Inbound Marketing and Resilience

Inbound Marketing Is Hard, But We’re Determined To Be Great

I’m an introspective person, and that personality trait is reflected back on our business. I always want to be better. So, we’re always looking at what we do, how we do it and ways to improve things for our clients, our team members and our partners. That is the essence of data driven marketing.

If you understand that about me, you’ll also understand why I’m so bothered by our inability to help every client. Why can’t we get them to change? Why can’t we get them to trust us?

Why won’t they do what is obvious, (to us)?

When I look back at what we’ve done as an inbound marketing agency, it seems the greatest failure is that we couldn’t help more people and more businesses to see the light we see.

Changing To Inbound Marketing Is Challenging

Human beings present a whole set of unique challenges. We’re afraid of change. Things that are unknown are scary, and they make us uncomfortable, anxious and defensive. As an inbound agency, we come along and tell CEOs that everything they’ve known is changing. The rules are different. The traditional tools you used to use to market your company and sell your products/services are becoming obsolete. That even sounds scary to me. However, inbound marketing and resilience go together well.

The world changes whether we like it or not. Whether we embrace it or not, it changes around us. Remember the bag phone, Blockbuster video, the VCR, Borders book stores, newspaper classifieds, land lines, printed maps, AOL, fax machines, long distance charges and public phones? They are all gone, or almost gone. We keep talking about getting rid of our home landline because the only ones who use it are telemarketers — and we never answer it.

I know change has to be inspired internally. People have to want to change.

But, we also have to be better at explaining to CEOs why now is the time to change, why moving to inbound and away from outbound is the right move. We need to communicate why their businesses need to be remarkable in order to stay in business, to thrive instead of simply survive and to avoid becoming the next Blockbuster or Borders.

Inbound Marketing Requires Education

Changing to something that we don’t fully understand is also challenging. While outbound might not be working like it used to, everyone understands the ideas behind placing ads, sending out post cards and making cold calls. You can touch and see the ads, put your hands on the post cards and look at call reports. However, even a blind squirrel finds a nut sometimes, so maybe these tactics do work.

Even if you think they work, they’re not going to be working for long. More accurately, they’re going to be working less and less every single day. Eventually, there will be no landlines or office numbers to dial. We have to be even better at helping CEOs understand the hows and whys behind inbound and the importance of transitioning to it early.

Marketing As A Strategic Investment, Not An Expense To Be Cut

Having been in marketing for my entire career, I’ve been through the rounds of budget cuts when times are tough, and marketing almost always bears the brunt of those cuts. That always seemed odd to me. Why cut the engine that drives revenue when times are tight? It seems like that’s the best time to double down and push through.

There is significant research that indicates companies that invest in marketing during a recession grow three times as fast after the recession is over.

So, if you’re a couple of months into your inbound marketing program and the results are slower to realize than you expected, don’t make your first move to cut. Instead, stick it out and let your inbound team deliver as planned. In fact, I’m going to tell you to not ever fully cut or stop your inbound marketing. I’m telling you this because I’ve seen companies stop their programs time and time again, only to realize it was just about to work or started working shortly after they pulled their investment.

Unfortunately, starting it up again is like starting from scratch. The momentum is lost, and everything has to be reworked, taking more time and more money. We could be in a recession in Edmonton, business owners will need to invest wisely.

Inbound works, always – as long as you let the team who knows inbound do it, as long as the program is properly funded and as long as you give it time to work.

If you think changing marketing is hard, try changing sales. Today, inbound marketing agencies are getting pulled into sales to help salespeople close the new leads. The change in buyer behaviour that’s impacting the way you market is also impacting the way you need to sell. 

We need to be just as astute in helping sales leaders redesign their sales process, reset the standard for communication with prospects, integrate educational content and teach sale people to start guiding their prospects instead of selling to them.

This is going to be an ongoing challenge, one that requires all of our knowledge, experience and skills. I know our team is up for the challenge. I know that we’ll be adjusting what we do and how we do it in an attempt to deliver better experiences, better results and better businesses for our clients.

We are here to help you win.