Ever feel like you’re just getting pieces of the jigsaw puzzle, but someone’s hidden the box? You’re trying to educate yourself about how to do a better job marketing your manufacturing business, but there’s almost too much advice. It’s a big puzzle, but if you can piece together some pieces you can start to get some traction. That’s what we bring to you in this article. Inbound, Content and Social Media Marketing working together, and the key ingredient that makes the wheels really start spinning.

Inbound Marketing

What is Inbound Marketing?

What be this beast they talk of in many a blog post and online marketing article? Simply put, Inbound Marketing is a way getting customers to come to you and manage their way from being a stranger to being a customer at their pace, without too much intervention from you. Sounds awesome, let them do the hard work, you’re thinking, not quite…

We won’t go full nuclear with an explanation here, but think about your online presence (that’s bigger than just your website) as a sales funnel. Inbound marketing is a way of systemising, not quite automating, that sales funnel.

"Customers manage their way from being strangers, to customers, at their pace..."

Your sales funnel is constructed of pieces of content (Articles, videos, slideshows, social media posts, whitepapers etc.) that your customer finds not just useful, but VALUABLE. So this isn’t content all-about-you, it’s genuinely valuable stuff - typically educational. Like this very article you’re reading. In exchange for this valuable information, you ask them for information about themselves.

OK so now you have information, but you have information about loads of people, where’s the benefit? The idea here is that the information you’ve captured allows you to understand what part of the buying cycle, or “Sales Funnel” they’re in. Armed with this information you can better tailor your approach to, and prioritise, prospects. By providing you with their details the prospect has given you permission to market to them. This could be marketing further content that helps them along the sales funnel, or marketing your capabilities to them. This is where email marketing can take over.

Different content for different needs...

The other key trick here is to not just provide valuable “content”. As your prospect moves along the sales funnel they have different questions, at the top of the funnel they may be researching general options. At the next level they may be researching costs and drawing comparisons. At the next level they may be researching “how to specify a process” when purchasing. The content you create should therefore be targeted at prospects in different parts of the sales funnel.

Straight away you get a better idea of which part of the sales funnel a prospect is in by understanding which pieces of content have actually downloaded or consumed Combine this with the information you’re requesting from them to allow them to access the information and BOOM! Your customers are self-qualifying themselves as viable prospects as they move along the sales funnel.

Make your move, you know...you're big move...

It goes without saying, the system has a lot of moving parts. You need to generate “top-of-funnel” leads by promoting your content where your customers “hang-out”. Then you need to capture information, manage it and take appropriate action based on the gained intelligence. Appropriate action could be using email marketing to nurture the lead and help them further qualify themselves as a viable lead. On the other hand it could be reaching out with a personal email, or picking up the phone! This all takes refinement, management and commitment to keep the system alive and kicking.

That was Inbound marketing in 500 words. That is nowhere near enough for the complexities of, or the strategies behind creating a successful inbound marketing system. What that should give you is a flavour of what people are talking about when they say “Inbound Marketing”.

Is Inbound Marketing The Answer To MY Troubles?

If you’re now thinking - awesome, I need one of those. Hold your horses! Inbound Marketing needs a number of systems working in harmony, it’s a living, breathing system. And that’s only once you’ve created the VALUABLE content to fuel the system (and you’ll have to keep creating new valuable content). Think of it as developing content for an online course which you could actually sell - that’s the level of valuable I am talking about. If you feel uncomfortable giving it away for free, you’ve reached the right level.

...Think of it as developing content for an online course which you could actually sell...

What does this system & content cost?

It would be careless for me to throw around cost figures, but I can guarantee “doing it on the cheap” is a strategy for disaster. There are a number of agencies and businesses who can sell you the systems and infrastructure, with varying cost levels. If you think the purpose built systems are expensive, multiply that figure by about 5-10 times and you’ll get an idea of how much you should be investing in the creation of valuable content to fuel them. Yes, that much.

I’m not advising in one direction or another. I’m providing you with the information to allow you to make an informed decision about where you want to focus your efforts, now and in the year ahead. Don’t go thinking Inbound Marketing is A. Cheap or B. Easy insert inappropriate joke about being cheap and easy…

Don't follow your nose, follow ROI

Inbound Marketing is an investment. As such you need to think about Return on Investment and the ongoing servicing costs, as you would any other contract or system in your business. The special consideration with Inbound Marketing is the cost of content. This requires you to pull on your in-house experts, who are responsible for delivery, to create your content. If you’re time constrained, and they haven’t got the inclination to get writing this could be a non-starter.

Where Can I Find Out More About Inbound Marketing?

Here are some really useful places to find out some more information about Inbound Marketing. I’ve tried to select blogs and sources that are relevant to the Manufacturing Industry and Industrial marketing. A lot of information sources are very focused on businesses with large markets, who sell products or services online. As a result you need to read the articles with your “Manufacturing Industry blinkers” on.

Digital Information World

Article and infographic describing the difference between inbound and conventional outbound techniques. US based but focused on B2B Sales techniques.

Hubspot

The godfathers of "Inbound Marketing" Hubspot have loads of information. They occupy multiple markets, B2B, B2C and everything in between. You can lose days in their blog, be warned!

Marketo

Occupying the same markets as Hubspot. Plenty of information posted regularly, and their guides are pretty detailed too. Once again, make sure you have your market in mind when you're reading the content, the scale of your system and efforts will determine what's actually relevant advice.

InfusionSoft

Their focus is on lifecyle marketing. I'm not going to debate the differences, but it's powerful stuff. Their blog is also pretty hot, puts some context to the size of the markets that Inbound Market is most effective.

Next up…

Content Marketing

What is Content Marketing?

Hang on, Inbound Marketing was all about Content, What the heck is Content Marketing? There will be people who will debate that some of the information I provided above was in fact more to do with Content Marketing than “Inbound Marketing”. The fact is, Inbound Marketing cannot exist without content, and content marketing doesn’t necessarily extend its reach as far as Inbound Marketing. The experts can’t agree, so don’t get hung up on it.

Enough of the babble. What does this mean for you? You can engage with Content Marketing without going all-in on Inbound Marketing. Let me explain.

Content with a purpose in the sales journey

Content Marketing can hone in on a specific purpose in a specific market. Your market. If your goal is to gain awareness of your business, the content you produce will align fully with this goal, and only this goal. Content Marketing focuses on delivering a marketing objective, gain more awareness, build more existing customer loyalty etc. Inbound Marketing helps you align, construct and systemise the transition of a lead, into a prospect and finally into a customer. In other words, it aligns Sales AND Marketing.

Simple. Not. The debate will go on in industry, you can even see some figures Hubspot put together trying to tackle the question. I only include for completeness, debating terminology is not a great use of your time right now.

So, so, so VALUABLE

Fundamentally, content marketing involves the creation of content that is valuable to your target market, then directing them towards it through promotion. It may or may not involve the capture of information from the person reading or consuming your content. Did I mention it needs to be valuable, like “I should be charging for this..” sort of valuable.

"We should be charging for this!" sort of valuable

A Word About The Types of Content

Content. The word is thrown around, almost carelessly. We’ve eluded to some types so far, being articles, videos, slideshows and the like. Reality is, anything that is published on the web is content. This includes the social channels. Facebook has posts, Twitter has Tweets, Linkedin has updates and “Pulse”. These are not only places on the web to promote content, but also create content, especially in the case of Linkedin Pulse.

It’s very true that one piece of content, for example a blog article can be turned into many. This very article will be turned into a slideshare presentation, potentially an email drip campaign and most likely a cut down version will make it to Linkedin Pulse. Don’t just think “Article” when you hear content.

Is Content Marketing The Answer Then?

The point was raised when talking about the cost of Inbound Marketing. Content is not free, and in some cases is worth more than money itself. Huh? If it was a case of simply paying someone to write some content and publish it on your business website, it would be simple. This however is not content marketing. Firstly the value of the content to your target market is likely to be low. Secondly, we haven’t really touched on promotion yet, and much like an iceberg, promotion represents the hidden 80%. More on promotion later.

"If it was a case of simply paying someone to write some content and publish it on your business website, it would be simple"

Valuable content in the eyes of your target market has to expose some expertise, it has to educate. If you employ someone who doesn’t have those expertise to create your content, what are you left with? Hence, “worth more than money itself”. You have to divert the attention of your “money-makers”, who are also the experts, towards creating content. Sure get it professionally edited if you want, but they need to be the source. Your customers will then value it.

I’m amazed I’ve got this far without making a very serious point about your content; It cannot be self promotional. Self promotional does not equal valuable. There’s little more to say on the subject. And saying “You’re educating them about your company” is complete crap that won’t wash. If you want to educate them about your company, create some VALUABLE content, get  readers to sign up to an email list and market to them using email.

“You’re educating them about your company” is complete crap that won’t wash

Remember, your Content Marketing Goal is bigger than SEO

There’s a lot of talk out there about Content Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) becoming ever closer together, even integrated. This basically means, Content Marketing can not only help you achieve your goal of “increased awareness of your business” or “customer loyalty” but it can also deliver benefits to your ranking in the major search engines such as google. This isn’t a lie, but it’s an extension of the truth. It's more important you figure out how to get your content in front of your customers, search engine rankings will come later.

TWEET THIS IMAGE

"It's more important you figure out how to get your content in front of your customers, search engine rankings will come later"

So, Content Marketing will take your time, your experts time, and maybe some money. You can’t be self-promotional and you need some skill when it comes to writing. But Content Marketing can help you achieve a marketing goal, such as raising awareness of your business, or establishing yourself as the leading expert. Potentially with some side benefit of increased search engine rankings.

Content Marketing can be your answer, but remember; you should be uncomfortable with giving it away, that’s how valuable your content needs to be.

And it doesn’t stop at content creation, after all it’s “Content Marketing” - now we need to go Market the hell out of it (I promise that’s coming next).

Where Can You Find Out More About Content Marketing?

I’ve presented a definition, and some things to consider when thinking about getting into Content Marketing. The subject is extensive, and we haven’t scratched the surface. I would advise you don’t get bogged down in the minutia, you need to know how to identify what’s valuable to your customer, how to write an article or create a piece of content, then how to publish and promote it. (More on Promotion next).

B2B Marketing

These guys have so much free content, and a lot of it is relevant. Your market size is still heavily a factor you need to be thinking about when reading their articles. I know that sentence is getting boring, but I really mean it!

Content Marketing Institute

Joe Pulizzi is one of the leaders behind the content marketing movement. The site is really useful for people starting out as well as the professional honing their skills. Their target market for their content is mid-sized to large businesses. Read "large markets" so take what you can, but don't get consumed.

Copyblogger

I'm going to lay this out straight. I love these guys. They have so much content, even a free members section called My Copyblogger. If you want to hone your skills and benefit from real insight into how to build a content strategy be prepared to invest some time in your education. They don't provide quick fix solutions, but the word I would use is "Wholesome". A place for education.

Next up…

Social Media

I’m not going to provide an extensive guide with the ins and outs of each platform here. I am however going to provide an overview of where social media “fits in”. Then I’ll discuss some tools, skills and things to consider when embarking on a social media binge.

TWEET THIS IMAGE

What is Social Media?

It’s hard to imagine someone who hasn’t heard the term, but there are far fewer people who actually get it. Especially in a B2B context.

When I say social media platforms I mean of course Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Linkedin, Pinterest, Instagram amongst a ton of others. What makes it social media is the act of conversation, the ability to comment, like, share and vote for posts and content is by nature a very social set of actions.

The advice you’ll read on every Marketing Agency blog is that “You should be on social media”. It’s easy advice to give, and hey social media accounts are free! Just slow down for a second though. You don’t need to be on every platform going, and if you do decide to get involved you need something to talk about and share. I’ve got an idea, what about that content you just created? See where it fits in now?

"if you do decide to get involved you need something to talk about and share"

Social Media as Content Promotion

Social Media is where content comes into it’s own. In fact many would say, social media without content to promote is like a river without water. Or at least the river isn’t flowing in your direction! By producing valuable content, you have something to fuel the conversation in a way that suits you. You can and should of course interact with other content, discuss, converse and challenge.

I mentioned an 80/20 rule earlier. I referred to promotion as the hidden 80% of Content Marketing, and social media makes up almost all of that 80%. I’m talking about time. If 20% of your time is spent on content creation, the other 80% needs to be spent promoting it.

"...much like an iceberg, promotion represents the hidden 80%..."

But Where Would I Spend All of That Time?

Creating posts, scheduling them, interacting with followers and connections, finding content produced by others to comment on and share. These are all time-sucking activities that you will need to get involved with. Don’t underestimate the time it can take. The social media account may be free, but the time certainly isn’t!

Let’s take a look at “posting” in more detail. You can’t just “post” or “Tweet” your content without a thought for how you’re presenting it. Your content will have a title, but social media needs more and it needs variation. You may have anywhere between 100 and 500 characters to play with, but it can take more time writing 100 characters than it can 500 words in an article. You have to REALLY think about what you’re saying. What’s going to make your target market click and read.

"...it can take more time writing 100 characters than it can 500 words in an article"

When they say you should post your content more than once on the networks, this is universal advice. Do it. But a word of warning, don’t use the same 100-500 character post again and again. It looks automated and boring, it soon fades in with all the rest of the white noise.

Hashtags are not complicated and they shouldn’t be a mystery. They are simply a way of you categorising your content. Therefore people searching for content in the category you have Hashtagged will get the opportunity to see your content, even if they don’t follow you. There are also a number of tools used outside of Twitter that use this information to pool information from other platforms such as Facebook.

I’m not going to give you a crash course on Hashtags - you can find plenty of content out there on them. Just know they are important, you should use them. Think about who your content should appeal to and what the content is about, then search for a hashtag. For example I will probably hashtag this article #B2BMarketing #Inbound #SmallBusiness #UKManufacturing and a few others. See the pattern, highlight what the content is about and then highlight who should care. Once you’ve found a few, check out Hashtagify.me for a few other ideas.

"...highlight what the content is about and then highlight who should care"

Is Social Media For Me?

I’ll be brutally honest, most people who have taken the advice and got themselves on Social Media “because they should” probably shouldn’t have. The white noise in the social media channels is obscene, making standing out, even with valuable content, really difficult. You need to be a student of the subject, willing to continually learn and get good at it, it’s a skill. From crafting your post, to getting posting times optimised, there’s loads to go at, loads to get wrong.

"The white noise in the social media channels is obscene, making standing out, even with valuable content, really difficult"

Outright capital investment is about as low as it gets for social media as a standalone item. But don’t forget, your time is money and you’ve just spent plenty of time, if not money on your valuable content. If you’ve not got content, you can join the conversation but be clear about why you are doing this.

Social Media can help you achieve your content marketing goal (remember your goal?) Social media on it’s own will not, I repeat, will not achieve this goal. Why not? Because social media itself doesn’t provide your customers with valuable content that can be consumed when they need it. Social Media is extremely transient, for that reason, not a lot sticks.

Scheduling Tools Are a No-Brainer

The market is flooded with tools, and to be honest this could be a whole post in itself. The most valuable tool I can advise on would be a social media scheduling tool. There are a few out there, they typically all have a free option for entry level use. Hootsuite and Buffer are two notable tools. We use Buffer here at Manufacturing Network and find it to be pretty awesome. They also have a pretty hot blog which is a really great go-to resource for everything social media. You can schedule everything from your own posts, to re-tweets and shares. Check it out here.

Schedule or submit yourself to the continuous onslaught of social media management. There's a reason companies out there are offering this as a service! It can become a full time job if you're not careful, and don't forget you've got to produce valuable content to promote in the first place! Get your time management under control. It means your business is active on social media, even when you aren't.

"Schedule or submit yourself to the continuous onslaught of social media management"

The Key Takeaways

Despite being information driven, as opposed to massively insightful there are still some key takeaways for you, the Manufacturing Business Marketer. There’s loads of information out there, we’ve even provided links to some which will evangelise their side of the story. They are just trying to be good marketers.

Scale Your Systems & Investments Appropriately

I’ve mentioned it a couple of times, but I really mean it. Read every piece of information through the eyes of your industry, your market and your customers. The scale of what you do needs to match the scale of your market. Get the scale of your inbound, content and social media marketing systems right and your ROI will be positive. Get it wrong and you’ll wish you’d never heard of it!

...So Valuable You Want To Charge For It

Scale is one thing you can play with, but value is not. Regardless of what systems or tools you put in place the value is the one thing you cannot compromise on. To truly create that valuable content you need to research your customers and build it for them - not for you. Remember, self promotion just wastes your time and money.

Budget Your Time AND Your Money

On the subject of time and money. Make sure you are equating time, with money. If you have a budget make sure it accounts for you learning, doing admin, greasing the wheels, as well as all the day to day tasks you need to perform. So many businesses have gone into social media in particular because it’s “Free”. You have more sense than that, don’t get sucked in.

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