If you have a B2B startup and have a limited marketing budget, you can’t ignore inbound marketing!

Traditional outbound marketing (buying PPC ads, direct mail, buying email lists, trade shows, etc.) can prove to be very costly. The average cost for leads through inbound marketing is 61% lower than outbound, and the average conversion rate more than doubles with inbound marketing.

B2B Startup Marketing Strategy:

•         Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
•         Landing Pages
•         Blogging
•         Social Media Marketing
•         Email Marketing

Over the past decade, people have drastically changed the way they utilize information to make purchase decisions. According to Forbes, 80% of B2B purchase cycles are completed before the buyer contacts sales. In order to grow your business, you must change how you market to potential buyers. Inbound lead generation is all about getting found online by your audience, where they're looking for your products/services.

SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION (SEO):

You have to have a website if you want to do inbound lead generation. And SEO is the best way to get free organic website traffic. Make sure to optimize every webpage on your website. Related post: How to Increase Organic Search Traffic

Top 5 Search Engine Optimization (SEO) best practices:

1. Pick one keyword per webpage
2. Put the keyword in the headline
3. Put the keyword in body content
4. Include the keyword in the image file name
5. Include the keyword in the URL

LANDING PAGES:          

Use your website content management system to create landing pages, sometimes called lead capture pages, for free. Landing pages are your digital sales reps that work 24/7. Create educational content that is valuable enough for visitors to exchange their contact information for it. Make sure to use forms to gate your content marketing offers to convert unknown website visitors into known leads that you can nurture. Related post: 4 Crucial Elements needed for B2B Lead Generation

6 must-have elements of an effective lead capture page:

1. Headline
2. Description
3. Image or Video
4. Form            
5. Remove Navigation
6. Social Share

BLOGGING:

You can use your website content management system to setup a blog and post for free. Blogging isn’t easy, but creating and maintaining a high quality blog can bring your company significant ROI. According to Social Media B2B, B2B companies that blog generate 67% more leads per month than those that don’t. Remember to offer educational content that visitors will want to read and be able to find via SEO.

Here’s a free blog topic generator that you can use: HubSpot Blog Topic Generator

SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING

Don’t be afraid to use social media if you are new to it. Start with sharing your blog posts and landing pages on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Google+. Make sure to check it daily to monitor the activity.

EMAIL MARKETING:

According to Direct Marketing Association email marketing has an ROI of 4300% and 77% of consumers prefer email for communications. There are more than 3.2 billion email accounts today; 95% of online consumers use email and 91% check email at least once a day. Email definitely has a longer lifespan than social media. Related Post: Top 5 Email Marketing Best Practices

1. Identify a specific goal
2. Personalize
3. Get to the point
4. Use your call-to-action (CTA) throughout the email
5. Optimize for mobile

The smartest and most agile marketers in the world are aggressively shifting their spend from traditional advertising and PR vehicles to internet-based marketing. According to Contently, 23% of marketers are now devoting over half their budgets to content marketing. Marketing a startup can be done on a limited budget.