Inbound Marketing

The traditional concept of marketing (outbound) has been to find or target customers, whether it be by direct mail, cold calling, telemarketing, trade shows and email blasts and hope that people will respond. The landscape of marketing has been turned upside down with the explosion of social media.

Inbound marketing methods include blogs, forums, email marketing, social networking and search engine optimization (SEO). Content, content and more content is key to successful inbound marketing efforts. if interesting and continuous content is not being created, it will be very difficult, in not impossible to build an audience and maintain it. Once that content is created, building a strategy for customers to find you could include following scenario (I'll use a photographer as the example):

• Build a website / or blog - you have several options for doing this:
  • Build your site from scratch - using web design software (Adobe products, Coffee Cup or a variety of others
  • Build using a content management system (CMS) - Joomla, Drupal are two of the best for small business sites - and definitely scalable as your business grows
  • Use a template
  • Hire a designer

• You want your website or blog or a COMBINATION OF THE TWO to be built using search engine optimization techniques so that search engines will find your site pages and rank it higher. I emphasized a website/blog combo because many people are using blogs as their websites. The importance of a blog is the consistent addition of new content. Search engines LOVE LOVE LOVE new content and this will play a major role in being found when someone interested in your product or service is searching for your type of business on the Internet. This is also the main difference between a blog and a website. The blog is two-way communication between the blog owner(s) and its readers and the content is updated frequently. Also, a blog has more of a personality and is more personable. Website content tends to be more static and a one-way communication vehicle.

• Set up a Facebook account and create a "page" for your business. This is different from the personal Facebook account that you set up to connect with your friends. Facebook pages are specifically set up for a business, a personality, an organization or any type of public figure.

• You may consider setting up a Twitter account and then cross-promoting Twitter and Facebook on your website / blog. I speak more about this in the Facebook and Twitter article. On your Twitter account, tweet about some of the photos you have taken or maybe the various locations where you may be conducting a photo shoot. Example tweet: "In Greece shooting the beautiful Greek Isles..Link to pics)." On your Facebook site, you can upload your photos and offer more details of the photo shoot and maybe offer tips on how to take certain types of photos. If you are selling your photos, you can create links back to your website.

• Consider other social media tools based on your business - LinkedIn, MySpace, etc. Developing the perfect social media marketing campaign for your specific business and customer base will help to maximize your overall marketing effort.

• Depending on your business, build a forum for your website or blog. This will establish a way to initiate a two-way dialogue between you and your forum visitors. Your forum visitors (that probably originated from your website) will be able to start discussions or threads that you or a staff member(s) can moderate - by making sure the conversation is non-abusive and relates to the topic(s). When people are engaged in the forum topics and website/blog content, it greatly increases the likelihood that your business will develop a loyal following and continue to grow.

• Register your website with the five major search engines. Conduct a search on "register your domain" and you will see all types of sites pop up. Many promise to submit your website to hundreds of search engines "for a fee." THIS IS NOT NECESSARY!!! There are only 5 search engines that in all reality really matter and they hold 99.2% of the market according to Hitwise. They are:
  • Google - 72% - Free submission
  • Yahoo Directory- 14.58% - $299 (Non-refundable annual charge)
  • Bing - 9.28% - Free submission
  • Ask - 2.18% - Finds your site using site map (xml file)
  • AOL - 1.06%

The most important part of this article is writing rich and dynamic content. If the content on the site or blog does not change, the search engines will not index it very often and site visitors will have little reason to return. It has been said that if you love your business / product / service and are passionate about it, it will not be difficult to create content. On the other hand, if your topic does not interest you, it will be more of a challenge. If the passion is there but you hate writing (...it happens), it may be worth it to hire a staff writer or someone to freelance for you. But you may be surprised. If writing intimidates you, just sit own at your computer, type about what you know and what you love as though you are talking to your a close colleague. Post these articles to your blog and you will be on your way.