Inbound Marketing Archives - Modern Marketing Partners

Develop an Inbound Approach to Creating Relevant Content image

There’s a sports adage that many coaches tell their athletes, “let the game come to you.” It may seem like odd advice, because most sports-related activities and matches seem to be all about controlling the tempo and taking charge of the game. However, this different and disciplined approach can yield important benefits for players and professionals alike. For marketing professionals in today’s business climate, it means being patient, not passive, just alert and resolute. And it means letting the customer come to you. You still have to entice them of course, but it may be over a longer period of time. How do you establish visibility and credibility with this approach? By creating relevant content that has more in common ...

Content Marketing Guide: Best Practices, Tips & Trade Secrets image

A new content marketing guide is available that details 3 phases of the content marketing process: planning, implementation, and measurement. Both business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-consumer (B2C) content marketing scenarios were considered. Numerous content marketing examples and resources are provided. The Guide starts with the premise that content marketing is the hottest topic in all of marketing. Why? Because according to a 2016 study by the Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, 88% of B2B marketers and 76% of B2C marketers are using content marketing. The content planning phase includes defining objectives, determining content topics, and identifying content types or tactics. Regarding tactics, the aforementioned studies identified both B2B and B2C content tactics in the charts below. No question, there are major differences in content types ...

18th of August, 2016
In: Blogging, Content Marketing, Inbound Marketing, Marketing Best Practices
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Blogging Best Practices: Top 10 Tips image

According to a recent study, blogging is used by 81% of business marketers, and 77% of consumer marketers (Source: Content Marketing Institute). No question, Blogging is now a proven marketing tactic for most marketing scenarios. Why? Because effective blogging can drive significant and measurable website traffic, build search engine authority, improve social media engagement, reinforce a thought leadership image, and even generate sales leads. So how can a marketer blog more effectively? Following are Top 10 Tips for Blogging Excellence with explanations of each, along with some additional resources. Top 10 Tips for Blogging Excellence: 1. How to Plan a Blog 2. Key Content Considerations 3. Properly Integrate Blog and Website 4. Employ all possible SEO 5. Blog Titles are Critical 6. Lead Generation Techniques 7. Use relevant ...

27th of July, 2016
In: Inbound Marketing, Influencer Marketing, Social Media, Uncategorized
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Find an Influencer that Fits Your Influencer Marketing Strategy image

If you read our previous article, you know to take influencer marketing seriously. But how do you need to approach this strategy? It’s difficult to track down an influencer that’s the perfect fit – both a balance of a large social following, and followers that would be interested in your niche. Selecting an influencer with too few followers is not going to be seen, but an influencer with many followers is useless if their interests don’t align with your product. If you find your perfect influencer, you need to think about your approach. How are you going to compensate the influnecers? It may not be enough just to give them a product sample. Give them a reason to talk ...

21st of July, 2016
In: Inbound Marketing, Influencer Marketing, Social Media
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Why Influencer Marketing Needs to be Taken Seriously image

As the popularity of social media marketing continues to grow, so does the use of influencers. Influencer marketing is a strategy companies use similar to word-of-mouth (WOM). Businesses find influential members within online communities and incentivize them to promote their product in a more organic or native way. Typically, these influencers are experts within a product category or have a large social following. Companies may offer free products, cash, or other compensation; in exchange, the influencer chats up or reviews the company’s product on their platform(s). Influencers may spread the word on a multitude of social platforms, blogs, or websites. Why Influencer Marketing? Advertisement exhaustion. We’re each exposed to 4,000-10,000 ads per day. Consequently, the population is sick of ads. This is ...

17th of June, 2016
In: Content Marketing, Inbound Marketing, Thought Leadership Marketing
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Thought Leadership Marketing Guide image

Thought leadership as a marketing discipline has been around for several decades. Some credit large consulting firms that published research (e.g. The McKinsey Quarterly, Deloitte Review). Defined as positioning a company or individual as an expert through current, relevant and valuable content, thought leadership marketing (TLM) is intuitively appealing because customers seek information, education, and expertise when evaluating options, or making important decisions. Another TLM definition references the need for expertise when a high degree of financial or emotional risk is involved. That said, TLM is likely important for a broad range of categories including information technology (IT), software, consulting, big ticket purchases, new technologies, and complex products or services. As you might expect, there are many challenges to effective thought ...

3rd of June, 2016
In: B2B Marketing, Content Marketing, Software Marketing
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Software Marketing Guide image

Software marketing is a special beast to conquer. With so many companies attempting to gain some market share, it is not easy to grab a footing. Moreover, customers are becoming exhausted by many marketing tactics. Following are 3 major challenges of software marketing. Intense Competition Effective marketing of business software to executive decision makers is increasingly challenging. With broad adoption of software as a service (SaaS), and high valuations for independent software vendors (ISVs), competition has grown dramatically over the last decade. Today, over 100,000 software brands compete in more than 300 categories. Paid Marketing Over-Saturation Your competitors are using all kinds of paid marketing and sales tactics. This is also giving the largest brands the advantage, because they have more capital to spend on marketing. The ...

Lead Generation through Landing Page Development image

When developing a lead generation strategy, many factors go into leads. One of the most important considerations in both website development and lead generation is the creation of landing pages that are both SEO friendly and will motivate visitors to act. How can you do this? Where should you start? Read on to see the guide to landing pages. With special thanks to Tuesday Marketing Notes author Eric Gagnon, we would like to share with you Developing Effective Landing Pages for Successful Lead Generation. Landing Pages for Lead Development Previously, we've covered the techniques for writing effective, response-generating text ads for Google AdWords and other keyword search marketing programs. This week, we’ll cover the very important techniques required to develop effective landing ...

7th of April, 2014
In: Content Marketing, Inbound Marketing, Infographic
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B2B Content Marketing Survey Findings for 2014 image

How can you plan your Business to Content Marketing in 2014? Through a recent survey by the Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, this information provides guidelines and benchmarking information for content marketing strategy in 2014. What did the survey find out? What should you expect in this year and beyond? Read more to see what will come of content marketing. We would like to thank Joe Pulizzi of the Content Marketing Institute and Ann Handley of MarketingProfs for surveying individuals and providing this data. To register for the CMI study, you can register and download the B2B Content Marketing Survey from CMI Website. Content Marketing Tactics Understanding content marketing is a valuable factor to developing a strategy. Although the strategy and distribution ...

Content Marketing: 7 Steps to Driving Interaction image

Content marketing is one of the most popular topics in marketing today. But with everyone jumping on the bandwagon, what content is effective? Valuable? Lead generating? To that end, following are 7 Steps, Tips and Strategies for effective content marketing. We share with you a recent article by Social Media Today contributor Mark Learner about Content Marketing titled Top 7 Tips for Effective Content Marketing. Along with our own editorial and ideas for proper content marketing. 1. Save the Sales Pitch for Your Sales Team Effective content marketing leaves the pitch to the salespeople. The minute you start talking about how great your product is, the reader sees right through this and closes the page. Give your readers information they want and ...

1st of January, 2014
In: B2B Marketing, Marketing Best Practices
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CMO Predictions for 2014 image

It’s the month of predictions for next year, and this is an important one for B2B Chief Marketing Officers (CMO’s). International Data Corporate (IDC), offered their prediction regarding what Business-to-Business Chief Marketing Officers (CMO's) can expect for the year of 2014. Learn 10 things you can expect as a CMO in the next year. 1. Increasing Complexity and Augmented Job Description As ways to best reach clients changes, so does the job description for a CMO. The concept of marketing is becoming more and more complex, and as firms adapt, so will their needs. Ideas have even come across as the development of a position known as the “Chief Content Officer” to augment the C-Suite, focusing strictly the company’s voice and ...

MMU on LinkedIn: Newly Improved Group image

One of the most important aspects to any campaign is its ability to remain topical and competitive on social media. In respect to this, we at Modern Marketing University would like to invite you to connect with us on our newly improved LinkedIn Group. We post discussion topics and polls about changes in the marketing world, and provide our answers to any questions that you ask. In Addition to this, we also offer our insights on many other Social Media Profiles: Twitter (@ModMktgUniv) Google+ (Modern Marketing Partners) Facebook (Modern Marketing Partners) Feel free to comment and discuss using the tools ...

Top 10 Inbound Marketing Strategies image

Inbound marketing, one of the top marketing buzzwords emerging over the past of couple of years, will be used by 58% of companies this year. In addition, 48% of marketers plan to increase their inbound marketing spend in 2013 (Hubspot). For the old-school marketer or traditionalist, inbound marketing is considered a “pull” strategy, while outbound marketing is considered a “push” strategy. Our new inbound marketing whitepaper, will share the top 10 inbound marketing strategies, followed by details on our Integrated™ Inbound Marketing Process with an accompanying infographic, and an inbound marketing case study. Top 10 Inbound Marketing Strategies Thought Leadership Blogging Social Media Search Engine Optimization (SEO) PR Integration Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising Use Calls-to-Action Generate Word of Mouth Leverage events Integrated Inbound™ Marketing To download a printable PDF version of the whitepaper visit: ...

Inbound Marketing in 2013 – Survey Findings image

Today Hubspot released their 2013 State of Inbound Marketing Report, shedding insights into what inbound marketing means to marketers and their companies. In this fifth anniversary edition, they asked 3,339 marketing professionals from 128 countries to share their perspectives on everything from strategy and organizational alignment to budget and channel management. Overall, marketers are increasing their inbound spending nearly 50%, for the third year in a row! No question, the marketing mix has has significantly changed, shifted, and evolved from traditional marketing to Internet-centric approaches. Below are Hubspot’s 10 key takeaways from the State of Inbound Marketing 2013 report. 1. Inbound marketing is gaining traction 58% of companies plan to execute inbound marketing strategies in 2013 48% of marketers plan to increase their ...

17th of April, 2013
In: Inbound Marketing, Marketing Strategies
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B2B Buyer Personas – Development Tactics and Content image

“A buyer persona is a composite of different factors that affect your buyer and motivate him/her to buy. Your prospect’s buying cycle and buying decisions are situated within a larger context that must be understood in order to motiveate his/her buyer behavior” (MLT Creative). For B2B, buyer personas are especially complex due to typical B2B sales cycles. MarketingSherpa found that 41% of B2B firms have established buyer personas, while 47% of organizations have not (See more). A complete understanding of your buyer is critical in the development of communications, marketing materials, and content. Below we will share tactics in developing buyer personas. In addition, we detail what type of content to develop for four different B2B personas. Effective Tactics For Developing ...

Blogging For Success (Part 1): Getting Started image

The term blog comes from the combination of the terms, web and log. A blog is defined as a website containing articles, referred to as “blog posts” or blogs”, that highlight subject matter expertise, industry news, or any relevant information to the audience you are targeting. Blogging has become a critical marketing tactic for a variety of reasons. This is part one of a two part series on blogging for success. Part one discusses reasons to blog, blogging platforms, and 11 important features every blog should have. Once you have established your blog, read Blogging For Success (Part 2) to learn more about the ongoing management of your blog including content planning, content ideas, and ways to promote your blog ...

13th of October, 2012
In: Inbound Marketing, Marketing Case Studies
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Inbound Marketing Case Study: Construction Marketing Association image

A great example of the power of Inbound Marketing to achieve measurable results is the launch of the Construction Marketing Association (CMA). Established in January of 2010, CMA employed a comprehensive Inbound Marketing program to build awareness, drive memberships, and launch such initiatives as the STAR Awards, professional certification, and a career center Like all successful Inbound Marketing, a search-optimized website was foundational, coupled with extensive and relevant content. An award-winning blog and integrated social media profiles distribute content and communications. Frequent webcasts and white papers reinforce thought leadership. The CMA inbound marketing campaign was recognized for the following awards: Communicator 2011 Silver CMA Social Communicator 2011 Silver CMA Blog Hermes 2011 CMA Blog Below is a snapshot of the website, blog, Facebook, Google Plus ...

5th of October, 2012
In: Inbound Marketing, Infographic, Marketing Best Practices
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Inbound Marketing vs. Outbound Marketing – Infographic image

Inbound Marketing is hugely popular thanks to the tireless efforts of marketing automation software publishers including Hubspot, Marketo, Eloqua and Pardot, each with a different spin on what constitutes effective Inbound Marketing. Still, each of these sources is selling software, so there is clear bias for Inbound Marketing, and bias against many Traditional or Outbound Marketing techniques. In some cases, this bias is so exaggerated, that it borders on conspiracy! Now that we have your attention, consider a recent study by Hubspot (The State of Inbound Marketing in 2012) that compares Inbound to Traditional or Outbound marketing, identifying lower costs and greater effectiveness of Inbound. The conspiracy? Hubspot defines Outbound marketing as trade shows, direct mail and telemarketing. Ok, what about ...

IT Reseller Marketing: Case Study image

IT Resellers and value-added resellers (VARs) are more focused on marketing than ever before. Why? Because the modern marketing mix is proving to deliver dramatic and yes, measurable results. This blog is a marketing case study that will show you how a leading IT reseller (VAR) employs digital and inbound marketing to build awareness and drive sales. A related blog in this series is a marketing case study for a top accounting/CPA firm's technology consulting division that Modern Marketing Partners implements thought-leadership content marketing via the Internet and social media to drive sales leads. Be sure to check out the post on accounting and CPA firm marketing best practices as a supplement to these case studies. CHALLENGE Brittenford Systems is a leading VAR in ...

Search Engine Optimization—SEO—Top Priority for Modern Marketers image

Achieving top position for keywords in search engine results pages (SERPs) is becoming one of the highest priorities of marketers. Why? Because studies* show that only the top few search result positions drive click-through, website traffic, registrations, and other great results like sales! Despite this priority, the majority of company or brand websites lack even the most basic Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques. *(Source: Search Engine Watch) Developing your website, or retrofitting an existing website with best practice SEO is critical to achieving improved organic or natural search engine results (vs. paid search results). Search Engine Optimization Techniques SEO is impacted by on-page coding and content, off-page link-building, and social media presence. Some of the techniques and features that support search engine optimization include: Meta ...

Modern Marketing Defined—Marketing Mix Infographic image

What is Modern Marketing? Glad you asked. To provide some context, let's go down memory lane. The internet launched circa 1995. Prior to that, advertising was the lead marketing strategy and tactic. In 1960, marketing professor and author E. Jerome McCarthy defined marketing as the Four P's: Product, Promotion, Price and Place. As recent as 1973, Webster's dictionary defined marketing as the advertising of products and services. To reference a famous tagline, "You've come a long way baby." Today, advertising is a secondary tactic for all but the biggest brands, primarily consumer and retail. Internet marketing and social media have become integral to the modern marketing mix. Let's take a closer look at modern marketing, inbound vs. outbound, traditional vs. digital. Our Modern Marketing Mix ...

Tags ArchivesInbound Marketing