you're doing inbound wrong
good morning media folks ☀️
Your advertising business depends on your inbound strategy. You can generate nearly 40% of your total revenue from it.
But it isn’t as easy as putting a “Work With Us” button on your website. You must understand your audience and focus on their customer journey.
So in today’s issue, we will talk about how to put together a full-proof inbound strategy from a high level... covering content strategy, landing page methodology, lead gen tactics, and optimization.
content targeting
Having a simple form to capture leads isn’t going to work. You have to think about the experience a potential client might go through to get to that form first. Have you provided targeted information that will get them to submit? Do they have any idea how it even works?
The best way to approach this is to come up with frequently asked questions that you think prospective clients will have and to write content and build social proof around it.
A really good example of this is when I was at The Hustle in 2018, we wrote a blog post about what it was like to advertise in newsletters. We didn’t talk about The Hustle at all. We shared some social proof and painted a picture of what it was like to advertise on newsletter platforms. And it worked exceptionally well, and we got some of our biggest budget spenders from that blog post.
The buying cycle is much different than it used to be. People make decisions on their own and information is available everywhere. And if they’re looking to advertise somewhere and you don’t have content ready to support their questions, they’ll move on to the next potential publisher to work with.
tactics
Something that gets overlooked is user experience. You can’t just build a great website, but let your inbound landing page slip through the cracks. Your inbound landing page needs to have a formula.
A landing page formula that I live by is a modified version of Harry Dry’s:
There’s something very powerful here. It eases the potential client into deciding to work with you. It gives them the info they need and shows that other people have had great experiences too. Sometimes this is all you need to push them over the edge.
When it comes to the CTA, there are a couple of different ways to approach depending on how much bandwidth you have. The smart way is to ask pointed questions to make sure you can qualify leads, or you can point to your media kit with an email opt-in to be able to get simple information to the potential client and build out a segmented list. It depends on how much time you have.
nurture
You really can hit another level if you start building a list of people who are interested in advertising with you. This is when you can productize sales if you’re not into negotiating and you have set prices.
Someone who does this well is Dense Discovery. He has a widget in every newsletter that he sends for those who are interested in advertising to submit their email. And then later he sends out an email when slots become available to book. And he has thousands of folks on the list, and it gets booked out FAST. And for months.
But you can also take a different approach, and use it to nurture. Have people submit their email and send new case studies and products that you have to offer. Don’t get too cute and send too many emails. Keep it thin, but informative. Nurturing is one of the toughest things to do. But sometimes it takes folks 2 years to buy from you, and this can be a great strategy to stay top of mind.
I personally use Webflow to build my websites. And I've discovered a secret formula to make sure they are high-converting. Here it is:
- Know Your Audience: Begin by understanding your target audience's needs and desires. Use tools like surveys and user interviews to gather insights. This knowledge is the base metal you’ll transform into gold.
- Craft a Clear Value Proposition: Your website should immediately communicate its value. Your message must be clear and compelling to draw visitors in.
- Design with Intent: Webflow's visual editor allows you to create stunning, responsive designs without coding. Focus on a clean layout, intuitive navigation, and eye-catching visuals that can guide users through their journey. Tastefully.
- Optimize for Speed: A slow website is like a leaden weight. Use Webflow’s tools to shrink loading times by optimizing images and using efficient hosting.
- Leverage Webflow’s Features: Use Webflow's built-in SEO capabilities, A/B testing, and analytics to refine your site. These tools are your philosopher’s stone... they will reveal insights that lead to continuous improvement.
- Create Strong Calls to Action: Be smart about your CTA placements. They transform interest into action, leading visitors down the path to conversion.
By following these steps, you can turn your website into a revenue-generating powerhouse.
Remember, optimization is an ongoing process. Continuously test, measure, and refine your site to keep it performing at its best.
With Webflow, you have the power to create digital gold.
optimize and automate
Automation can be your best friend here. And that’s because people are used to instant satisfaction. So as soon as someone submits the form, you should give them something... it could be a simple email response, or it could be access to the media kit or even a case study. Something that gives them more information because that’s what they are seeking.
And this is a given, but you should always be monitoring your conversion rates. For an inbound form, a good conversion rate is about 2%, a great one can be 3 - 5%.
Always be willing to change and test new things on your landing page to find the sweet spot. Use the formula but find what works, whether that trying new case studies, more social proof, etc...
One last thing to mention is that social proof doesn’t have to come from advertisers who work with you. It can also come from your readers. Advertisers also want to know that people ACTUALLY read your newsletter and aren’t just blank emails.
This is a high-level and stripped-down version of what your inbound strategy should look like. The point here is to treat the inbound experience like baking a cake. Don’t skimp out on ingredients.
see you next week,
shaan
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