5 Signs It's Time to Invest in Inbound Marketing

Cold-calling and other traditional marketing techniques don’t work like they use to. I don’t know about you, but I hang up immediately on all unsolicited sales calls. I don’t want to be bombarded with information I never asked for. But, I Google questions at least 5 times a day. Wouldn’t you like to be the answer to my questions and problems?

That’s the power of Inbound Marketing.

Are you wasting your time and money on marketing tactics that don’t bring in revenue? It might be time to convert to inbound. Here are five signs it’s time to invest in inbound marketing.

1. You aren’t hitting your sales numbers

This is the first red flag in any business. Your sales team is probably complaining that none of the marketing department’s leads are qualified. And marketing is probably complaining the sales team is dropping the ball. Either way, if you aren’t consistently hitting your sales numbers, it’s time to reevaluate your marketing strategy.

2. Your marketing efforts aren’t having a good ROI

Whether you’re spending $5,000 a month on TV and print ads or you’re pouring all of your resources into PPC, if there’s little to no return of your investments, it’s not worth it! ROI can be calculated by dividing the net profit by the cost of investment. A good marketing ratio would be 5:1 or 500%. So, for every dollar you spend, you make $5. But an amazing (and usually unrealistic) ratio would be 10:1! Meaning you’d make $10 for every dollar you spend.

If you’re having a face-palm moment after realizing you’re not getting the revenue you need to make your marketing efforts profitable, you may need to consider inbound.

3. Your product or service is an investment

The buyer’s journey for products and services with a higher investment is much longer than a consumer buying $30 jeans. If they’re buying jeans, they might visit a few different websites or stores to find the best fit and price. But, the buyer’s journey usually won’t last longer than a few hours. A majority of people won’t drop more than $500 without doing a little research. Consumers want to be certain the product or service is worth the investment and risk. Your business must be ready to provide all the answers to their questions to allow them to mitigate the risk as much as possible.

With inbound, businesses can reassure consumers with educational blogs, case studies, industry reports and more. This content allows the consumer to convince themselves before ever talking to you. Asana does an awesome job on their case study page. It’s visually appealing, has a list of current well-known customers, a rolling slide of reviews and case study articles from a variety of clients and success stories.

This allows potential clients to mitigate the risk of buying. They have seen other businesses similar to theirs be successful and can trust that they are getting a top-notch product.

4. Your product or service requires an explanation

Stop spending a majority of your sales meetings educating potential customers on what your product or service is. Inbound marketing allows leads to self-educate about your product and industry. So, when you are on a sales call, you can spend less time educating and more time selling.

Utilizing inbound content not only attracts visitors to your website but also automates the lead scoring process by the content being consumed. When you go into a sales call, you’ll be able to know each content piece the lead has read in order to cater your conversations to their specific needs and stage of the buyer’s journey.

For Example:

You own a pool company. Sally is a homeowner with three kids and is thinking about getting a pool for her kids for Christmas. She first Googles “best backyard pools” to compare all the different kinds of pools and features she may want.

After reading the “Best Backyard Pool Features for 2018” on your website, she decides that she wants an inground pool with a waterslide and a hot tub (so she and her husband can enjoy the pool too!) Then, she wants to know how much it will cost. Luckily, there was a call to action at the end of the blog for a checklist on “How to get the best bang for your buck when installing your inground pool.” She submits her email into the form and downloads the checklist. But buying a pool is a big investment, Sally needs a little more time to think about her decision.

A week later, she receives an automated email about what to look for in an inground pool construction company. By now, she’s already seen three different kinds of content from your business is ready to get a free in-home consultation. When you come visit, she already knows what kind of features she wants, that she can afford it and that it’s worth her money, all because of your content! You can spend a majority of your consult on closing the deal instead of convincing Sally that an inground pool is what she is looking for.

5. You don’t have a strong online presence

If you’ve established your potential clients will be educating themselves on your industry or trying to mitigate the investment risk, you must have a strong online presence with useful content related to your product and industry. Potential buyers will learn all of this information from search engines. And if you aren’t there, they’ll get it from your competition.

Inbound marketing utilizes blogs, social media, advertising and SEO to direct traffic to your website from potential customers researching solutions. Next, inbound uses call-to-actions, landing pages and forms to convert website visitors into leads. Then, it’s time to close the deal. Inbound uses CRM, email, workflows and sales enablement to close leads into customers.

Can inbound really get you more quality leads?

Inbound allows potential clients to sell themselves before they even reach a sales team. It matches the modern way consumers research, consume resources and make their buying decisions online.

With all that being said, if you’re getting enough quality leads and customers by cold calling, going to trade shows and other traditional marketing tactics, don’t change a thing! But, be sure you are satisfied with your marketing ROI before you rule out inbound.

If you’re not satisfied with your current marketing ROI, here’s your sign. It's time to switch to inbound.