How to get started with inbound marketing

Getting started with inbound marketing is usually not as difficult as you think. And you probably already carry out a lot of activities that fall under the concept of inbound marketing. The most important thing is that you find a good structure for your work and that you create logical flows that are easy to follow and measure. In this blog post, we describe what you do to get started with inbound marketing.

Defining the problem

An inbound marketing project usually starts with some kind of communication challenge that needs to be solved. This can be anything from difficulty in reaching a particular target group to an ambition to increase sales in a particular industry or for a particular product. Define the problem clearly and visualize the goal by describing what you want your activities to lead to.

Identify your personas

For an inbound marketing campaign to be effective, you need to take the time to identify exactly what your desired customers look like and define a number of personas who are the beneficiaries of your efforts. You should carry out different activities against different personas so that they are as tailored as possible. It's important to interact with your personas, understand the challenges they face to reach their goals. Using personas is about much more than just knowing the needs of your target audiences. It is about gaining a deep understanding of your customers' and potential customers' goals, ambitions and motivations, both personal and business.

Build a keyword strategy

Inbound is fundamentally about being found. To do this successfully, you need to have a keyword strategy that is in line with what your personas are searching for. Start by identifying how tough the competition is for a number of keywords and search phrases and how many people are searching for them. This will determine how you should think about short-tail and long-tail. Next, you should identify a large number of keywords and search phrases that form the basis of the content you will create to attract qualified visitors to your website. Select your priority words and optimize for them on your website and in the content you create.

Developing a content strategy

The best way to demonstrate that you are a knowledge leader in your industry is by providing valuable and relevant content to your stakeholders. Start by mapping out the customer journey and buying process for your personas and identify materials and activities that move them from the top of the sales process to the bottom. The materials you produce should always be search engine optimized and in line with your personas' needs. The goal is to initiate conversations and present solutions that address their key challenges and concerns.

Create an editorial calendar

If you have a good content strategy and optimize everything you do for search engines, you have a great opportunity to drive traffic to your website. One of the most effective tools for sharing knowledge and quality content is the blog and the best way to structure the work is to create an editorial calendar. The calendar should include the topic, title, content points, keywords/phrases, intended persona and offer/call-to-action. With a clear and well-thought-out editorial calendar, you can quickly get your work up to speed while ensuring that your visitors are guided through the digital customer journey in an efficient way.

Producing quality content offers

A good way to get your visitors to leave their e-mail address or other information about themselves is to work with so-called content offers. These need to be attractive, contain quality material and address one or more of your personas' challenges. By creating material that helps solve the problem, there is a greater chance that they will provide their contact details. The content offer can therefore be an e-book, white paper, case, templates, evaluations, reports or any other smart solution. Each offer should target at least one persona and cover at least one step in the digital customer journey.

Design compelling call-to-actions

The purpose of a call-to-action is to generate leads. To get someone to give you their email address in exchange for something, it is important that your forms, landing pages and call-to-actions are well designed and educational. Feel free to use an image of your content offer and write a simple but clear and inspiring text about what the material contains. Preferably in point form so that it is easy to understand. Also develop simple descriptive and clear texts for the button itself so that people understand what happens if they click.

Set up simple MA flows

For each persona and for each content offer, you should set up a simple but well-thought-out marketing automation flow that takes your lead further in the buying process. Think about what should happen once someone has downloaded or signed up for something and how much time should pass between each activity. Think about creating emails or mailings that build trust and at the same time tickle the recipient to want to engage more and get more information. They need to look professional and have the right tone of voice.

Spread on social media

Decide which social media channels are relevant to your personas and make sure to spread your activities here. Tailor your content to best suit each channel and thus generate the most traffic. A strong social media presence also helps your search engine optimization. Reuse material you already have but that is relevant to your personas and feel free to promote your posts, at least those about your content offers.

Measure your activities

The ability to measure and follow up on your activities is one of the real strengths of inbound marketing. Set clear goals and KPIs linked to your micro- and macro-conversions and find good ways to share the results internally in your organization - at least between marketing and sales.