Having a B2B website today is not only about having a good looking site that is easy to navigate. There is the opportunity through inbound marketing, also known as inbound lead generation, to drive revenue. As with any sales or marketing tactic, organizations should measure their results to determine the return on investment. To measure your organizations inbound marketing results don’t just focus on the revenue, but also some of the leading indicators of future revenue. To do this you will need the right tools, internal processes, and of course great content.
Improve Search Results
By creating great content and working on your SEO, you should be able to improve your search engine rankings. Having SEO tools not only helps with formatting and creating new content, but also with tracking results. There are many tools you can use to track your results including one of our favourites, Moz. If your organization is generating the right content, the traffic should follow.
Increase Web Traffic
Inbound marketing needs to drive traffic to your website. Measuring your year-to-year increase is a great metric to track. We like to measure the total traffic, not just organic search. That is because other traffic sources can also be a result of inbound efforts. Social media, email marketing, and referral traffic are all influenced by your inbound efforts. It is also recommended you do a deeper dive into all the traffic sources to determine what is working and where there are some opportunities. Google analytics is a great free tool and is one of the most important and easiest to use to support your measurement efforts.
Convert Traffic to Leads
We classify a lead as when a prospect provides and email or telephone number to us. These leads can come from newsletter sign-ups, white paper downloads, contact us forms, inbound emails, other downloadable assets, and inbound calls. Encourage this process by giving your visitors multiple ways to connect with your organization.
Close Inbound Leads
The ultimate goal for B2B is to have these inbound leads convert to customers. The best way to measure your success and ensure that you are doing the right things with your inbound leads, is to have them reside in a CRM. Many of the forms and email solutions have the capability to connect directly into your CRM system. You can set-up tags within the CRM to understand where the leads originated. Set goals for revenue or closes for inbound leads and measure your results within your CRM.
If you are interested in an inbound marketing campaign but don’t have the resources to do it yourself check-out our white paper on outsourcing your sales and marketing efforts.
