There's no denying that PPC works. We use it to drive consistent, qualified traffic to client sites...
Originally Written: Apr 2015
Blog Updated: Nov 2019
As inbound is becoming one of the most popular strategies in digital marketing, people are naturally turning to the web to learn more about it.
However, some business owners are missing out on the benefits of inbound because of the false information going around. So, we've collected a list of the most common inbound marketing myths to help get the facts straight.
-
“Inbound is just about writing broad content for the masses”
-
“Inbound is just for small businesses as they can’t afford outbound”
Read on to see how we bust all these inbound marketing myths.
1. “Inbound is a fad that will soon be forgotten”
Trends appear and disappear. It can be disappointing to dedicate time to one only for it to be replaced by something new. Fortunately, this doesn’t apply to inbound marketing. It started in 2005 (coined by our beloved HubSpot Hero Brian Halligan) and it’s still here to this day.
This is because the inbound methodology is based on a simple and adaptable core marketing strategy. The aim is always to provide value to prospects within each stage of their journey, creating a trusting relationship and earning the sale. This will turn that lead from a prospect into a customer and finally to a promoter of your brand.
There are stats to back this up too:
- In 2017, 76% of marketers in North America were using inbound marketing. 63% of those surveyed said that generating traffic and leads was their main challenge when it came to marketing.
- In 2018, 69% of sales and marketing teams felt that inbound practices brought in the most high-quality leads for their organization.
- In 2019, 60% of companies in Europe are using inbound strategies to create leads.
It’s a proven method that has withstood the test of time. Inbound marketing builds on that core strategy and scales it to your business, creating a highly efficient and personal way of approaching a certain market.
2. "Inbound consumes more time than it's worth"
Some people are drawn away from inbound because they are looking for a strategy that's quick to set up and gives fast results. But fast results can be unsustainable.
We’re not going to lie - a successful inbound plan can take longer than other digital marketing methods. As inbound marketing focuses on engaging with customers on a personal level, it takes time to research and understand the psychology of your buyer personas.
However, because you go the extra mile to understand your customers, your inbound strategy will have more of an influential impact on their decision making process.
Just like SEO which is a long term strategy, inbound marketing is an investment. When you've created excellent content and it's on your site, it's there forever. It will keep on working to convert people into customers.
3. "You can't measure the ROI of an inbound strategy"
One of the most common inbound marketing myths is that you can't measure your ROI. It almost sounds impossible to effectively track people's activity on your website and count how many people are converting into customers.
But it's easy to measure ROI on your inbound strategy if you have an intelligent CRM (Customer Relationship Management) - like HubSpot.
A CRM can track the most important KPIs of your business, such as new leads, marketing qualified leads, sales qualified leads, opportunities and customers.
With a CRM like Hubspot, you can easily observe your strategy to see which tactics work for you.
4."Inbound is just about blogging"
Because inbound marketing relies on content, some people believe all you have to do is set up a blog and that will start bringing the customers in - but this isn’t the case. There’s much more to inbound than just an awesome blog.
Blogging is a big part of inbound, yes. But there are many other forms of content like video, pillar pages, premium content offers, social and more that are often forgotten about. It gives us the initial ability to provide value to any prospect. It can also give your business a whole range of benefits, such as:
-
You have a 434% higher chance of being highly ranked on a search engine if you feature a blog as part of your website.
-
Businesses who use blogs as part of their content marketing strategy get 67% more leads than businesses who don’t.
-
Marketers who prioritise blogging efforts are 13x more likely to see positive ROI.
But it’s not all about blogging. It’s about content overall. The presence of inbound can be found on your website pages, in other forms of content like eBooks, downloadable templates and even your content on social media.
Secondary to this, the strategies and tools to capture data and nurture individuals beyond their first touch is where inbound really starts to shine. For your strategy to work you have to implement it in every area of your marketing plan. Inbound marketing myth busted.
5. "Inbound is just about writing broad content for the masses"
As the inbound methodology relies on creating high quality content, some people presume the content will be read by all types of customers. Well, that's not true. Inbound marketing is all about personas.
Each form of inbound content we create has to have an ideal customer, or persona, in mind. As inbound marketers, we work to understand the psychology of the different types of customers coming to your business so that we can create varied kinds of content that will engage with your different buyer personas.
Inbound Marketing isn't about blindly typing away on the keyboard, there is a method to the methodology.
6. “I could do inbound all by myself”
We hear this one a lot - people get excited by the inbound methodology and the benefits it provides, but are unrealistic about how much work is needed to gain them.
As the inbound marketing strategies apply to many different parts of a whole business, getting one person to do it simply wouldn’t work. They either don’t have the time, or don’t have the desired skill set to create a campaign that includes everything from blogging to website optimisation to social media.
That’s why it’s often a good idea to work with an inbound marketing agency.
Here at Digital 22, we have a whole team of inbound specialists applying the inbound methodology to a bunch of different things: SEO, social media, content writing, design, development, strategy, project management, data analysis, business thinking, audio/video production - and that’s not all of them! You’d need a marketing superhero to do all of that, or like here, an experienced and reliable team.
For further reading, here’s 10 reasons why you should hire an inbound marketing agency.
7. "Inbound is just for small businesses as they can't afford outbound"
Because outbound advertising methods like television adverts and ads in a newspaper are so expensive, there is a common perception that only small businesses switch to inbound because it's cheaper.
In reality, company size doesn’t play a role. In fact, more and more large businesses are adopting inbound techniques.
This is because marketing has changed and outbound techniques aren't as successful as they used to be:
-
89% of customers research products and services online before buying.
The inbound methodology works around these issues to capture people's attention and engage with the reader's needs. Rather than cold advertising, we can see how companies (regardless of their size) are investing in their blogs, creating downloadable content and engaging more on social media.
Busting inbound marketing myths wide open
The danger of falling victim to inbound marketing myths means you’re more likely to be discouraged from exploring whether inbound can benefit your business.
If only there was a guide to inbound which went over all pain points and issues that you may have. Look no further.
We’ve created ‘A Year in Inbound’, a free-to-download guide which takes you through a 12 month approach to an inbound marketing methodology, providing context and information about the different stages to an inbound campaign. It’s a roadmap, showing you how inbound marketing works. Decided you want to try inbound but not sure what it will look like? Click on the button below to download our ‘A Year in Inbound’ resource.
