Leigh Simpson
In one of our recent blog posts, we discussed how long it takes for content marketing to work. Blogging frequency and quality were the key topics, but it led to questions about more subtle signs that things are starting to work.
So, here’s a quick list of the sort of signals that you should be on the lookout for when starting out on your construction inbound marketing journey (we'd love you to add your own ideas in the comments at the end of the post).
1. Website Traffic Is Up!
You’re regularly checking Google Analytics and can see that your organic traffic is up. Your referral traffic is also climbing as other websites link to your work. A deeper dive reveals that your blog pages are amongst the top 10 most visited pages on your site.
2. Ranking's up
You’ve done your homework, and know which keywords are driving traffic in your sector.
You have a content strategy in place and are working hard to build authority around the most valuable keywords to your company. There is nothing random in your approach; everything is planned down to the last detail.
Within days, you can see your latest campaign positively impacting your positions, and this is correlating to traffic increases. Your plan is coming together.
3. You’re Generating Sales Leads
You’ve started to track the number of leads that your website is generating. Your Calls-To-Action (CTAs) and landing pages are doing their job, and the metrics are looking healthy.
You can reliably report on how many leads are generated every week, where they came from, how many are sales ready and what revenue they are linked to.
At last, the rest of the business can see the positive effect your marketing is having!
4. You’re Becoming A Data Scientist
For every input, you know what outputs to expect. You’ve started to A/B test to find out what works best. Everything is under the microscope; language, colour, images, typeface, time of day, channels.
Data drives decisions. Continuous improvement methodologies have been adopted by you and the team. Failure is an opportunity to learn just as much as success.
There is a Nelson Mandela quote pinned to your wall – “I never lose. I either win or learn.”
5. You’re Obsessed With Rankings
You’re getting super competitive about your site visibility and rankings and can’t wait to see the impact of your latest blogs on your keyword positions.
You used to check your email first thing; now you’re logging onto SEMRush to see how your positions have changed overnight against your competitors and which keywords are now hitting #1.
6. Domain Authority Is On The Up
You're getting some great backlinks from authoritative websites. Not only are they driving referral traffic to your site and into your sales funnel, they’re also boosting your Domain Authority on Moz.
Month in, month out, your DA is improving and overtaking all of your competitors' websites. Your high authority is also feeding into your search engine rankings too. It’s a win-win.
7. An Industry Blog Invites You To Write A Guest Post
Your opinion matters. An invite arrives in your inbox asking you to submit a guest article for a well-respected industry blogger.
It will be read by a whole new audience, extending your reach, and the backlink alone is worth the effort. Time to produce some original content.
8. Journalists Contact You For Opinion
Word has got out about your authority in your field. Journalists and editors know who you are because your outreach and blogging are so effective. They now call you for comment on a subject or story they are writing about, as you’re seen as an expert!
9. You’ve Landed A Speaking Gig
Your star is rising. People want to listen to your story and understand more about one of the key people behind the success of your business.
It’s pretty low-key, local stuff for now, just a few hundred people in the room, but afterwards; you get an invite to speak at a national event.
10. Connect Me
Every day you’re receiving connection invites on LinkedIn, you even start to get followers too. You’re building a sizeable audience.
Understanding the power of social media, you’re sharing more on the platform and delighted to see the likes and shares of your posts and views.
11. Is This A Twitter Storm?
You’ve just been followed and retweeted by someone with 700,000 followers; the retweets start to hit your inbox.
What a buzz.
Your last blog post hit a nerve in the industry, and you can already see a spike in your site traffic, and you’ve got notifications of new leads and subscribers to your blog
All these new followers, the pressure is now on to produce some more thought-provoking and relevant content!
12. Sales Say Thanks
The sales director takes you to one side to thank you for the great leads that your recent campaign produced.
They also mention that customers are talking about how useful your blog posts are and how they look out for your weekly roundup.
13. You Get A Blog Post To Review From The Sales Team
At last, you’ve got buy-in from sales. They understand that blogging is the engine room of the lead generation process.
The penny has dropped, and they decide that if they help with the content creation, it will build a more predictable sales pipeline.
They can spend their time closing rather than prospecting, and the trade-off makes sense. Write a blog for a morning and get 20 leads or hit the phones to get 1.
14. You’re Getting Mysterious Calls From Head-Hunters
It was always going to happen. Your company is making waves, dominating search and being talked about as the opinion leaders in your sector.
Savvy CEO’s know that it is because your company is outperforming them with your marketing. They want a slice of the action too, and head-hunters start to approach you with furtive enquiries about your happiness and ambitions.
What a great dilemma.
15. Your Boss Would Like A Word!
Your boss is nobody’s fool. They know that the growth they are experiencing is down to this new inbound marketing approach and that you are the in-house expert.
Your campaigns are fuelling sales activity and you increase the quantity, and quality, of leads, then nurture them until they’re sales ready.
Word on the street is that your competitors are taking notice – of you! The company can’t afford to lose a rising star, and this cosy chat is all about your future development and the generous pay increase that you will see in your next paycheque.
16. The CFO Knows Who You Are
You’re talking numbers, you're referring to ratios and metrics. You speak the language of the boardroom, and now your colleagues in Finance listen to you and nod with approval.
At last, Marketing can prove that the budget is delivering results. Questions turn to doing more rather than proving ROI.
17. The CEO Wants More
Your Inbound Marketing experiment has delivered tangible, measurable results. You’ve learned from your experiments and honed your processes and approach.
At last, there is a direct correlation between marketing investment and sales performance. It’s working, and it’s time to scale.
Plans are drawn up, resources are aligned behind Inbound, and the CEO gives you the green light and the budget to drive growth to the next level.
The Secret To Success
Apart from hard work, perseverance and patience, what else can get your Inbound Marketing strategy off to a winning start?
Honestly? Working with experts like Insynth will help you to avoid common pitfalls, give you access to decades of marketing knowledge and the latest techniques and time-saving technologies.
Supporting you and your team every step of the way from developing your strategy, training, setting up your CRM, improving your website and planning and producing your content can all be taken care of.
Talk to us today to explore how inbound marketing can be the catalyst for your business growth and personal success.
How Can Insynth Use Inbound To Help You Drive The Results That You Need?
When you sign up for Insynth's Inbound Starter Plan, you can trial inbound and world-class sales and marketing technology to gain traction with lead generation. For less than the cost of one ad placement, or a fraction of the cost of a trade show, you can generate more high-quality leads than both combined would have produced. For a small investment (not to mention our money back guarantee), Insynth will provide:
- A 2000+ word, high authority, pillar post every quarter to form
basis of a strategic topic cluster. - 2 original technical blog posts of at least 500 words per month. The blog will be written exclusively for your business by our talented in-house content team and posted onto your website.
- Promotion of your blog posts on key social media channels (LinkedIn, Twitter & Facebook).
- Production of a quarterly Ebook or Whitepaper to drive lead generation.
- Monthly Keyword Tracking and Reporting (up to 25 keywords).
- Monthly review meeting.
Read More
■ How Long Does Content Marketing Take To Work?
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About Insynth
Insynth Marketing is a leading UK construction marketing consultancy based in Shifnal in the West Midlands. Insynth employ the latest inbound marketing techniques such as construction inbound marketing, to help building product manufacturers grow their businesses by aggressively driving sales lead generation activity.
As the only HubSpot certified agency to major on construction marketing, we bring together construction marketing strategy, digital strategy, website design, SEO, content marketing, email marketing, sales automation, marketing automation and HubSpot CRM implementation to produce successful campaigns and great results for our clients.