By Michael Briggin
Success in your marketing initiatives depends on how quickly you can reach your customers. Considering whether to do inbound marketing, outbound marketing or both requires you to examine the scope of your marketing objectives and what your budget and bandwidth will allow.
Here’s what to pay attention to when looking at the practical application of what inbound and outbound marketing lead generation can do for your organization:
Inbound Marketing
This is where you invite prospective customers to get engaged with your brand through content-related campaigns.
If your goal is raising brand awareness so the leads come to you, inbound marketing can do this effectively without you having to spend as much time doing it in-person.
Outbound Marketing
If you want to focus on immediate contact and get in touch with potential customers quickly, outbound marketing allows you to do this.
Often outbound marketing can be in the form of appearances at conferences, seminars, tradeshows and summits. It can also entail a heavy use of your sales force from Inside Sales to Outside Sales Executives depending on their territory.
With outbound marketing, you can make an immediate impact on a potential customer depending on your pitch and what marketing materials you use to help you make your case.
Why Inbound Marketing Works Better Outbound Marketing
Not all leads can be sold through the outbound marketing process. Certain customers prefer getting to know you when they consider your brand through any content you publish.
This is where you have to place particular emphasis on content strategy. Whether it be blogging, email marketing, or social media marketing, brand awareness can go a long way in grabbing a customer’s attention.
Outbound Marketing can have a tendency to be expensive, particularly when it comes to your organization securing spots at an in-person event.
Why Outbound Marketing Works Better Than Inbound Marketing
Many organizations need business development on an ongoing basis in order to develop relationships with customers. Just depending on inbound marketing for leads isn’t enough.
In B2B organizations such as Oracle and Salesforce, outbound marketing is a heavy focus when it comes to inside sales executives, outside sales executives and even sales consultants. A lot of this entails regular business development activities from prospecting to follow ups.
Even demonstrations at conferences can be impactful in ways that inbound marketing cannot be.
Conclusion
Both inbound marketing and outbound marketing have their positives but you can’t rule out one or the other as they both can make a positive impact on your revenue stream.
It’s always good to be proactive as opposed to having to depend on one type of marketing all the time for lead generation. Being mindful about your budget but it also matters what the scope of your marketing objectives mean as they help you generate more leads.
