Once upon a time, “marketing” meant buying an ad on a local radio station and “selling” meant pitching a product to strangers on the phone.
Inbound marketing has been around for over a decade, but inbound sales is a relatively new phenomenon. Nonetheless, it’s becoming much more common.
Businesses are finding themselves in a good position to help their buyers. Web content and social media provide new avenues for engaging with customers. Today’s CRM software is sophisticated, tracking and storing all kinds of useful information about leads and prospects.
Even a basic inbound marketing strategy can give you plenty of intelligence about who’s visiting your website and contacting you. But despite the proliferation of inbound marketing, not everyone takes an inbound approach to sales.
Outbound sales practices treat the buyer like they are a stranger. Salespeople who use these practices tend to lead with an elevator pitch, present their product the moment a lead expresses interest, or prioritize their own timeline above that of their buyers.
If you’re still doing sales the old way, you should make the switch to an inbound sales strategy.
If your company has a CRM and a website, you’re probably already doing some inbound marketing. Making the switch to inbound sales is just a matter of changing your process and using the tools at your fingertips.
If you don't, you should consider investing in these technologies. A lack of a website is a common pitfall for small businesses and can truly hurt larger ones. People are searching for businesses online more than ever before. And if buyers are converting on your website, you’ll need something more sophisticated than pen and paper to keep track of their data.