Generating leads automatically and effortlessly is the holy grail of inbound marketing. In an ideal world, qualified prospects, i.e. Internet users, discover their content, in the research phase before purchase, then proceed themselves through their sales funnel to become a customer after a few emails sent by an autoresponder. ,
Lead generation through inbound marketing takes a long time to set up
Obviously, this works when the content marketing strategy is well driven. But, the implementation is long, tedious and takes a lot of time, hence the money. Creating educational content that attracts qualified prospects by responding to their issues and problems is time consuming. It is undeniable, it must be done. If only because it will also serve to retain your existing customers.
But a company can’t wait until it’s written about 20 articles and a white paper, and all that content is indexed by search engines, before it can generate revenue. It will take time for your content to be referenced in search engines and results are not guaranteed. It is impossible to predict how many leads an inbound marketing strategy will generate per month. Whereas with an email on a well-targeted prospecting file, we can figure it out, as long as we’ve repeated this type of operation a few weeks in a row.
You can’t depend 100% on a system you don’t completely master.
Your lead machine is ready, you’ve spent time producing quality articles, possibly investing in SEO to get your content ranked in search engines. You also start getting interesting contacts. But your system completely depends on the goodwill of Google, which has more than 90% market share.
It takes an algorithmic change with them or some of the better SEO competitors to change the game and ruin your entire business operation. This situation is unstable for a company. A manager must limit risks to avoid relying solely on a search engine over which he does not control operations or decisions.
Attracting qualified prospects to its content via search engines and turning them into leads is good, but it’s not enough to build a solid business strategy. It’s more to be seen as a bonus.
Your sales representatives should be fed regularly
Your sales reps work full time and need contacts to stay productive. There are two types of contacts: incoming contacts and the contacts we are going to look for. It is possible to adjust the amount of its outbound marketing actions to generate a sufficient number of leads to feed your team.
In inbound marketing, by definition, it is the Internet user who takes the step of finding you. Even with an effective content strategy, it is imperative to have short durations. These periods are painful for salespeople. In addition to the demotivation they generate, long periods of inactivity are detrimental to a sales team. It can be very difficult for them to go back to work.
Outbound Marketing as a Complement to Inbound Marketing
Creating your own leads through inbound marketing is not a substitute for outbound marketing. It is a supplement that comes to enrich it.
B2B Prospecting File Hiring to Send Sales Emails works for some activities for which the product or service is simple and everyday consumption. In this case, price is often the main selling point and direct marketing remains a safe bet, even though conversion rates have dropped in recent years.
For more complex activities, with longer shopping trips, this is not the best option. But, in this case, sending an email to the right target with high value-added content (for example, a white paper) is beneficial. Interested professionals will make new contacts for your sales representatives or for your nurturing operations. And, you won’t be relying on Google to power your lead generation machine.
With a few precautions when selecting a supplier, purchasing a database for B2B emailing can generate a steady stream of leads to feed to your CRM.
To conclude, it is necessary to multiply the prospecting channels. Content, references, emails, advertisements, fairs, professional networks. Content tailored for inbound marketing will allow you to establish yourself as an expert and bring added value to your lead acquisition email marketing operations. It is profitable to send relevant and useful content to the right target.
About the Author
Loïc Bresler: Associate Director of Ediware, an email marketing platform optimized for B-to-B prospecting and agencies.