Which strategy should I choose, Inbound marketing or Outbound marketing?

It’s important to test different tactics, techniques and strategies to determine what works for you. A good start would be to determine who your ideal customer or buyer.

Which strategy should I choose, inbound marketing or outbound marketing

Consider a few things when deciding inbound vs outbound marketing strategy.

  1. What is your budget?
  2. How soon do you want to see results?
  3. Quality vs Quantity

Inbound Marketing

Inbound marketing is a pull tactic in which you attract customers to your business. (content, value, testimonials, organic methods)

If you are only starting out and have a very low budget, then inbound marketing will work better for you since the cost is not money but time, effort, and work put into the value you provide for your audience.

Inbound marketing strategies attract high quality visitors and leads to your business. Because they are essentially coming to your business for exactly what they need, you are more likely to convert them into paying customers.

Inbound marketing allows you to build trust, authority, and increase your credentials in your business . The more value you provide the more your business becomes a trusted source and you begin to attract more visitors based on your business reputation and brand alone.

Inbound marketing consists primarily of the following activities:

  1. Search engine optimization
  2. Weekly Blog Posts
  3. Monthly Web Enhancments
  4. Social Media
  5. Paid Social Campaigns to Generate New Contacts
  6. An infographic
  7. whitepaper
  8. webinar
  9. video series

Outbound Marketing

Outbound marketing is a push tactic in which you are placing your business in front of people. ( PPC, Display ads, solo ads, social media ads such as facebook ads, instagrams ads, quora ads, etc)

Outbound marketing is more about getting in front of as many people as possible. It can come off as spammy and annoying in many cases.

Outbound marketing consists primarily of the following activities:

  • Cold calling
  • Trade shows
  • Advertising
  • Telemarketing
  • Seminar series
  • Online surveys and polls
  • Email blasts
  • Advertising on televisions and radio, etc.

Conclusion

Inbound marketing is very cost effective. Generating leads is less costly in inbound marketing as compared to outbound marketing techniques. A report says that inbound leads cost 61% less than the outbound leads. Therefore inbound marketing is preferred for small budget marketing.

In inbound marketing,

  • Communication goes two ways
  • Your prospects come to you (via search engines, social media, referrals, etc.)
  • Marketers provide value and seek to educate

In outbound marketing,

  • Communication is one way
  • You seek out your prospects (via advertisements, cold calls, etc.)
  • Marketers don’t provide value and seek to sell not to help

Both the strategies are necessary and required to retain and expand the customer base. The promotions and door-to-door selling of the products/services needs to be done to tap the untapped market. Inbound marketing covers a wider customer base but not the whole of it. Which strategy to focus on more, depends upon the business objectives of your organization.

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