Imagine if you went to the Apple Store, and there were no salespeople present. No Genius Bar. No staff at all. Would it still be the highest grossing retail store on the planet? Not likely. Though with all those goodies left unattended, most of them would disappear without benefitting Apple at all.
If your Website doesn’t have a content strategy that is designed to support your likely buyers’ needs throughout the buying cycle, with calls-to-action driving them to engage with your content, then your Website is like that imaginary Apple Store. It’s not selling anything, and your content is walking out the door for free. Your investment in the Website isn't being returned to you.
The good news is that you can make your Website a profit center. It can generate a consistent flow of ever-more-qualified leads. The way you do it is called Inbound Marketing; it's the new way leads are generated for B2B, and it probably could work for you, too.
Inbound marketing is a discipline and set of tools that’s been a long time coming and it’s a good thing it’s here. Many of the elements you’ve heard of before. It’s the analytics, methods and discipline, combined with a sales-marketing feedback loop that makes marketing ROI plainly and routinely visible for the first time.
Inbound marketing is also based on the reality of selling in the 21st Century. Likely buyers will check you out a number of times before wanting to have a conversation with a sales rep. Providing meaningful content, resources and experiences as they make their decisions is the key to success. And like any good marketing strategy, it starts with a good plan… you need to know where you want to go.
The next time you're on a B2B website, check around and see if there is content being offered behind landing pages, or if everything is out in the open. If you're like me, you'll realize that those Websites are unlikely to provide an identifiable ROI, and will find yourself wondering if the company is as up-to-date as they'd like you to believe.
Want to learn more about Inbound Marketing and how it might work on your Website? Just click the banner below for a no-obligation 15-minute call to learn more.
