Outbound Marketing for Modern B2B Marketers

Inbound MarketingInbound marketing may be the hot topic for B2B marketers today, but today’s big B2B inbound marketers are all active outbound marketers as well.

So how do you pair your outbound marketing activity with your inbound marketing?

Here are six ways outbound marketing can support and scale your inbound marketing efforts and some of the channels that are appropriate for each one.

Before we start, here is the purpose or definition of inbound marketing I use:

Inbound Marketing: Be found through the recommendation of others and delight everyone that finds you.

How Outbound Marketing Contributes to Inbound Marketing

1. Outbound Marketing Seeds Content
Outbound marketing gets your content into more hands, immediately increasing content consumption and increasing potential social sharing.

Channels that drive organic sharing of content are a particularly good way to kickstart your inbound marketing program.

Tactics: email, search, social advertising, native advertising, online banners

2. Outbound Marketing Amplifies What Is Said About You
Do people rave about your product, your latest research or your vision?

What others say is often an implicit, if not explicit, recommendation of your company or offering. Use testimonials, quotes and praises in your outbound marketing to make certain those recommendations are heard.

Tactics: email, PR, print, online banners

3. Outbound Marketing Reaches Your Audience Again
Just because someone discovered you once doesn’t mean they will come back on their own.

Outbound marketing can put you and your content back in front of people that have found you before.

Tactics: email, retargeting

4. Outbound Marketing Grows Your Audience
You can only send content directly to people that have actually signed up in some way to receive your content. Outbound marketing can grow those audience you can share with directly through various channels.

Tactics: social advertising, retargeting, search

5. Delight The Audience
In order to delight, inbound marketing must deliver something valuable, from information to entertainment, to your audience, and deliver it well.

Your content was designed to do this. However, don’t overlook the potential to deliver this same value directly on sites your audience is already visiting.

Tactics: sponsorships, native advertising

6. Help People Find What They Are Looking For
You have invested in great content that answers the questions your audience has. Now make certain your audience finds the answers they are looking for.

Tactic: search

Your Turn

There are many ways outbound marketing can support your inbound marketing efforts. What other ways would you add to this list? Share your answer in the comments below or with me on Twitter (@wittlake).

Image Credit: (CC) Gavin Llewellyn on Flickr

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