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Inbound vs Outbound Marketing for B2B

One of the most important questions for marketing managers in recent years has been whether inbound or outbound B2B marketing is more effective. In this article, we will examine the key points of each approach and what to consider when developing your B2B marketing strategy.   

 

What is outbound B2B marketing?

Outbound B2B marketing is a proactive approach in which you take your brand to your target customers rather than waiting for them to come to you. The marketer identifies relevant potential clients and initiates conversations through outreach efforts, which can be sent in bulk or personalised. It is also known as interruption marketing can be defined as the marketer choosing the interaction. Common practices used in outbound B2B marketing include: 

• Direct mail
• Telemarketing
• Brand awareness campaigns 
• Bulk email marketing
• Banner advertising 

What is inbound B2B marketing?

Inbound B2B marketing is passive and allows the buyer to take action of their own accord instead of responding to direct proposals from the marketer. Here the consumers are exposed to content that allows them to make their own informed decisions. This method can help build trust and strengthen relationships. It is also known as permission-based marketing, as buyers give their permission by viewing content and then beginning a relationship. The techniques used in outbound B2B marketing commonly include:

• Content creation 
• Blogging
• Social media
• SEO
• Lead generation 
• Lead nurturing

Inbound marketing vs outbound marketing

The tide has recently turned in favour of inbound marketing, with a general belief that outbound marketing is less effective than it used to be. This is because buyers are becoming increasingly overwhelmed by invasive forms of marketing and advertising. Internet-enabled clients prefer to have more control over their purchases, usually carrying out their own research before making a commitment. A recent survey shows that more than 50% of B2B buyers use social media to learn more about products, services and vendors because modern business clients prefer to be fully informed. 

Inbound marketing holds the advantage of listening to clients and responding directly to their needs. As marketing guru,Seth Godin puts it: “Don’t find customers for your products, find products for your customers.” Readers of your online content have already shown that they are interested and ready for nurturing. In this respect, inbound marketing gives your B2B clients agency and helps build long-lasting relationships that can form part of a sales funnel. A survey from Databox revealed that 67% of B2B marketers create top-of-the-funnel content most of the time as this is the most critical stage.  

But while outreach efforts to a broad range of contacts could be ineffective in the majority of cases, where the target is more carefully defined they are more likely to pay off. Outbound marketing still holds particular relevance for high-end products that require a personal touch. 

Outbound marketing is often aided by marketing automation tools that make it easier to instantly connect with higher numbers of potential clients. It’s worth noting, though, that improvements in AI are making it increasingly possible for outbound marketing to be more specific and personalised. A recent report shows that more B2B organisations are making personalisation a priority in 2021.   

Budgeting is an additional consideration. Outbound marketing efforts are generally much more costly than their inbound equivalents. For large corporations, this is less of a concern, but it is another reason why small businesses and entrepreneurs warm to inbound marketing. 

In B2B marketing, there is a place for both inbound and outbound marketing. The question is which approach is best suited to each individual case, database of clients, or stage in the sales process. While the “pull” of inbound marketing is increasingly popular in an age that is empowered by information, there are still certain occasions when there is a call for that extra “push”.

How to Use B2B Email Marketing Tools More Effectively

Email is reportedly one of the most popular organic distribution channels and is used by 87% of B2B marketers. And in the face of so much competition, it’s vital you don’t miss the mark. B2B email marketing tools can simplify the process, helping you reach and engage your audience more effectively.

Why is B2B email marketing still important today?

In the wake of the pandemic, it’s more important than ever to have a strong digital strategy. Companies around the world have moved online, and reports show that business leaders plan to spend 25% more on digital in 2021. You can’t afford to be left behind.

For years, email has been a vital component of any successful digital marketing strategy. It helps businesses connect with customers and analyse campaigns effectively. The world of digital marketing might move quickly, but Forbes recently published an article stating that email marketing still promises to deliver the highest ROI of all marketing channels.

What can email marketing do for your business?

B2B email marketing and newsletters offer businesses the chance to connect with customers in a creative and measurable way. You can provide value through free content or downloads, almost instantly let customers know about an event or offer, and create a sales funnel that guides them through to purchase.

Thanks to the latest tools, email marketing can be personalised, too. For instance, businesses can divide their customers into groups (called segmenting) and personalise what they see based on factors such as region, interests or demographics.

Using analytics, businesses can then analyse their success. In fact, 90% of B2B marketers use email engagement to measure content performance – showing how just important it is.

Tools for B2B email marketing

Although there are many factors to consider, with the right tools, email marketing doesn’t have to be overly complicated. With everything in one place, it’s easier and quicker than ever to create, deliver and analyse engaging campaigns.

These tools aren’t just for amateurs. Approximately 85% of marketers use mail marketing software, making it one of the top two tools, alongside analytics software.

Which tool you need depends on your goals. However, the best tool will save you time and effort at each stage of your campaign. A dedicated email marketing specialist can advise on this. Below are some examples of popular choices.

Mail Chimp

Popular for:

• Creating designs
• Managing audiences
• Insights

HubSpot

Popular for:

• Having everything in one place
• Including email marketing
• CRM
• Website CMS
• Insights

Send Grid

Popular for:

• Focus on deliverability
• Making sure emails get where they need to go

Getting the most out of the tools

To get the most out of your B2B email marketing tool, you need to have a solid campaign created by someone with a good understanding of how those tools can benefit it – ideally, a dedicated specialist with prior knowledge of MarTec solutions. They can save you time and help you build the most effective strategies.

Outsourcing is a scalable and flexible way of achieving this without stretching in-house resources. It can decrease production time and give you access to new expertise.

Reusing Content Across Different Channels: 3 Things You Need to Know

Content marketing is all about the right content at the right time in front of the right people. And it’s not just about your website. It’s also about distributing that content across multiple channels to drive traffic and engagement from outside your own social media accounts. This blog post will discuss the importance of reusing content and distributing it through multiple channels to see the best results.

What Does Repurposing Content Mean?

Repurposing content means taking your existing content and adapting it to make it suitable for other channels. For example, if you have an article on your blog that has been well received and shown good results in terms of engagement, you might want to repurpose it for social media networks. 

Repurposing can also help make sure all your bases are covered. For example, if you’re posting on Twitter you will have to consider the character limit and for a Facebook ad, you need to be aware of the strict policies in place. To reach both audiences will require different adaptations of the same content. Likewise, your LinkedIn audience will differ from your other social media followers and you may need to tweak it to engage them.

Understand Each Channel’s Character

What type of content should be posted on each network? This depends mainly on the character of each platform as well as your brand’s message and voice. For example, you wouldn’t share a serious article about personal finance on Pinterest or an infographic with visualized statistics on Twitter because they don’t match the audience interest on those platforms.

The popular social media analysis tool – BuzzSumo – has lots of data from Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest etc. to help you analyze what people are sharing online.

For example, it shows that Pinterest users are primarily interested in visuals rather than text, while users on other social networks such as Facebook and Twitter are more likely to engage with posts that contain statistics.

Instead of blogging on your website and posting the same content across all networks, repurpose it by extracting extracts that resonate with each channels’ audience. For example, if there is an article entitled “Top 10 Fun Things to Do in Your City,” you can share these fun things using visualized statistics or a list format instead of quoting a long paragraph that might not appeal to, say, your Instagram followers.

Finding the Best Content Posting Platforms

Understanding what you want from your website is important because it impacts how much time and effort you spend on repurposing content. For example, if the goal of your website is to generate leads for a product, then posting articles on LinkedIn or Twitter might be more beneficial than on Facebook. 

Repurposing content also requires research into which channels are best suited to your goals. One way of doing this is by using an online tool like BuzzSumo. This allows you to search by keyword or topic to see all relevant articles, along with their social shares and who wrote them to find topics popular among influencers within those networks.

Different platforms are better suited to different types of businesses and different target audiences. For example, the younger demographic prefer Snapchat and Instagram, while older people are more likely to use Facebook. LinkedIn, on the other hand, is popular among professionals and people hiring and trying to find jobs. These things should be taken into consideration when deciding where to post your repurposed content.

Is Content Repurposing Beneficial?

Absolutely! Writing 100% unique content each time you want to post for every platform takes time and can become expensive if you hire a writer to do the job. By repurposing content, you can adapt blog posts, social media posts and much more to suit the specific needs and requirements of each platform. This allows you to reuse the same content with minor tweaks to see better results, saving you time and money.

In conclusion, content repurposing is undoubtedly beneficial and is an efficient way to grow your online presence and audience. The technique is used by thousands of companies, both big and small and can help you increase your reach and engagement.