Comments on: Outbound Marketing is Broken

By: Eric Goldman

Eric Goldman — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 00:40:14 +0000

Christine;
Your approach to networking your “connections” or, as you prefer to think of them, your “friends” is a good one and speaks directly to my concern of how many people are trying to build an impressive list of so-called contacts, but in reality end up with lists of people who are 3rd degree connections (or higher) and thus who really don’t know them.
But yes, overall, this is outbound work, not inbound. And although one doesn’t sit back and do nothing while one waits, it’s much more pleasant!

By: Christine Koenig

Christine Koenig — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 20:09:25 +0000

Hi Eric,
I just came across this blog of your’s and I love it. Especially the notion that using LinkedIn or other professional networking platforms has some inherent traps, and those will show pretty soon. I try to follow my policy to exclusively connect to people I personally know well, I trust and I would happily recommend to others. That limits the number of people in my preferred network Xing to some 60, but man, with these people we could change the world.
Compared to some colleagues still living in the “big is beautiful age” with thousands of direct contacts my network is insignificantly small, but strong.
Now, does that mean I’m not effectively networking? I don’t think so. I frequently talk (yes, I mean real live communication, with 100% open sensory channels and total reception of odors, image, sound, and sometimes touch) with these people and try hard to really listen to what they have to say, what moves them, concerns them, what fears or anxieties they have. I very often strongly empathize with these people most of which I’d rather call my friends and not my network. And very often they ask me for help or an information, and I do help them, because I’m confident that, because I spend so much time listening to them, I’ve understood what they’re asking from me.

Ahhh, wait a second, weren’t we talking about inbound marketing? Am I off track?

Maybe I’d rather sit a lot more idle as Axel put it so nicely and listen to my friends and colleagues in the meantime ;-)

Cheers,
Christine

By: Axel

Axel — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:05:03 +0000

This ties in nicely with my Sept 20th post on The Shift in Power from Seller to Buyer in the B2B space. Buyers don’t want to be sold, they want to buy. So the move from Outbound Marketing to Inbound Marketing works for both buyers and sellers, a true win-win.

So why are some companies hesitating to switch from Outbound to Inbound?

Some are hesitating because they believe, wrongly, that Inbound Marketing means sitting idly by, waiting for the phone to ring. They don’t like the perceived lack of control. Instead, they would rather be busy doing Outbound work, even if it is less and less effective.

Inbound Marketing does not mean sitting idly. Not at all. Inbound Marketing is very active, and done properly, gives substantial control to the marketer/salesperson over his/her fate.

Inbound Marketing programs also build more brand equity than Outbound programs, dollar for dollar. And that may be a good topic for a future post.

Well done, Eric!