2012 was a big year for Inbound Marketing companies, so it's safe to say that internet marketing isn't going anywhere if the trend continues. It's an exciting time in the business, but it's also a time to assemble your knowledge on the subject before you make any big pushes in advocating the process.
It's always helpful to read articles on what to do to better your inbound marketing campaign, but it's equally important to avoid the mistakes, as the game can be tricky and it's important to know what you're doing before you engage it.
In 2013, the industry will only continue to advance, so build a good base before your marketing campaign resembles the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
So what mistakes should you avoid?
1. Don't Generalize Your Audience
It's one of the easiet (and most common) mistakes to make in the marketing game. You would never advertise that you only provide one way of doing business, so why would you approach every lead the same way? You should have different campaigns for different businesses with each tailored to a specific role that your company can fullfill. Even if you want to link several different TOFU (top of funnel) incentives to the same page, you should structure each page so that it references the particular funnel each visitor is arriving from.
2. Don't Let Your Potential Clients Grow Stagnant
It's much harder to keep your potential clients interested than it is to grab their interest initially. It's your job to give them incentives so that they will not only engage in what you have to offer, but funnel down, becoming a much more involved client. Offer them bottom of the funnel incentives they can't pass up and make sure you provide lead generation incentives from top to bottom. By always engaging, you're helping to build the foundation for a long-term relationship, a relationship they can find trust in.
3. Don't Forget To Bring A Trail Map
It isn't hard to get carried away with all of the hype surrounding the Inbound Marketing game, so it's a necessary best practice to assure you know what lies ahead. If Charles Dickens taught us anything, it's that we need to be aware of our past, present, and future in order to find success in this world. Figure out what's working best currently, and apply that to where you want to end up a year from now. Too many companies enter Inbound Marketing cold-turkey, and it gets them nowhere in the end. Know where you want to be this time next year, and actively take steps to achieve it. How many clients will you have? How large will your employee-base be? Inbound marketing will take up a large and consistent ammount of your time, so you need to research what you're getting yourself into before you find yourself saying "Bah Humbug!"
4. Don't Ignore Your Target Audience
In following the 80/20 rule (which states that 20% of your business yields 80% of your profits) it's important to remember how critical your relationship with your target audience is. It's worth noting that by throwing out a large net, you'll catch more fish, but we're after quality here, not quantity. You want to establish connections with companies and clients that will give you the biggest push back. It's endlessly important to make sure that you research the wants and needs of your target audience in order to yield better business. After all, one of the most effective ways to generate new business is through referrals, so if you do right by "the few," you'll find "the many" will line up right behind them.
5. Don't Recycle (At Least In Terms of Your Marketing Campaign)
I know it's sometimes easy, even necessary to go back and reuse parts of your old marketing campaign but don't! Just, don't! Inbound Marketing is a constantly evolving process which adds value as time goes on. The simple fact is, things that were popular practices a year ago have been buried under the new emerging practices of today and it'd be foolish to think that they'd still be applicable. Everyone wants the new, so provide that to your customers, and they'll reciprocate your forward thinking. Shell out some of that creative energy you have pent up inside during the holidays and think of something new to grab your potential client's attention. If it doesn't work, move on, you're no worse for wear, but falling back to an irrelevant campaign could be just as harmful as doing nothing at all. It's all about the new!
