Inbound marketing means gaining the public’s attention with relevant and useful content. This approach allows you to add value to your prospects with every interaction they have with your brand.
Traditional marketing methods, including peer review management are focused mostly on commercial messages. In this scenario, you either use intrusive methods to caption attention, or you buy your public’s time. On the other hand, the inbound methodology allows the customer to find you when looking for answers.
According to HubSpot, the inbound marketing is the best way to turn strangers into customers and advocates of your business.
This process through which a website visitor becomes a customer and a promoter of your brand is called the buyer’s journey. The way you guide your public in this journey is essential for your business.
The connection between inbound marketing and your conversion rate
The inbound methodology allows you to promote your business differently from your competitors. It helps you to build long-term business relationships with your customers, which leads to active business growth and higher revenues.
When you practice inbound marketing, you hold your customers’ hand during their buyer’s journey. There are four phases of this process:
- attract
- convert
- close
- delight
The first step refers to attracting strangers to your website with relevant content, through your blog and social media channels. When you give the right answers and solutions to people’s problems, you drive targeted traffic to your website — people that have an interest in what you have to say and are more likely to buy from you when they’re ready.
In the second stage, visitors become leads, as they give you their information. These conversions are the result of the conversations that you start with your visitors, through forms, messages, or even meetings.
The more people you convert, the higher your chances to grow the number of customers. To calculate your conversion rate, take the number of conversions and divide it by the number of total visitors from the same period — if last month you had 50 conversions from 1,000 people who visited your landing page, your conversion rate is 5%.
The higher your conversion rate, the more people you get to guide through the other two steps of the inbound methodology. In the closing phase, you turn leads into customers, meaning that you convince people to buy your products and services using the right content and the best channels to communicate with your prospects.
After closing the deal, you must continue to provide your buyers with the best customer experience. This is the fourth stage of the inbound methodology — delight. You must engage with your customers and make them successful. This way, they’ll become advocates for your brand.
The power of word of mouth
91 percent of people read online reviews before making a buying decision. 84 percent of them trust peer reviews as much as they believe their friends. In this context, it’s essential to have customers that speak in your favor.
Inbound marketing helps you to make your customers happy and achieve your business goals with cost-effective methods. With a consistent content strategy and by applying simple conversion rate optimization tips, you can attract more people in your sales funnel and guide them to become your loyal customers.
You need to create high-quality content to educate your public and show them the benefits of doing business with you. This way, you gain trust, and people are more likely to engage with you and become first your leads, then your customers and, eventually, promoters for your brand.