Inbound Marketing Blog

Inbound Marketing Methodology: First, you need to "Get Found".

1. First, create remarkable content. That's the core of inbound, attraction, search or pull marketing.
2. Optimize the content for the major search engines (SEO) and other audiences.
3. Promote this remarkable content in the blogosphere, social mediasphere, email marketing, and other appropriate channels.
   


A. Content Creation
The first and most important part of “Getting Found” is creating remarkable content. This means creating blog articles, web pages (updating existing pages & creating new landing pages), videos, photos, webinars, whitepapers, and other resources that are useful, interesting, thought provoking, controversial, and entertaining. This may be the most critical step in the development of a powerful inbound marketing & SEO plan and generating more traffic and qualified leads.

Create a content creation strategy and schedule, and then try to stick to it as closely as possible.

Every web page has the potential to rank well in search engines and draw traffic from other sources, like social media sites and the blogosphere. Of course, whether a page draws traffic (and links) depends on whether it's optimized and how remarkable (useful, interesting, etc.) it is. But in general, most pages do "well" and contribute to the cause, so it's both a quality and a quantity game.

Consider a 10 page website. This site has 10 unique pages that could rank on the major search engines as well as other places. 10 unique opportunities to draw traffic. Now compare that to a 100 page website. The 100-page site has 10x more opportunities to draw targeted traffic, and on average will be drawing 10x the amount of actual traffic. Thus, content really is king, and creating great content is the first challenge in any inbound marketing strategy.

B. Optimize Content

After content creation (which you need to continue through the entire inbound marketing process), you need to optimize that content for search engines (SEO) as well as for other channels, like YouTube & Twitter.

The foundation of any successful inbound marketing program is compelling content creation. Optimizing that content is a key step to ensure you give your valuable content the best chance possible of drawing traffic from the web.


Focus on two major components of your Search Engine Optimization (SEO):

1. On-Page SEO is the process of placing selected keywords in the right places on the web pages so that Google and other search engines know what each page of our client’s website is about, and what keywords to rank the different pages for. On-Page SEO makes up about 25% of how well you rank in the major search engines.
2. Off-Page SEO is the process of building links and authority, getting other sites on the Internet to link to you. The more links you have from other popular sites, the more important your site appears to be to Google and other search engines. Links are your online reputation from the perspective of the search engine. Off-page SEO makes up about 75% of how you rank in search engines.

How To Get Found Online: Search Engines Presence

As I normally state in these Inbound Marketing blog posts, the information below was created for businesses & professionals looking for inbound marketing strategies. Inbound marketing professionals should already be familiar with this information but I do encourage marketing professionals to share this blog post with their readers.

There are generally two forms of search engine results:

1.    Sponsored or paid results
2.    Organic or natural results.

Sponsored Results:  Paid search engine results (sponsored results) are those listings that require a fee for the search engines to list their link for specific, selected keywords or keyphrases. The most widely used form of paid listing is Pay Per Click (PPC). This is where you pay each time someone clicks on the link in your advertisement on the search engine results page (SERP). The price increases with the level of competition of the selected keyword.

Organic Results: Natural or organic search results are gathered by search engines’ web crawlers and ranked according to relevance to search terms. This relevance is calculated by criteria such as:
•    Extent of keyword match
•    Keyword prominence
•    Keyword frequency
•    Keyword relevance
•    Number of links into that website or web page

Ranking in the organic search results is better because not only is it FREE, but research shows that people click on the organic results 75% to 84% of the time and paid results only garnish 16% to 25% of the attention. Part of the reason for this is that consumers are intelligent enough to understand that money alone can get a web site to the top of a page through these sponsored ad purchases but organic results are dictated by the direct relevance as determined by Google or the other major search engines. This gives organic search results and those web sites that achieve these results much more credibility.

How Do The Major Search Engines Decide Page 1 Rankings?
Google and the other major search engines rank websites in search engine results pages according to relevance to the search terms. This relevance is calculated by looking at both on-page factors such as the content on your site and off-page factors in the form of inbound links to your website. Off-page factors (number of links to a given web page or web site) are the biggest influences in your website’s ranking in search engine results. With these factors as the primary influence, any web site with inbound marketing as a priority, needs to learn how to do some or all of the following:

1: Research & Develop Master Keyword Inventory    
•    Search Volume – Given two different keyword phrases, optimize for the one with the larger number of searches.
•    Relevance – Choose keywords that your target market is using to describe and search for your products and services.
•    Difficulty or Competition – Consider your chances for ranking on the first page of Google for that keyword phrase. Look at the sites ranked in those first 10 slots, their authority and relevance to search terms, and gage if you will be able to overtake them to secure a spot on that first page.

2: On-Page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
•    Place keywords in the page title, URL, headings, and page text.
•    Optimize your page description for maximum click-through-rate when your site ranks in Google searches.
•    Place keywords in other “invisible” places on your web site, including meta-keyword tags and alt-text on images.

3: Off-Page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
•    Build more inbound links from other sites into yours. Each link serves as a recommendation or a reference.
•    Build more links within context, i.e. those with valuable keywords in the link anchor text (the text that is hyperlinked to your site). Link anchor text provides context for the search engines to understand what your site is about.
•    Build more links from trusted websites. Just as references from well-respected friends and experts offer more value, so do links from trusted and well- respected websites.
•    Link-building tips:    
      o    Submit your website to directories like the Yahoo! Directory and Business.com
      o    Communicate with others in your industry through blogs and other social media    
      o    Create compelling tools (such as an interesting calculator) and content (via a blog, for example)

4: Measure, Evaluate, Analyze  & Modify
•    Track number of inbound links, keyword rank over time and compared to competition.
•    Measure real business results: number of visitors, leads, and customers from SEO.

Below is an example of search engine ranking results produced for my company. This is some of the data I use to help understand my inbound marketing productivity.

Featured Business: Signs In One Day - Signage Retailers

Business Name: Signs In One Day
Business Web Site: www.sarasotasign.com
Business Location: Sarasota, FL
Marketing Decision Maker: Ken Frank
Business Description: Sign retailer - Manufactures, installs and repairs commercial signage

What are your current marketing activities?: Word of mouth, networking, yellow pages, web site search engine optimization.

What is your primary marketing method?: Yellow pages

What changes are needed (if any) in your marketing methods?: I am currently re-evaluating all of may marketing efforts. I took over this small business about 8 years ago and have grown significantly. I realize that what I have been doing needs evaluation and certain changes to keep current with the times. My issue is I don't know where to start and if I even have the time to devote these changes. I hired an SEO company about 6 months ago and have gone from zero internet presence to very dominant positions but I don't see it translating to the kind of customers and accounts I am looking for. My market is almost entirely local and I keep pretty busy but I do see the need for changes sooner than later.

Do you know what Inbound Marketing is, if so, please define in your own words?: Sort of - The truth is that I have little time and desire to learn anything new that will place new demands on my time. I usually stay with what works and even though the economy slowed, I have stayed busy. My understand of Inbound marketing is having a web site and some internet exposure so my customers can find me easier.

What percentage of your marketing budget is applied to Outbound marketing vs. Inbound marketing? In 2009 it was 100% of all our marketing budget. It is now 80%. We launch a new web site and hired an SEO company 4 months ago. Our rankings seem to be outstanding but I am not even sure (yet) what is translating into business customers. When I have more time I will evaluate this further.

What inbound marketing components are you currently utilizing?: Web site development (content) and an SEO program.

How are you currently measuring ROI?: I have only measured ROI resulting from my yellow page ads. I have not yet constructed the appropriate ROI measurement from my web site activity.

Have you ever executed a keyword development strategy for your web site?: Yes, as part of my new search engine marketing campaign.

How are you measuring your web site's traffic?: Not.

How are you measuring your web site's conversions?: Not.

What search engine strategy has been employed?: We have hired an SEO company to optimize our site for about 15 different keywords.

Are you using a blog? If so, how often are you posting a new article?: No, I don't see why people would care what I have to say about sign installation and I don't have the time to do the writing or blog development.

Who creates each blog article?: N/A

Does your business have a Linked In account?: No.

Does your business have a Twitter account?: No.

Does your business have a Facebook account?: Yes and my wife created a fan page.

How would you define your lead generation system?: It's more of a traditional, fly by the seat of my pants lead generation from referrals, yellow pages and now my web site.

How would you define your lead tracking system?: I have none.

How would you define your lead nurturing systems?: Follow up call from my staff.

Have you considered developing an Inbound Marketing Plan, if so, what are your challenges?: Yes, I would like to get more involved but I don't really know where to start and frankly I don't see it as a priority.

On a scale of 1-10, how important is developing a focused inbound marketing program?: 1

How soon do you plan on developing a better inbound marketing plan?: I developed a new web site 6 months ago and hired an SEO company to get search engine exposure. I'm not sure what my next step will be. I guess my main challenges is trying to understand what inbound marketing means to me and if I can really benefit without giving up my management time.

What would be your first step in creating a better inbound marketing plan?: Speaking with an expert on the subject.

Inbound Marketing Successes & Experiences Shared

Today's blog features a graphic design firm in Norwood MA and is an interesting Inbound marketing participant. My assessment is that this firm absolutely understands the movement from outbound marketing to inbound marketing and understands this from first hand experience. Like many business Peartree is and has been studying and experimenting with various internet marketing options. They have used SEO, sponsored advertising, blogging, social media and traditional marketing methods. Peartree graphic design's inbound marketing strategy, like many of us in the business world, has evolved over the past couple of years. They used to do "this and that" but learned that maybe they really need to "try this and that" instead. For the record, this is exactly why I created this inbound marketing blog series. It seems to me that with companies like Peartree willing to share these experiences, all readers can avoid mistakes that have been made by others. We don't all need to recreate the wheel.

I believe this graphic design firm is close to isolating a system that meets it's needs and budget. The important thing to learn from this case is their desire and efforts to learn and listen. Even more importantly, this company has shown to be willing to take risks and apply inbound marketing elements in an effort to grow.

Featured Business: PearTree USA Graphic Design

Business Name: Peartree USA
Business Web Site: www.peartreeusa.com
Business Location: Norwood, MA
Marketing Decision Maker: Kevin Poirier
Business Description: Graphic Design, Logo Design, Brochure Design Services

What are your current marketing activities?: Yellow pages, email marketing, Google Adwords & now business.com. We used direct mail in the past with some return success.

What is your primary marketing method?: Email marketing

What changes are needed (if any) in your marketing methods?: A more aggressive strategy with alternative methods and execution, analysis is front burner for us to understand what we need to focus on first.

Do you know what Inbound Marketing is?: Yes - Driving people to contact me and  our web site.

What percentage of your marketing budget is applied to Outbound marketing? 30%

How are you measuring ROI?: We use tracking codes for all of our promotional activity so either direct mail, email marketing or web site coupons, we track any activity through these codes.

Have you ever executed a keyword development strategy?: Yes, we hired an SEO company about a year ago and that was part of the first steps.

How are you measuring your web site's traffic?: Google analytics

How are you measuring your web site's conversions?: We use a contact form for site conversions while we ask all inbound callers how they got our name.

What search engine strategy has been employed?: We started with a Google Adwords campaign and other than securing one good client, we haven't seen any impressive results. Last year we hired an SEO company to optimize our site with limited results. We are now trying business.com with the idea that we will receive more qualified traffic.

Are you using a blog? If so, how often are you posting a new article?: Yes, 2 a month but I know I need to do more posts. I have a hard time creating subject matter and don't really understand why a business will take any time to read random information about graphic design. I do understand that in theory, its an important tool and I will continue to develop my blog.

Who creates each blog article?: I do

Does your business have a Linked In account?: Yes - Kevin Poirier

Does your business have a Twitter account?: Yes - PeartreeUSA

Does your business have a Facebook account?: Yes

How would you define your lead generation system?: No specific software being used but we are researching options.

How would you define your lead tracking system?: Tracking (promo code) through inbound phone call records and contact form.

How would you define your lead nurturing systems?: I don't believe a newsletter would make sense for some of the same reasons I have trouble grasping the blog value. I do think I need to discover new methods of interaction.

Have you considered developing an Inbound Marketing Plan, if so, what are your challenges?: Yes - Driving qualified businesses to my site

On a scale of 1-10, how important is developing a focused inbound marketing?: 8

How soon do you plan on developing a better inbound marketing plan?: This has started as explained earlier.

What would be your first step in creating a better inbound marketing plan?: We are in the middle of investigating more complete Internet marketing solutions. Our biggest concern with some solutions is the costs to start the process. Some of the solutions we looked at involved migrating our site at a significant cost so we were then locked in to using a specific CMS. I don't like that idea.

Stay tuned for "Part 5" by subscribing to this inbound marketing blog.