Improving the Image of Marketing
There are two big reasons why there is some self-loathing going on today, according to Cassie Nolan:
1) It feels shady. We can use certain words, deliver a message in a specific way and display content that produces the action we want. That seems wrong on some level and manipulative.
2) It feels unnatural. Most of us want to be honest and helpful without screaming to get attention for ourselves. Marketing runs counter to this tendency.
The reality is you do have to capture attention and let people know your company and products but it doesn’t have go against your conscience. That is the beauty of inbound marketing. Instead of pushing your message on people, you pull them in with valuable content such as blog posts, how-to guides, checklists and more. Prospects come to you as a resource. Then they begin to trust you and eventually purchase. In other words, if you give people the information and guidance they seek, the selling takes care of itself and everybody wins!
Inbound Marketing
Not convinced yet? Consider this: inbound leads cost two thirds less than those generated from outbound tactics and social media has a 100% higher lead-to-close rate than outbound marketing. Here are three tips for making inbound marketing work for you.
- Think about content like a media company
Content attracts people to your business. Building assets is different from traditional marketing, where you are essentially renting something from somebody versus owning it. For example, if you use Google AdWords or other paid media, as soon as you stop paying, the traffic goes away. This is a long-term change in strategy and equity must be built over time with blogs, interactive tools, photos and infographics, videos and podcasts, presentations and eBooks. It’s about creating content people want, not about your business. The content is the foundation for your communications strategy. You can use it to power social media, emails, website content and so on. But instead of thinking about how to reach people on a channel, you should think about what the consumers want first then adapt the content to the channel. Ultimately, we should not interrupt what people want to consume. We should strive to become what they want to consume.
