By M. Isi Eromosele

In order to remain competitive, companies need to be found on the Web, leveraging Inbound Marketing methods to reach their best customers with targeted messages that they seek out, not ignore. Instead of bombarding people with television ads, companies would create videos that potential customers want to see. Instead of placing advertisements in print publications, companies should create their own blogs that customers subscribe to and look forward to reading. Instead of cold calling, companies would create useful content and give people the tools and applications to enable people to call, seeking more information about their products and services. All of the above helps a company drive its message to its most sought after audience, which translate to attracting highly qualified customers to designated touch points.

Companies need to turn more to Inbound Marketing because it is a more efficient way of allocating marketing resources than traditional outbound marketing. Inbound marketing is an opportunity for companies to transform their contacts with customers into revenue generating channels by precisely addressing their potential marketing needs.

It requires using a combination of behavioral, personal and contextual data to create real time profile of each customer. This information is integrated with real time analytics and business rules evaluation to deliver the highest impact offers to customers at their moment of interaction. Inbound customer contacts represent opportunities for companies to personalize communications with customers who initiate contact with them at various touch points.

The most successful Inbound Marketing campaigns have three major components:

• Content - Content is the substance of any Inbound Marketing campaign. It is the information or tool that attracts potential customers to a company’s site or business touch point
• Search Engine Optimization - SEO makes it easier for potential customers to find your content. It is the practice of building the company’s site and embedding inbound links into it to improve its search engine ranking, making it easier for customers to find it
• Social Media - Social media intensifies the impact of your content. When your content is distributed on social networks by consumers, it gains real authentication, thus more likely to draw qualified customers to your site.

Superb attributes of Inbound Marketing:

• Cost Effectiveness - A major part of Inbound Marketing is the creation of content and talking about it. The cost of starting a blog is minimal. A Twitter account is free. Both can draw thousands of customers to your site. The marketing Return-on-Investment from inbound campaigns is higher
• Precise Targeting - When you implement Inbound Marketing, you only approach potential and current customers who self-qualify themselves. They have already demonstrated an interest in your content, so they are likely to be interested in your product or service
• It’s an Investment, not a Continuing Expense - In order to maintain a high position at the top of Google’s paid results, you have to keep paying. If you invest that money in quality content that ranks well in Google’s organic results, you will stay there until another company displaces yours.

Business Benefits of Inbound Marketing:

• Reduces cycle time to develop marketing campaigns and devise go-to-market plans
• Increases customer acceptance through personalized offers
• Increases long-term profitability through enhancement of customer experience, reducing customer turnover
• Increases revenue through improved cross-selling and up-selling
• Increases efficiency of outbound campaigns through the utilization of customer response insights

M. Isi Eromosele is the President | Chief Executive Officer | Executive Creative Director of Oseme Group - Oseme Creative | Oseme Consulting | Oseme Finance

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