So what exactly is outbound marketing? Outbound communication is often highly targeted, with a call-to-action that is very obvious.
- Stock control and inventory.
- Community, Home, and Identity (Law, Property and Society).
- Lead Generation: A Complete Guide - Marketo.
As a result, good outbound marketing can push someone through the funnel at a faster rate, assuming they are closer to being ready to buy. Inbound alone often does not drive someone to buy. Outbound gives them that extra nudge they need to drive a lead down the funnel. Combining outbound and inbound can multiply the number of views you generate, dramatically increase sharing, and ultimately increase the number of potential customers who see your content. While your mix may differ from ours, we find that the following outbound tactics work best.
Email is a cornerstone and key component of every marketing campaign.
Whether you are hosting an event, sending out a new piece of content, promoting a new service offering, or staying in touch with customers, email should be one of your main forms of communication. By putting your content in front of prospects, you can find people who might not be looking for you.
Display ads are typically highly targeted to different demographic or behavioral actions. You can select where you want the ads to be seen by choosing an online publication that you feel is a place where your leads spend time, or you can also leverage re-targeter ads that can cookie a lead that views your site.
With re-targeter ads, once a person gets cookied, your ads appear on other sites that he or she visits afterwards. Through online ads you can reach more of your target audience, educate potential prospects, and drive leads. Display ads also serve a purpose at every stage in the funnel—building brand and audience at Top of Funnel, educating and helping evaluation at Mid-Funnel, and increasing conversions at Bottom of Funnel. For PPC on search engines, your ads show up as sponsored results on the top and side of the organic search terms.
PPC ads are a terrific way to draw attention to your latest content or service offerings. They are also highly targeted so they can generate very high quality leads. Advertisers bid on keyword phrases relevant to their target markets and your ads will display when a keyword query matches your chosen keyword list. A great way to deliver high-value content to the correct prospects is through content syndication — a content sharing strategy that can be used to promote your whitepapers, articles, news releases, etc.
Through content syndication, your content appears on third-party sites and newsletters. You may think direct mail is a thing of the past. Consider a content asset developed for high-level executives. And it can be hard to get through to them via email. This is where direct mail can prove powerful. You could send a direct mail piece to this audience to make them aware of your new, targeted content asset.
The 5 Characteristics Of Great Leaders
Direct mail also gives you a chance to grab the attention of a hot prospect by being creative and interesting with your message and presentation. After all, events are a critical component of an outbound marketing strategy. Essentially, events offer you the chance to define your brand, clarify the solutions you provide, and establish personal connections with participants.
And while they provide you with an invaluable opportunity to engage with prospects and customers, events also give attendees the chance to interact with each other. As every marketer knows, there is no better advertising than the direct words of a satisfied customer. Compared to other marketing tactics, events are more likely to quickly turn a prospect into a strong lead. As a lively, interactive, educational forum, events position your business as a trusted leader in a field of many.
Why do it this way? Because you want to make sure every single lead Marketing passes to your Sales team is as qualified as possible.
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Your SDRs should take the time to help each and every lead, offer them value, make a positive impression, create future demand, and become a trusted advisor. Developing a relationship to cut through the noise is critical. Through paying attention to your MOFU efforts through tactics such as lead nurturing, you can continue to have a relevant conversation with prospects long after your lead generation efforts.
Lead nurturing also increases lead to opportunity conversion rate, drives more revenue, and shortens the sales cycle. It is about finding the right buyers at the right time. Lead generation brings buyers into the funnel, but lead nurturing and scoring sends them to sales so that your sales team can close the deal at the right time. Here are some basic lead generation metrics that many companies track as part of their lead generation efforts:. This has allowed the sales force go from just blindly 'smiling and dialing,' to intelligently targeting the hottest leads and as a result, closing more business.
Watch a 4 Minute Demo. Watch a 4 minute demo. Find a LaunchPoint Partner. Be a LaunchPoint Partner. What is Lead Generation? Lead generation describes the marketing process of stimulating and capturing interest in a product or service for the purpose of developing sales pipeline. Lead generation often uses digital channels, and has been undergoing substantial changes in recent years from the rise of new online and social techniques. Why is Lead Generation Important? The buying process has changed, and marketers need to find new ways to reach buyers and get heard through the noise.
Instead of finding customers with mass advertising and email blasts, marketers must now focus on being found and learn to build continuous relationships with buyers. Information Abundance and Attention Economics With the growth of the internet, the world has changed from one of information scarcity to one of information abundance. Lead Generation Research Many marketing departments are allocating more budget to lead generation tactics.
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Inbound marketing spend in particular has been growing as companies need to find more creative ways to get in front of the customer and break through the noise. Biggest Lead Generation Challenges Even though marketing executives report that lead quality is one of the top priorities for lead generation, it is also one of the biggest challenges facing marketers today. Most Effective Lead Generation Tactics IDG reports in its B2B Lead Generation Marketing Trends survey, that the company website, conferences and tradeshows, and email marketing are the most effective lead generation tactics being used today.
What does a lead mean to your company? Many companies have different definitions depending on their sales cycle, but standard definition is a qualified potential buyer who shows some level of interest in purchasing your product or solution.
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For the leads that fill out a form, they often do so in exchange for some relevant content or a compelling offer. You can break lead generation up into two main categories: And as discussed above, you need to make sure that you keep in mind your nurture and customer retention marketing strategies as part of a holistic strategy. Content and SEO Your content is the foundation of your inbound marketing efforts. Website Your website is where the magic happens. Blog Your blog is a fantastic place to create trust with your buyers. Social Media The increasing popularity of social channels has directly attributed to information abundance.
Outbound Marketing While inbound marketing is getting a lot of buzz, a well-rounded marketing mix should include both inbound and outbound marketing strategies. Email Marketing Email is a cornerstone and key component of every marketing campaign. Display Ads Display ads are typically highly targeted to different demographic or behavioral actions. Direct Mail You may think direct mail is a thing of the past. Lead Scoring Lead scoring is a shared sales and marketing methodology for ranking leads in order to determine their sales-readiness.
Computerised stock control systems run on similar principles to manual ones, but are more flexible and information is easier to retrieve. You can quickly get a stock valuation or find out how well a particular item of stock is moving. A computerised system is a good option for businesses dealing with many different types of stock. Other useful features include:. The system will only be as good as the data put into it.
Run a thorough inventory before it goes "live" to ensure accurate figures. It's a good idea to run the previous system alongside the new one for a while, giving you a back-up and enabling you to check the new system and sort out any problems. There are many software systems available. Talk to others in your line of business about the software they use, or contact your trade association for advice. Avoid choosing software that's too complicated for your needs as it will be a waste of time and money. Radio Frequency Identification RFID allows a business to identify individual products and components, and to track them throughout the supply chain from production to point-of-sale.
An RFID tag is a tiny microchip, plus a small aerial, which can contain a range of digital information about the particular item. Tags are encapsulated in plastic, paper or similar material, and fixed to the product or its packaging, to a pallet or container, or even to a van or delivery truck. The tag is interrogated by an RFID reader which transmits and receives radio signals to and from the tag. Readers can range in size from a hand-held device to a "portal" through which several tagged devices can be passed at once, e.
The information that the reader collects is collated and processed using special computer software. Readers can be placed at different positions within a factory or warehouse to show when goods are moved, providing continuous inventory control.
Using RFID tagging for stock control offers several advantages over other methods such as barcodes:. The costs associated with RFID tagging have fallen over recent years, and continue to do so, to bring the process within the reach of more and more businesses. The benefits of more efficient stock control and improved security make it particularly attractive to retailers, wholesalers or distributors who stock a wide range of items, and to manufacturers who produce volume runs of products for different customers. Keeping stock secure depends on knowing what you have, where it is located and how much it is worth - so good records are essential.
Stock that is portable, does not feature the business' logo, or is easy to sell on, is at particular risk. A thief coming in from outside is an obvious threat. Check the security around your premises to keep the risk to a minimum. In a store, thieves may steal in groups - some providing a distraction while others take goods. Teach your staff to be alert and to recognise behaviour like this. Set up a clear policy and make sure staff are trained in dealing with thieves. Offering to help a customer if you are suspicious will often prevent a theft. Avoid using confrontational words like "steal" if you do have to approach a suspected thief, and avoid getting into a dangerous situation.
Quality control is a vital aspect of stock control - especially as it may affect the safety of customers or the quality of the finished product. Efficient stock control should incorporate stock tracking and batch tracking. This means being able to trace a particular item backwards or forwards from source to finished product, and identifying the other items in the batch. Goods should be checked systematically for quality, faults identified and the affected batch weeded out. This will allow you to raise any problems with your supplier and at the same time demonstrate the safety and quality of your product.
With a good computerised stock control system, this kind of tracking is relatively straightforward. Manual stock control methods can also use codes to systematise tracking and make it easier to trace particular batches. Radio Frequency Identification RFID can be used to store information about a product or component's manufacturing date, to ensure that it is sold or processed in time. The system can also be used to trace faulty products quickly and efficiently.
There are many administrative tasks associated with stock control. Depending on the size and complexity of your business, they may be done as part of an administrator's duties, or by a dedicated stock controller. For security reasons, it's good practice to have different staff responsible for finance and stock. Stock can tie up a large slice of your business capital, so accurate information about stock levels and values is essential for your company's accounting.
Figures should be checked systematically, either through a regular audit of stock - stocktaking - or an ongoing program of checking stock - rolling inventory. If the figures don't add up, you need to investigate as there could be stock security problems or a failure in the system. Health and safety aspects of stock control are related to the nature of the stock itself. Issues such as where and how items are stored, how they are moved and who moves them might be significant - depending on what they are.
You might have hazardous materials on your premises, goods that deteriorate with time or items that are very heavy or awkward to move. Our information is provided free of charge and is intended to be helpful to a large range of UK-based gov. Because of its general nature the information cannot be taken as comprehensive and should never be used as a substitute for legal or professional advice. We cannot guarantee that the information applies to the individual circumstances of your business.
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Guide Stock control and inventory Share on: Types of stocks How much stock should you keep? Stock control methods Stock control systems - keeping track manually Stock control systems - keeping track using computer software Using RFID for inventory control, stock security and quality management Stock security Control the quality of your stock Stock control administration. Advantages Disadvantages Efficient and flexible - you only have what you need, when you need it Meeting stock needs can become complicated and expensive Lower storage costs You might run out of stock if there's a hitch in the system You can keep up to date and develop new products without wasting stock You are dependent on the efficiency of your suppliers.
Advantages Disadvantages Easy to manage Higher storage and insurance costs Low management costs Certain goods might perish You never run out Stock may become obsolete before it is used Buying in bulk may be cheaper Your capital is tied up. How reliable is the supply and are alternative sources available? Are the components produced or delivered in batches? Can you predict demand? Is the price steady?
Are there discounts if you buy in bulk? Minimum stock level - you identify a minimum stock level, and re-order when stock reaches that level. This is known as the Re-order Level. Stock review - you have regular reviews of stock.