I had a comment in my LinkedIn inbox from an agency owner who shared with me his goal of:
“having clients come to him through inbound marketing without ever having to send 1 outbound message”
While that is a great ideal and commendable goal
I don’t think it’s a strategy for success
Here’s the best method (in my opinion)
• do direct outreach, build relationships
• follow up on those inbound inquiries
The thing is, these two LOOK different today than they did 3 or even 5 years ago.
Here’s the modern approach:
» Outbound
In the past, you’d get a list and send at least 3,000 emails or messages…been there done that… wasted nearly $20k (that story is for another time…)
Today you:
• Create a highly targeted list (i.e. your ideal ICP + “uses WordPress, has a team of 12, traffic above 5,000 visits per month, yet page engagement is low”)
• Create a personalized business case
• Show you did your homework: look them up on social, read the latest news. If you filtered your list, then you should be sending manually (no reason to spam)
Do this for your
1 – prospects
2 – your prospect’s buddies (i.e. vendors they use who can be strategic partners for you)
» Inbound
Do the same thing you’ve been doing, create content on yours + other people’s platforms AND
• Use AI tools that show you companies or people who visit your site so that you can follow up with them via email or LinkedIn
• Reach out to LinkedIn profile follows, connections, comments… and have a real human conversation (gasp)
The key is to build relationships.
Doesn’t matter if you’re doing outbound, inbound, or all bound…
just talk to a human on the screen like you would to a human in real life.
Trust your gut and don’t rely on a copy/paste script.