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Inbound

Terms in this set (228)

What's the difference between traditional marketing and Inbound marketing?
It is customer focused
What is Inbound?
A marketing agency that is about being apart of the conversation
What is the Inbound Methodology?
It is a process that makes up the marketing and sales strategy for Inbound marketing
What are the different phases that make up the Inbound Methodology?
1. Attract
2. Convert visitors into leads
3. Close
4. Delight
How does analyze fit into the Inbound Methodology?
Analyze should be inherent in every single thing you do with your inbound strategy
What are the inbound best practices?
1. Use buyer personas
2. Use the Buyer's Journey
3. Create remarkable content
4. Leverage your content
What is a buyer persona?
Representations of your ideal customer based on real data and some select educated speculation about customer demographics, behavior patterns, motivations, and goals.
How do you create a buyer persona?
1. Research

2. Identifying trends

3. Creating persona profile stories
How do you go about researching buyer personas?
-Start by asking current customers their demographics, goals, and challenges
1. Job Description
2. Age
3. Gender
4. Location
5. Why they buy
What are the components of a persona profile story?
Who your persona is, using information about their background, their demographics, and their goals and challenges
What is the buyer's journey?
The active research process people go through leading up to making a purchase
What are the stages that make up the buyer's journey? How are they defined?
1. Awareness stage - Prospect is experiencing and expressing symptoms of a problem or opportunity

2. Consideration stage - Prospect has now clearly defined and given a name to their problem or opportunity

3. Decision stage - Prospect has now decided on their solution strategy, method, or approach
What part does content play in inbound marketing and sales?
...
In terms of inbound, what is context?
The people you are creating content for
What are the different ways to leverage content?
- Website pages

- Business blog

- Landing pages

- Social media

- Calls-to-action

- Marketing emails
What is considered a shift from traditional to inbound marketing?
The shift is from marketer centric to customer centric
What makes up a good persona profile story?
...
What makes content the right fit for buyer personas?
If it fits their characteristics
What is search engine optimization (SEO)?
The process of improving your website so that it attracts more visitors from search engines
In what ways does SEO help your inbound marketing?
helps you figure out what your prospects are searching for, so that you can make sure that they find your website.
How do search engines find, understand and rank pages to show in search results?
They rank the results in order of the popularity and authority of the websites.
What is the difference between paid results and organic results?
Paid, cost and organic is free
In terms of SEO, how are keywords defined?
Words typed into search engines
How should you go about picking the right keywords for your business?
1. Address a common topic to your buyer persona

2. Use natural language and variations of the keyword

3. Mimic the language of your buyer persona

4. Focus on long-tail keywords
What are the different steps for doing keyword research?
1. Make a list of keywords your buyer personas would search for

2. Expand your list by searching the web for alternatives

3. Determine which keywords people are using to find your site
How do your buyer personas and the buyer's journey factor into your keyword research?
The research will mirror what your buyer personas are and what stage they are in the buyer's journey.
In what ways can you expand your list of keywords?
Searching the web for alternatives
How can you determine which keywords people are using to find your site?
By doing keyword research
What is the difference between short and long-tail keywords?
Short-tail keywords are short phrases

Long-tail keywords are long phrases
In what ways and where should you optimize your pages for search engines?
1. Optimize a page around a primary keyword (Put keyword in Title, URL, body, headers, alt-text, and meta description)

2. Include relevant links with the content

3. Promote a good user experience

4. Optimize your website for mobile
How should you properly optimize a website page?
1. Optimize around a primary keyword

2. Include relevant links with the content

3. Promote a good user experience

4. Promote your content

5. Earn links to your content
What types of links should you include in your content and why?
Include relevant internal to drive traffic to them and include external links in your content because it shows that you have done your research, helps build connections, and give your readers more information (all about customer service).
Why is promoting a good user experience important for SEO?
the experience that people have on your site when determining how to rank you.
Why should you optimize for mobile?
because 80% of internet users have a smartphone
Why is promoting your content important for SEO?
The more popular your content the higher you will rank, so to gain popularity you need to promote your content
What's the relationship between links and SEO?
Inbound links will help you rank higher on search engines
What are inbound links?
Links coming in to your website
What strategies can you implement to earn links?
Create content with input from industry thought leaders.

1. Create a "best-of" or resources list

2. Interview an industry thought leader

3. Write crowdsourced content

4. Ask an industry thought leader to write the forward or give a quote for an ebook
What are online directories and why are they important for SEO?
Directories are pages like Yelp and Yellow Pages. They are important because they will increase the number of citations and links to your website.
How can you optimize for getting found in local searches?
Online directories
How can you tell if a business has picked the right primary keyword for a page?
If they're addressing a common topic that their buyer personas might want to learn about
How can you tell if they've optimized the page around the keyword?
If your Page title, URL, Image alt-text, and Body are around one primary keyword
How can you tell if they're linking to other sources?
When important keywords acting as the hyperlink.
How can you tell if they're offering a good user experience?
If you have clear navigation and clear next steps
How can you tell if they're promoting their content?
We can see that they have prominent social sharing buttons, which means that visitors can share the article themselves. They've also promoted this content on their Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook profiles.
How can you tell if they're earning links?
You can look at Hubspot links
What is content?
The message your Inbound strategy delivers
Where does content fit into the Inbound Methodology?
Delight
What are the different steps to the Content Process?
1. Plan
2. Create
3. Distribute
4. Analyze
5. Repeat
What are the three things that content can defined by?
1. Purpose
2. Format
3. Topic
How do you determine the purpose of a piece of content?
By determining the goal, to get more people to your site, or to get them to convert to leads
What are different formats of content? What's the difference between these formats?
Analyst reports, research reports, ebooks, editorial content, expert content, whitepapers, and educational content are the different formats of content. - Awareness stage

Expert guides, live interactions, webcasts, podcasts, videos, and comparison whitepapers. - Consideration stage

Vendor or product comparisons, case studies, trial download, product literature, and live demos. - Decision stage

The difference between these formats are for specific stages in the buyer's journey
How do you pick the best format for a piece of content?
Depending on what stage the customer is in, in the buyer's journey
What two things should you always keep in mind when determining the topic for a piece of content?
1. Buyer Personas
2. Buyer's Journey
What are different ways to identify content topics that matter to your buyer personas?
1. Keyword research - what you want to rank for

2. Internet forums

3. Popular industry news

4. Sales/support FAQs

5. Your buyer personas' goals

6. Your buyer personas' challenges
What's the buyer's journey? What are the three stages and how are they defined?
1. Awareness
-They first identify a problem or opportunity

2. Consideration
-Then they investigate solutions

3. Decision
-Find a way to solve their problems
What are the best practices for content creation?
1. Always focus on mapping content to your buyer personas AND where they are in the buyer's journey.

2. Less is more: your buyer personas are probably just as busy as you are - make it easy for them to consume your content.

3. Keep it educational, not promotional. It's not until the decision stage of the buyer's journey when your product should be discussed in detail.

4. Focus on the informational part of the content first, worry about design second. Prioritize writing great content over making that content look nice.
How does distribution fit into the Content Process?
Distribution gives your content more potential
What are the different ways to leverage content with distribution?
1. Website pages

2. Business blog

3. Social media

4. Landing pages

5. Calls-to-action

6. Marketing emails
Why is it important to analyze content?
Because you need to know what is working, what isn't, how to implement new solutions, and improve your efforts as efficiently as possible.s
What are the different metrics that can be used to measure content efficacy?
Social sharing, views, subscriptions
What's the value in repeating the Content Process?
It helps you adjust your content consistently depending on what works and what doesn't
How do you determine where a content offer fits into the buyer's journey?
It all about what your content is about and how it is positioned.
How do you effectively take someone through the buyer's journey with content?
Addressing a problem their buyer persona might be facing - Educational content (In the awareness and consideration stage)

Producing content offerers does not start until the decision stage, because now they know enough about the product or service to make a decision.
How does blogging help to attract new visitors?
People who search for an issue will find your blog and want to read it if it helps.

Each time you create a blog post you are creating a new unique page online. This means you are increasing your chances of ranking in search results, having other websites link to you, and being shared on social media.
How does blogging help to convert new leads?
If they are interested in your content, they are more likely to be interested in your offers, and then convert into leads.
How can your blog help you to build trust with your prospects? Why is this important?
The more you blog, the more you will become a reliable, trustworthy source for information. Building that trust will help you turn your prospects into customers down the line.
What are the blogging best practices?
1. Pick a topic and a title

2. Format and optimize the post

3. Promote offers on your blog to increase lead generation

4. Promote your blog posts

5. Analyze the performance of your blog posts
How do you pick an appropriate blog post topic?
By making a list of topics that support a specific conversation, so that people who search your conversation will find your blog post.
Why should you write about educational content rather than your business?
You want to attract strangers to your blog, that have never heard of your company before. They will not find you through search engines if you are just talking about yourself.

Answer the questions or problems that people are searching for answers to
What are ways to brainstorm different topics to blog about?
1. What are the most frequently asked questions?

2. What do your buyer personas need help with?

3. What do you wish people knew about your industry?

4. What are industry bloggers, social media and your competitors talking about?
Why is it important to do keyword research around your blog topics?
because you want your blog post to be discovered
How many topics should you focus on per post, and why?
One, because you want the viewer/reader to understand what the post is about
What is a working title and how is it different from your topic?
It is a specific topic, it is different from your topic because it is specific to one single blog post
Why should you include a long-tail keyword in the blog post title?
To rank higher on search engines
How long should your blog title be, on average?
50-60 characters
Why is it important to format your blog post properly?
So you can access the write buyer personas
What is whitespace and how does it affect your blog post?
Empty space on a page. That allows the visitor to focus on content, not clutter.
Why are images important to include in blog posts, and where should they be placed?
Because they visually break up text, they should be placed at the top of your blog post to entice your visitors to read further.
Why is it important to optimize a blog post for search engines?
So you can rank higher in the results
Where should you place your long-tail keyword within your blog post?
Make it easier to rank higher
Where should you include links within the content of your blog post?
To give readers additional sources on the topic
How can you use your blog and blog posts to promote your other offers?
Social sharing and following buttons
What are the different ways you could promote your blog posts?
Social media and email
Which metrics should you analyze to track the performance of your blog? What does each metric tell you, and how can you use that knowledge to improve performance?
1. Number of visits
-How many views did your content have

2. Leads generated
-Did your content offer convert leads, how many? Did it reach your goal?

3. Social proof, share-ability
-Did anyone share your content on social media? How many?

4. Inbound links
-Is their any outside websites linking to your content? (Helps build authority to your website and your content)

5. Content performance by author
-Is one content author performing better than any other? Is their other tips to share with your other content creators?

6. Content performance by topic
-Do your buyer personas prefer a certain topic you are covering?

7. Content performance by format
-Is their a certain format that is performing better than another?
How can you tell if a business picked a good topic to blog about?
It addresses a common topic that their buyer personas might want to learn about
How can you tell if they picked a compelling blog post title?
A working title that includes your buyer persona
How can you tell if the blog post has been formatted properly?
If it is formatted in a way that accesses your buyer personas
How can you tell if the blog post has been optimized for search engines?
If the blog has a primary keyword in the

1. Page Title
2. URL
3. Body
4. Image alt-text
How can you tell if the blog or blog post is promoting other offers, and if the calls-to-actions are appropriate?
If they are promoting offers such as a ebook to a free consultation.

The calls-to-action are appropriate if they are action-oriented, include keywords that are consistent with the offer you are marketing on the landing page, should grab attention, stand out as a clickable button, they should use strong, and appropriate on-page placement.
How can you tell if a business is promoting their blog posts?
When they have prominent social sharing buttons, many different social channels you can use, use a social media scheduling tool to help you save time, and are promoting continually.
How does social media fit into inbound?
...
In which stages of the inbound methodology can social media be used?
In every stage
What are SMART goals?
Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Relevant
Timely

Goals
How do you set a SMART goal for social?
Set goals that help push your social media efforts forward
What is a social media content plan?
It outlines the pieces of content you will promote and the social media channels you will promote on them.
What should a social media content plan include? What are the components?
Must clearly communicate a company's brand and values, Deliver helpful content that adds value, and provide relevant content for each platform.
What social media channels should brands be using?
The channels that your personas are active on
How do buyer personas fit into a social media strategy?
...
How can you find the right social media platform for your business?
1. Survey audience members

2. Conduct industry research

3. Ran an experiment

4. Consistent publishing

5. Monitor keywords
What are the key ways to use optimization?
1. Platform
2. Message
3. Visuals
4. Results
How are visuals used in social media?
Content with relevant images get 94% more views than content without relevant images
How can you tie social media efforts back to ROI?
Post/messages that contain video are shared 1200% more than text and links combined
How can you measure reach?
Social sharing
How can you measure engagement?
The number of interactions with your brand
What is audience growth and how can it be measured?
The number of new audience members you attract, it can be measured by CTA's
What type of inbound challenges can social media help solve?
...
How does consistently publishing to social media help with content strategies?
It helps to retain an active audience
How can you tell if a business has properly optimized their social posts for relevant content across platforms?
1. Have a compelling message

2. Meet your audience where they are
What does it mean to 'meet your audience where they are'?
To bring them content they are looking for
What is the conversion process?
1. Call-to-action
2. Landing page
3. Thank-you page
What is a CTA?
is a button that promotes an offer and links to a landing page
How does a CTA help to convert visitors into leads?
By CTAs requiring visitors info
What role does a CTA play in a conversion process?
It promotes an offer and links to a landing page.
What are the CTA best practices?
-CTAs should be action-oriented.
-They should include keywords that are consistent with the offer you are marketing on the landing page.
-CTA should grab attention and stand out as a clickable button.
-They should use strong and appropriate on-page placement.
-Test out new changes one at a time, analyze the results, and repeat.
What kind of words can you use on a CTA to get visitors to take action?
Verbs
How do the keywords of your offer and landing page impact the CTA?
...
How can the visual aspects of a CTA, such as the size or color, help to grab your visitors' attention?
...
Where should you place a CTA in an email? In a blog? On a website page?
Email - CTAs can be placed at the end of the email, at the end of the paragraph, or sentence

Blog - Blog sidebar, after the first few paragraphs, bottom of the page
What is a good click-through rate goal to aim for with a CTA?
1-2%
What is a good clicks-to-submissions goal to aim for with a CTA?
10%
How do you measure the effectiveness of a CTA?
...
What different ways can you test and analyze a CTA?
...
What is a landing page?
Are digital sales reps
How does a landing page generate information about your website visitors?
They use a form to gather information
Where does a landing page fit into a conversion process?
After the call-to-action, before the thank you page
What is a good conversion rate goal for a landing page?
20%
What are the landing page best practices?
1. Write a clear, concise action-oriented headline

2. Explain the offer clearly and place visual emphasis on the value

3. Remove the navigation menu and links

4. The form length mirrors the value of the offer

5. Include a relevant image, animation or short video

6. Add social sharing icons
What kinds of words need to be included in a landing page headline?
Write clear and concise words
What are some ways to place emphasis on the offer you're promoting with your landing page?
...
How long should the form on the landing page be?
On longer than a scroll
What kinds of questions should you ask on a form?
...
What can you place on a landing page to visually communicate an offer?
...
What is the benefit in including social sharing icons on a landing page?
It can create additional reach
What is a blink test?
A test to calculate the effectiveness of your landing page.
What is the purpose behind performing a blink test?
To see if visitors remember your site
How do you measure the effectiveness of a landing page?
Blink Test
What is a thank you page?
It can be used to help someone continue
Where does a thank you page fit into a conversion process?
At the very end
How does a thank you page differ from an inline thank you message?
Thank you page allows a marketer to:

1. Provide additional content

2. Move leads further into the buyer's journey

3. Extend their social media reach
What are the thank you page best practices?
1. Deliver the offer or set some expectations about when your lead will receive the offer.

2. Make sure it's easy to get the offer they're expecting.

3. Your thank you page should display the site's navigation menu.
How do you set proper expectations of what happens next on a thank you page?
By letting the lead know what happens next and be specific
Why does displaying the site's navigation menu on a thank you page help your thank you page?
It gives the buyer the option to continue looking at the website
Are you required to use a CTA on a thank you page?
No
How can you move leads further into the buyer's journey using a thank you page?
Use the thank you page to show them another offer that might interest them
How can a thank you page extend your social media reach?
By putting social media icons on your thank you page
When examining a thank you page, are you able to understand how to get the offer or what happens next?
Yes
Can you identify what types of additional content to offer on a thank you page?
1. Case study

2. Key pages of your website

3. Blog post
How can you examine a thank you page to make sure it directs a lead further into the buyer's journey?
Look for a navigation pane
What are some reasons why email works?
1. 4.3 billion email accounts that send 196 billion emails every day

2. 91% of consumers check their email daily

3. Email is a channel that you own

4. 77% of consumers prefer email for marketing communications

5. Email lets you be highly personal

6. Email has a marketing ROI of 4300% (Spend $1 and get $43)

7. 76% of marketers say they use email more than they did three years ago
How can email help you close leads into customers?
Send your leads relevant information about their interest or pain points
How can marketers use email to delight customers?
By sending follow up and thank you emails
What does content and context mean to your inbound marketing strategy and how does this help email marketing?
Content is the what and context is the who. It is used to attract, convert, close, and delight. You should use this process every time you send an email so you can send the most effective email.
Why are buyer personas and the buyer's journey important to sending great emails?
Knowing who your buyer is and where they are in the buyer's journey should determine what type of email you should send
What different types of data can you use to segment your email sending recipients?
Hard and soft bounces
The average email list decays at 25% a year. What are some reasons that this happens?
People unsubscribe and block emailers
How can you avoid having your emails marked as spam? What is the impact of your emails being marked as spam?
...
What type of content is appropriate to email leads during the awareness stage of the buyer's journey? The consideration stage? The decision stage?
1. Awareness stage - Provide educational content to help prospects educate themselves about the overarching issues, root problem, or potential opportunity at hand.

2. Consideration stage - Provide educational content to help prospects learn more about the solution to their problem, opportunity, or issue.

3. Decision stage - Provide content and resources that help prospects learn more about and choose your best solution for their problem.
How is the success of your email marketing tied to the rest of your inbound strategy?
...
What is lead nurturing?
The process of building relationships with prospects with the goal of earning their business when they are ready
What different ways can you optimize your email for mobile?
1. Use responsive templates

2. Bigger is better

3. Use clear and concise messaging (People scan emails)

4. Avoid using tiny fonts
How does email personalization impact the success of your email sends?
Makes them more successful because people are more likely to respond to personal emails
What are the different ways to add personalization to your emails?
1. Greeting with the recipients name

2. Put their name in the message

3. End the message with their name
What is actionable language, and where can it be used in your emails?
Convinces leads to take an action, it can be used anywhere in the email
What components of your email can you make a CTA?
1. Link images to your offer's landing page

2. Add a CTA to the signature

3. Hyperlink the appropriate copy in the email

4. Edit alt-text of images and CTA's

5. Modify preview text
What does delivery rate measure? Open rate? Click rate?
Measures how many emails are being delivered. How many people are opening. How many people are clicking.
Why is it important to A/B test your emails?
So you can see which email is more effective
What is the difference between a hard bounce and a soft bounce?
Hard bounce - is when emails are sent to inactive or fake accounts

Soft bounce - is when emails arrive in the spam folder
How can you optimize your emails to look good on mobile devices?
1. Use responsive templates for mobile
2. Use clear and concise messaging
3. Avoid using tiny fonts
Where are some appropriate places to put a CTA in an email?
1. Images
2. Download now links
3. Hyperlinks
Is it never appropriate to have more than one CTA in an email. T/F
False
What are some different ways you can you expand the reach of your emails?
Encourage sharing of download with colleagues/friends
What are the components of a good email signature?
Personalized signature with CTA
What is smarketing?
The process of aligning the sales and marketing teams around common goals within a business or organization, focused on improving revenue
Where does smarketing fit into the Inbound Methodology?
Close
How does smarketing increase bottom line revenue results for organizations?
Companies with strong marketing & sales alignment get 20% annual revenue growth
What are the smarketing best practices?
1. Both teams must have the same/interdependent organizational goals.

2. The marketing pipeline should be tied to sales quotas

3. Visibility into each others goals

4. Compensation based on shared marketing and sales goals

5. Continual communication and education around personas
Why is it important for both teams to have the same or interdependent goals?
So both teams are on the same page
What are the benefits of tying the marketing pipeline to sales quotas?
The marketing and sales teams work together
How does visibility into each other's goals create better alignment and bottom line revenue results?
It gives real-time information and allows for real-time adjustments and improvements
How is compensation around goals related to smarketing alignment?
Money can be a valuable lever for jumpstarting organizational alignment
Why are personas important for successful smarketing alignment?
So marketing and sales know who to focus on while working together
At what size company does smarketing work best?
Any
What are the five steps to integrate smarketing?
1. Speak the same language

2. Implement a service level agreement

3. Set up closed-loop reporting

4. Rely on data

5. Maintain open communication
What are the six stages in the marketing and sales funnel and how are they defined?
1. Prospect/Visitor
2. Lead
3. Marketing Qualified Leads
4. Sales Qualified Leads
5. Opportunity
6. Customer
What is the most generic term for anyone in a marketing and sales funnel?
a contact
What does it mean when someone says "the marketing and sales funnel is not always linear?
Customers either lean more toward marketing or sales, so the amount each group gets can vary
What constitutes a marketing qualified lead (MQL)?
Contacts who have raised their hands (metaphorically speaking) and identified themselves as more deeply engaged, sales-ready leads.
What is a service level agreement (SLA) and why is it critical to integrating smarketing into your organization?
It is what each team commits to accomplishing in order to support the other in reaching the share revenue goal(s).
What is closed-loop reporting?
...
What are some questions to ask yourself to identify if your organizations needs closed-loop reporting?
...
What are some benefits of closed-loop reporting for marketing and for sales?
...
Why are dashboards a great way to display data? What are the different types of dashboards?
They surface the data the aligns teams around revenue goals.

1. SLA
2. Volume
3. Visits
4. Leads
5. Leads by source
6. Leads by campaign
7. Sales by day
8. Sales activity reports
Why is it important to rely on data not emotions when integrating and running smarketing?
Data isn't biased
What are the different ways to maintain open communication within your company?
...
What should take place in a monthly management meeting regarding smarketing that is different from the weekly smarketing meeting?
Resolving issues at the monthly meeting and the weekly meetings should be about the team getting on the same page about: team successes, product info, persona education, and SLA waterfalls
Why have buying habits changed?
Technology
What's the difference between the traditional and inbound way of selling?
Traditional is marketer centric
-Cold calling
-Cold emails
-Interruptive ads

Inbound is customer centric
-SEO
-Blogging
-Attraction
What is inbound sales?
...
What are the best practices for effectively transforming the way you sell?
...
How can you transform the way you target accounts?
...
How can you transform the way you prospect accounts?
...
What things about your lead should you thoroughly research?
...
How is the goal of a call determined?
...
How can you transform the way you connect with accounts?
...
What are the guidelines for transforming the way you connect?
...
How can you transform the way your prospects perceive you as a salesperson?
...
If you needed to research a lead, where would you start?
...
If you needed to research a lead, what information would you gather?
...
What is a positioning statement?
...
What are the three parts to a positioning statement?
...
In which stages of the Inbound Methodology can delight be used?
...
When should you be focused on delighting people?
...
Why do people stop doing business with a business?
Because of a poor customer service experience
What are the three pillars of delight?
1. Innovation
2. Communication
3. Education
Which interactions will build or destroy trust?
Every interaction
What are the components to the customer delight checklist?
1. Solve problems

2. Provide recommendations

3. Be yourself
What tool can help you solve customer issues quickly and exceed customer expectations?
Delight
What are the seven customer delight guidelines?
1. Delighting team members
2. Educating team members
3. Empowering team members
4. Listening
5. Asking (Lean toward open ended questions)
6. Serving
7. Following up
Who is responsible for delighting customers?
Everyone
Why do you need to build a repeatable, consistent hiring process so you hire for character, train for skill?
...
Why do you need to make sure you properly train your team so they understand why developing trust is key to delighting people?
...
Why should you be measuring and tracking as many of your customer's interactions as you can?
So you can learn more about your buyer personas
How can you educate your team members?
...
How can you exceed people's expectations during more interactions?
Exceed their expectations
Why is following-up so important to delight?
...
What steps should you take when trying to solve a person's problem as fast as possible?
...
What's an effective way to empower your team while not micro-managing them?
...
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