Diversification is not a new concept. You may have already applied diversification strategies in other areas of your business or personal life. The same concept needs to be applied to your business’s marketing.
Diversification into Inbound Marketing is Not an Option
Let’s face it. Our traditional marketing methods are getting more and more expensive everyday. And if they are not already less effective for your business than they used to be, chances are that they will get ineffective soon.
Why you ask? A recent research from industry analysts found that customers are 60% done with their buying cycle before they even make the first contact with your sales team. The reason is that in today’s connected world, they are able to conveniently do most of their research online and don’t need your sales team to inform them about your products and services.
They can be just searching on Google , or they maybe on LinkedIn connecting with people in your industry who have similar solutions to offer, or they may join one of the Webinars your competitors are hosting that discusses the solutions similar to what your company has to offer. If you are not present everywhere your customers are looking for your products and services, you may be losing out on big revenue.
So, it makes sense for businesses to diversify their marketing efforts and do more than have just an online presence (AKA a website).
With the popularity of inbound marketing growing by leaps and bounds, when thinking about diversification from marketing channels perspective, the first thing most marketing directors think about is adopting inbound marketing strategies. But not all of them think about a holistic approach to inbound marketing marketing.
It’s not just about diversifying into Inbound Marketing, even within Inbound Marketing, you need to diversify your efforts into multiple different channels.
Without Diversification, You are Putting all your Eggs in One Basket
“We are spending all our marketing budget on XYZ, and we’re getting great leads out of it. We’re happy with this approach.”
Is that you? Let me give you an example about why this is a bad idea. Look at the graph below.
Imagine that one-fine day you wake up to find out that your lead generation dropped by more than 90%. Sounds bad, right? No doubt it is bad.
Now imagine, that this graph represents the only source of leads you have. It’s a no brainer that the business will be in big trouble if things are not changed in their favor soon enough. Without having a secondary source of leads, it is highly unlikely that such a business would be able to sustain itself while it recovers from the blow.
Even if that wasn’t the only channel generating leads for the business, and this was an effect of not “”pumping enough money” into the channel, you can see that it will have a negative impact towards company growth. I say enough money because, for channels like PPC , the competition is getting tougher day by day and the cost of lead acquisition is sky-rocketing. Unless you plan to increase your spend on these channels, you will likely not get the same number of leads out of those channels.
What is hindering diversification today?
Businesses need to ensure that they optimize their marketing spend, while still effectively marketing their products and services. And this could lead to making the choice between going all in on a single marketing channel (that is working or has worked in the past), or diversifying.
Maybe it’s the budget that stopping you from diversifying your marketing efforts into other channels, or maybe it is buy-in from top management. Whatever the reason be, you need to start thinking about diversifying and do it sooner rather than later. After all, your business’s future depends upon it.
Have you thought about diversifying your marketing efforts? What challenges are you facing with adopting inbound marketing? I’d love to hear from you.
