The main elements of inbound marketing for small business

On the internet today, marketing has become more and more challenging to overcome. Most small business drops the SEO for more interaction with their followers. But Google says that SEO is not dead though we still need to think like human rather than robots. Search algorithm Hummingbird is an advanced search tool which will also benefit marketers as well as searchers.

Know the elements of inbound marketing

 

1.       Email Marketing – Good email marketing can be the solid ground for your business. Most business deals are negotiated through email not social media

Email platforms to use

·         Exact Target

·         MailChimp

·         iContact

·         Mailgen

·         Active campaign

2.       SEO – Search engine optimization can give life to your website in form of organic traffic. A website cannot survive without SEO. SEO include:

·         Content Marketing

·         On-page Optimization

·         Off-page optimization

·         Keyword Research

·         Competitive analysis

Tools to use:

·         Google Analytics

·         SEOmoz

·         Ravertools

3.       Social media – is a tool that can spread your message well to your community and beyond, if your message is valuable and informative. Target audience will spread your messages in their network and so on, this will give you online credibility and online presence.

Platforms:

·         Facebook

·         Twitter

·         Google+

·         LinkedIn

·         Pinterest

·         Instagram

·         Foursquare

·         YouTube

·         Slideshare

Tools to manage your social media platforms are:

·         Hootesuite

·         Tweetdeck

·         Wildfire

·         Sproutsocial

4.       Content – Content brings life to the internet marketing efforts, without content you will not gain the brand awareness you are aiming for. No one will know about your business without spreading contents across multiple platforms.

Types of content for your marketing campaign

·         White Paper

·         Press Release

·         Blogging

·         Videos

·         Presentations

·         Infographic

·         Video/ online tutorials

·         Webinars

·         Ebooks

5.       Design – design is what binds all your marketing effort into one. A good website design with great user experience is one of the most fundamental elements of your overall business marketing. All your marketing campaign leads back to your website and it affects your overall conversions.

Website needs:

·         Branding/awareness

·         Website design

·         Mobile website version

·         Interface design

·         Responsive design

·         Business information

·         Blog

·         Images

·         Graphics

Tools to use to improve your website:

·         Wordpress

·         Drupal

·         Social media buttons

·         Photoshop

Inbound marketing plan should include these 5 important panels

1.       Identity

Buyer stage needs to have identify stage, whereof the customers permission to sell your products is earned

2.       Exploration

Use blog to publish valuable content and promote it on social media, invite more users to share your content across their network

3.       Decision making

One of the most important thing you can do for your inbound marketing is to help your clients make the decision through easy and quick solutions or informative content

4.       Take action

When your article meets the readers need, show them what benefit it has for them to choose your product and repeat the process.

5.       Advocacy

Turn your customers into your supporters and turn your fans into your clients

What to consider for your marketing mix

 

·         Social media marketing

52% of small business owners have found customers through Facebook, 67% companies who blogs have generated more leads than those who don’t, 43% of small business owners found customers on Linkedin through their professional Linkedin Profile. These statistics tells you that it is worth to mix your marketing campaign and learn the different platforms benefits as well as weaknesses

·         Content Marketing

Adding content with relevant keywords to your website will increase your page rank, having new valuable contents increases interactions with your potential customers. By creating interesting content can give you something to post on your social media sites. New content also means another reason to contact your customers through email content, which will be offered through presentation, white papers or Press release.

·         Video Marketing

Video marketing offers the same level of audience engagement, but more effective than content alone, in fact by year 2016 online video will be the largest single generator of internet consumer. Everyday 75 Million Internet users in USA watch online videos, from Advertisements, to DIY, How tos and Online tutorial videos. Video and marketing will be the perfect pairing, it also improve consumer engagement and increase your small business trustworthiness.

Final words

Make the most out of your inbound marketing by adding and mixing up different marketing campaign to suit all your target audience.

Roderick Hunnicutt

Socratic SBC | Small Business Consulting

2 Wisconsin Circle Suite 700 Chevy Chase, MD 20815
Office: (410) 929-6395  
Fax: (202) 318-0689   
admin@socraticsbc.com