, in-store relations, and traditional forms of advertising such as television.
Gennaro is the creator of FourWeekMBA, which reached about four million business people, comprising C-level executives, investors, analysts, product managers, and aspiring digital entrepreneurs in 2022 alone | He is also Director of Sales for a high-tech scaleup in the AI Industry | In 2012, Gennaro earned an International MBA with emphasis on Corporate Finance and Business Strategy.
