We’ve all heard the terms, “outbound” and “inbound” marketing, but do you really understand the difference, and are you using them correctly? Outbound marketing is finding and interrupting potential customers with your message, while inbound focuses on being found and persuading customers to inquire or purchase on their own will. It’s a fine line, but one’s a push and the other’s a pull.
What’s also interesting is you can use the same content for each tactic. For example, you found this blog post because you’re probably interested in our services or you stumbled across it organically doing some research- a great example of inbound. Where as if I emailed it to distant business contacts (which I did) it was outbound to those who received it. So you see it’s not about the content, it’s the channel and the relationship.
According to Hubspot over 90 percent of marketing budgets are spent on outbound, which aligns more with traditional advertising, email spam and telemarketing. Of course these tactics can be effective, but I would challenge you to transition more of your resources to inbound marketing.
How does this relate to good ole public relations? PR is more credible because someone else is telling your story, and at the end of the day it’s generating engagement to you, not from you. What a great example of inbound marketing. Is it a part of your strategy?