Sales people will be all too familiar with the methods of selling products and services and the race to hit targets. If you’re in IT services or software sales you’ll definitely understand the hard work that goes in to differentiate from competitors who are selling almost exactly the same thing (if not the exact same thing).
There are a few four letter words we could use to express the pressure this can sometimes put on us as individuals, but I think “phew!” will simply do it here (you may come up with others, but think twice before posting them in the comments section below).
Inbound marketing is pull marketing to generate inbound leads. Your inbound leads, in the most part, have searched online for answers and have come to you to ease the business pain they are experiencing, because you can offer them software solutions to their challenges.
Your sales people have committed years to honing their sharp striker skills that have enabled them to go out, push forward, and close business, and a significant proportion of their leads have traditionally come from outbound methods using cold-calling via telemarketing or face-to-face meetings.
Have you noticed recently that it’s getting harder to hit the same targets even though you are furnishing your sales people with inbound leads?
![By David Gallaher [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons](http://www.brightfire.co.uk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/striker-203x300.jpg)
Sometimes people/companies just want a presence online and are not really focussed on how it equates to actual revenue.
It seems odd to say that someone would be willing to invest time and budget in a website, social media and online content without asking how this online marketing meets your actual business goals, but, surprisingly, it still happens.
Possibly people get carried away with great ideas and sparkling creativity that makes decision making very exciting at the time. Certainly, it was great fun choosing the weird dog image for this blog, but I’m trying to prove a point, of course.
Essentially, inbound marketing is about setting and achieving your online lead generation goals and tracking this through to revenue.
A valuable component of inbound marketing is you can assess all investment and see exactly what it produces. It allows for 100% transparent reporting which means you can scale what is working for you and similarly change what could work better.
The BBC Education News 11 March 2013 headline read:
“Complacent” British universities that fail to respond to the rise of online universities will be swept away by global competition…
and included an interview with Sir Michael Barber, chief education adviser for Pearson, on a recent IPPR study titled An avalanche is coming: Higher education and the revolution ahead. (more…)
The European business world is crossing a threshold in terms of using marketing tools to reach their audience and Tuesday March 5th 2013 Hubspot crosses that threshold with them.
Brightfire are in Dublin, also, as HubSpot’s keynote speaker, to provide valuable insight into how three of its technology customers Flexiant, Amor Group and Surfray have been successful in growing revenues using a combination of HubSpot’s marketing automation tools and Brightfire’s inbound marketing method which uses marketing automation to analyze and track data produced by inbound marketing tactics.
Why choose e-learning?
E-learning is catching on. If done right, it can produce great results for users and at the same time lower costs. You can reach students across the world with little or no geographical barriers. You are not restricted to training rooms or classrooms, and you can benefit from instant sharing of documents, audio-visual assets and automated testing.
As a start-up technology company on a fast-growth track, you are in a fortunate position, when it comes to using the internet to develop your business. Unlike other less fortunate sectors, your audience can be found online. They are also tech-savvy and ‘live’ digitally in online groups and social media. This means you are at a great advantage when it comes to using inbound marketing tools, like blogging or social media, to educate your market, demonstrate your thought leadership, and firmly pave the way for your prospects to come to you when they have a problem you can solve.
If you don’t already know, blogging is a great practice to make a habit from, as it works for you by increasing indexable pages on your website which is excellent for your Search Engine Optimisation, as contextual content is more visible to search engines. Did you know 75% of all people who search online never actually make it past the first page of Google? (more…)
Blogging is no longer a personal publication medium that allows bloggers to write about anything that takes their fancy. Its is a flexible and influential marketing tool that software companies should be using as part of their marketing and communication mix. The Technorati ‘State of the Blogsphere’ survey showed that there are now more than 133 million blogs out there, emphasising how important blogging is if you needed any convincing.
In today’s web savvy world, the first stage of the software buying process often starts on search engines. It is therefore essential that potential clients can find you quickly and easily online. Blogging provides an excellent opportunity for your organisation to be found more easily.
