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The Best Outbound Channels to Reach Your Customer Base
The best gift I had at two of the start-ups I worked at was hiring and leading SDR teams. As a marketer, so often we’re tasked with generating demand, only to pass over leads and lose visibility into what happens to them. The game of “you’re not handing us quality leads” begins, and we lack the data to be able to see what is being done with the leads. In my current role, when I hear that the marketing team has SDRs/LDRs or has really close alignment with them, I am overjoyed. When you have a good inbound and outbound marketing strategy, you are golden.
Outbound marketing means the outreach to a customer, rather than trying to draw them in with compelling content and offers (inbound marketing.) Reaching customers effectively is not about being everywhere at once. It is about choosing the channels your audience actually uses and matching the message to the context. While email, phone, SMS, LinkedIn, and paid ads remain core outbound tools, more niche channels like WhatsApp, Snapchat, community platforms, and direct mail can be surprisingly effective when they fit the customer.
Email is still one of the most reliable outbound channels because it is scalable, cost-effective, and easy to personalize. It works especially well for promotions, product updates, lead nurturing, and re-engagement campaigns. For most businesses, email remains the foundation of outbound communication.
Phone calls are best for high-value sales, complex products, and B2B outreach. A call allows for immediate conversation, objection handling, and a more personal relationship. It is less scalable than email, but often more effective when trust matters.
SMS is ideal for time-sensitive communication. Appointment reminders, flash sales, shipping updates, and urgent alerts perform well here because text messages are usually seen quickly. It should be used carefully, though, because customers can find it intrusive if overused.
WhatsApp has become a strong outbound channel for businesses with international audiences, service-based businesses, and brands that rely on conversational selling. It feels more personal than email and often gets faster responses. It works well for customer support follow-up, appointment scheduling, product questions, and one-to-one sales conversations.
LinkedIn is especially effective for B2B outbound. It gives brands and sales teams a way to connect directly with decision-makers in a more natural, professional environment. Personalized messages, thoughtful follow-ups, and relevant content sharing tend to work much better than generic cold outreach.
Snapchat can be a valuable channel for brands targeting younger audiences, especially in consumer markets like fashion, beauty, events, food, and entertainment. It is less about formal selling and more about quick, visual, attention-grabbing communication. Limited-time offers, behind-the-scenes content, and location-based promotions can work particularly well here.
Online communities such as Discord, Reddit, Slack groups, and private Facebook groups are more niche, but powerful when used carefully. These spaces reward relevance and authenticity. Brands that enter communities only to sell often get ignored, but those that contribute real value can build trust and create strong outbound opportunities.
Direct mail is another overlooked channel. In a world crowded with digital messages, physical mail can stand out. For high-value accounts, local businesses, or premium brands, sending something tangible can make a stronger impression than another email in a full inbox.
Paid media such as search ads, social ads, and retargeting also plays an important outbound role. While it is not direct outreach in the same way as email or phone, it helps businesses proactively put their message in front of the right customer segments at scale.
The best outbound strategy is usually multi-channel, not single-channel. A customer might ignore an email, notice a retargeting ad, respond to a WhatsApp message, and finally convert after a call. The goal is to meet customers where they already are, using the channel that feels most natural to them.
The strongest outbound teams do not just ask, “What channels can we use?” They ask, “Which channels fit this audience, this message, and this moment?” That is what makes outreach feel relevant instead of disruptive.
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Which Marketing KPIs are Worth Tracking?
Growth marketing is not just about getting more traffic or leads. It is about measuring how people move through the full customer journey and understanding which efforts actually drive sustainable business results. That is why choosing the right KPIs matters.
The most important growth marketing KPIs usually fall into a few core categories.
First, track acquisition metrics. These show how effectively you are bringing new people into your funnel. Common examples include website traffic, cost per click, lead volume, customer acquisition cost, and conversion rate from visitor to lead. These numbers help you understand whether your top-of-funnel efforts are working.
After that, measure engagement metrics. These help you understand whether prospects and customers are actively interacting with your brand after the initial activation point. Metrics such as email click-through rates, content downloads, session frequency, social engagement, and time on site can all help show whether people are staying interested and involved.
It is also important to track re-engagement metrics. Not every prospect or customer stays active continuously, so growth marketers need to know whether they can successfully bring people back after a drop-off. Re-engagement metrics might include reactivation rate, returning user rate, win-back campaign performance, repeat site visits, or the percentage of dormant users who engage again after a marketing touch. These KPIs show whether your campaigns can recover lost attention and create additional value from existing audiences.
Another critical area is marketing pipeline influence. Not every marketing effort creates an immediate conversion, but it may still play a meaningful role in moving prospects closer to a sale. Pipeline influence helps you understand how marketing contributes across the funnel, not just at the point of first touch or last touch. This can include metrics such as marketing-influenced opportunities, influenced pipeline value, and the percentage of closed deals touched by marketing campaigns. These KPIs are especially useful for showing how marketing supports revenue generation over time.
You should also measure the time it takes for prospects to progress through the funnel, especially where marketing has had an impact. This includes how long it takes someone to move from lead to qualified lead, from qualified lead to opportunity, or from opportunity to customer. Looking at funnel velocity alongside marketing influence can reveal whether campaigns are not only generating interest, but also helping move people through the buying journey faster. A shorter progression time often signals stronger messaging, better nurturing, and a more effective overall funnel.
I also always like to track the revenue vs revenue (average order value and lifetime value) that had marketing influence. We, as marketers, like to think that we play a vital role in the sales cycle, but at the end of the day, we know we are a cost center (and sometimes a very costly one.) Being able to show both quicker deal progression and higher revenue from marketing influence are very concrete datapoints to show executives on the power of marketing.
Retention metrics are equally important. Growth that disappears quickly is not real growth. Track repeat purchase rate, churn rate, customer retention rate, and ongoing product usage over time to understand whether customers continue to find value after the first conversion. It is also useful to include upsell and cross-sell metrics within retention, since expanding existing customer relationships is a major part of sustainable growth. Measures such as upsell conversion rate, cross-sell revenue, expansion revenue, and average revenue per customer can show whether retained customers are deepening their relationship with your brand.
The key is not tracking everything. The best growth marketing teams choose a small set of KPIs tied directly to business goals, then review them consistently. When done well, KPIs help teams move beyond guesswork and make smarter decisions about where to invest, optimize, and scale.
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Say Goodbye to Gated Content
Say Goodbye to Gated Content
A long time ago, I told my team that we weren’t going to gate a very expensive piece of analyst content. It was a vendor comparison, so every other vendor was using it to collect names and email addresses, but in this particular report, our product didn’t look so good. My logic is why would we give all of those leads over to the competition? Let’s just give the report for free and get them on our site. It didn’t take long for that analyst to take notice and start making calls. We were able to keep it un-gated that time, but they made a policy going forward that if you bought the rights, you had to gate.
Marketing used to rely heavily on gates. If someone wanted a whitepaper, webinar recording, case study, or research report, they usually had to fill out a form first. The goal was simple: trade content for contact information. For a long time, that approach was one of the main ways marketers built their databases.
That model has changed. Today, many marketing teams are moving away from strict gating and toward capturing contacts through multiple automated touchpoints across the customer journey. Instead of forcing every interaction through a form, marketers are finding better ways to identify interest, build trust, and collect data more naturally over time.
One reason for this shift is that buyers have changed. People are more selective about sharing their information, and many will leave a site rather than fill out a long form for basic content. In many cases, ungated content performs better because it removes friction and allows more people to engage. That broader reach can help brands build awareness and credibility faster.
At the same time, automation has made it easier to collect contact data in less disruptive ways. Marketers can now use newsletter sign-ups, event registrations, chat flows, product demos, free trials, interactive tools, retargeting, CRM enrichment, behavioral tracking, and lead capture pop-ups triggered by engagement. Instead of depending on one form fill, they can build a fuller picture of interest from many smaller signals.
There are also many non-gated, automated ways to collect contact data without putting a traditional content form in front of every visitor. These include:
- Chatbots and live chat tools that ask for an email address during a conversation when someone requests help, pricing, or follow-up.
- Newsletter subscription modules embedded naturally in blog pages, resource hubs, or site footers.
- Webinar and event registrations that collect details when people sign up for something timely and relevant.
- Demo requests and free trial sign-ups that capture high-intent leads when visitors are ready to engage more seriously.
- Exit-intent or behavior-based pop-ups that appear after a visitor spends time on a page, scrolls deeply, or shows signs of leaving.
- Interactive content such as calculators, assessments, quizzes, or product finders that invite users to save or receive their results by email.
- Account creation or saved preference flows where visitors share information to bookmark content, save progress, or personalize their experience.
- Social lead ads and integrated campaigns that sync contact information directly into marketing systems without sending users through a website gate.
- Conversation-driven email capture through SMS opt-ins, messaging apps, or automated follow-up prompts after engagement.
- Identity resolution and data enrichment tools that help connect anonymous behavior to known contacts once a user interacts elsewhere in the funnel.
This shift also reflects a change in how value is measured. Gated content once made success easy to count because every download created a lead. But not every lead was qualified, and many contacts were collected before real buying intent existed. Automation allows marketers to focus less on raw lead volume and more on engagement, intent, and progression through the funnel. A contact captured after repeated visits, webinar attendance, or demo interest is often more valuable than one collected through a single download form.
Another important difference is that automation supports nurturing before conversion. Someone can read blog posts, return to the site several times, click an email, interact with a chatbot, and only later share their details when they are ready. That creates a more customer-friendly experience and often gives sales teams better context when a contact finally enters the system.
This does not mean gates have disappeared completely. They still have a place for high-value offers, exclusive research, or high-intent actions. But they are no longer the default. Modern marketing is increasingly about reducing friction, learning from behavior, and using automation to capture and qualify contacts in smarter ways.
In short, marketing has shifted from a gate-first model to a more flexible, automated approach because buyers expect easier access, and marketers now have better tools to identify and convert interest over time. I hope eventually, even those expensive analyst report policies can follow.
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Why Audiences Matter in Marketing
Why Audiences Matter in Marketing
Marketing works best when it speaks to the right people, not just more people. That is where understanding your audience and defining your ideal customer profile, or ICP, becomes essential.
An audience is the broader group of people who may be interested in your product or service. Your ideal customer profile is a more specific description of the type of customer most likely to benefit from what you offer and most likely to become a valuable, long-term buyer. Together, they help marketers focus their message, budget, and energy.
When you know your audience, your marketing becomes more relevant. You can create content that addresses real needs, answer the questions people are already asking, and use language that feels familiar to them. Instead of generic campaigns, you build messaging that connects.
A strong ICP also improves efficiency. Marketing teams often waste time and money targeting people who are unlikely to convert. With a clear profile, teams can prioritize the channels, offers, and campaigns that attract better-fit customers. This usually leads to stronger results, lower acquisition costs, and better alignment between marketing, sales, and product teams.
Audiences and ICPs also make decision-making easier. They guide everything from brand positioning and ad creative to email campaigns and product launches. When teams understand exactly who they are trying to reach, they can make smarter choices with more confidence.
In short, audiences and ideal customer profiles matter because they turn marketing from broad guesswork into focused communication. The better you understand who you want to reach, the better your chances of reaching them in a way that matters.
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Why Should You Track Website Visitors?
Why Should You Track Website Visitors?
One of my favorite memories of managing the go-to-market team at Cisco was our optimization meetings. Every week, I’d go through demand metrics with my ops lead, and then every month, my extended team would deep dive into Tweb, content and demand metrics and make decisions on what to test or tweak for the next round.
Website visitor tracking is important because it helps marketers move from guesswork to evidence. Instead of only knowing how many people visited a site, businesses can understand how visitors got there, what they looked at, how long they stayed, and whether they took meaningful actions. That visibility makes marketing more precise and more effective.
One of the biggest benefits of visitor tracking is that it shows which channels are actually working. Marketers can see whether traffic is coming from search, social media, email, paid ads, referral sites, or direct visits. More importantly, they can compare which sources bring visitors who convert, not just visitors who click. This helps teams invest in channels that drive real business outcomes.
Visitor tracking also reveals how people behave once they arrive. It can show which pages attract attention, where users drop off, which calls to action get clicked, and how people move through the site. Those insights help marketers improve website structure, messaging, and user experience. If a landing page gets traffic but no conversions, tracking helps identify where the disconnect may be.
It is especially important to track repeat visitors. A first visit often signals awareness, but repeat visits can indicate growing interest and stronger purchase intent. When someone comes back to a site multiple times, it often means they are comparing options, doing research, or moving closer to a decision. Tracking repeat visitors helps marketers understand whether their campaigns are creating lasting interest rather than one-time clicks, and it can highlight which content or channels are bringing people back.
Bounce rate is another valuable metric because it helps show whether visitors are finding immediate relevance. A high bounce rate can suggest that the page content, message, offer, or user experience is not matching visitor expectations. In some cases, that may point to poor targeting, weak landing page copy, slow load times, or unclear next steps. Monitoring bounce rate helps marketers identify where attention is being lost early and where pages may need to be improved.
It is also important to measure time on page. This metric helps indicate whether visitors are actually engaging with the content or leaving quickly. Longer time on page can suggest that people are reading, watching, or exploring what is in front of them, while very short time on page may signal that the content is not useful, clear, or relevant. There is also a chance that longer time on the page without clicks can mean people are confused, so you need to take the metrics into context. When reviewed alongside conversion rates and bounce rates, time on page can give marketers a more complete picture of content quality and audience interest.
Another reason visitor tracking matters is audience understanding. Over time, patterns in visitor behavior help marketers learn what different audience segments care about. They can identify returning visitors, high-interest pages, repeat engagement, and common paths to conversion. This creates a stronger foundation for personalization, retargeting, lead nurturing, and content strategy.
Visitor tracking is also essential for measuring campaign performance. A campaign should not be judged only by impressions or clicks. Marketers need to know whether the people coming from a campaign actually engage, convert, or come back later. Tracking ties marketing activity to outcomes, making it easier to report on return on investment and improve future campaigns.
It also supports funnel optimization. Marketing is rarely a single interaction. A visitor may discover a brand through an ad, return later through organic search, download a resource from an email, and convert weeks after the first visit. Tracking helps marketers understand that journey and see where momentum builds or breaks. That makes it easier to improve conversion paths and shorten the time it takes users to move through the funnel.
Most importantly, website visitor tracking helps businesses make smarter decisions. Without it, teams often rely on assumptions about what customers want and what marketing is accomplishing. With it, they can test ideas, spot problems early, and continuously improve performance based on real behavior.
In short, website visitor tracking matters because it gives marketers the insight needed to attract the right people, improve their experience, and convert more visits into meaningful business results.
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The Importance of Inbound Marketing and How to Start Driving Inbound Leads
I remember when I was at a start-up looking for the best marketing automation for the company’s maturity level, and I kept coming across a (then) little company called Hubspot. They coined the phrase “inbound marketing” – and I couldn’t get enough of their blogs because it made so much sense.
Inbound marketing matters because it helps customers find you when they are already looking for answers, solutions, or products. Instead of interrupting people with cold outreach, inbound marketing attracts them through useful content, strong visibility, and trust-building experiences. That makes it one of the most sustainable ways to generate leads over time.
At its core, inbound marketing works because buyer behavior has changed. Most people do research before they ever talk to a salesperson. I actually avoid at all costs talking to a sales person! I search online, compare options, read reviews, and look for businesses that seem credible and helpful. As a marketer, if your organization shows up with the right message at the right time, you have a much better chance of turning that interest into a lead.
One of the biggest advantages of inbound marketing is lead quality. Inbound leads are often warmer because they have already shown intent. They clicked on your article, downloaded your guide, filled out your form, or signed up for your newsletter because something about your offer matched a real need. That usually means less resistance, shorter sales cycles, and better conversion potential than completely cold outreach.
Inbound marketing also creates long-term value. A paid ad stops working when you stop paying for it, but a strong blog post, helpful landing page, or optimized website can keep bringing in traffic and leads for months or even years. Good inbound content compounds. One useful piece of content can continue generating visibility well beyond its publish date.
Just as importantly, inbound builds trust and authority. When your business consistently answers customer questions, explains problems clearly, and offers genuine value, people begin to see you as a credible source rather than just another company trying to sell something. That trust is often what moves someone from casual visitor to qualified lead.
How to Start Driving Inbound Leads
The first step is to understand your ideal customer. You need to know who they are, what problems they are trying to solve, what questions they ask early in the buying journey, and what might stop them from taking action. Strong inbound marketing begins with customer insight, not content for content’s sake.
Next, build content around search intent. Think about what your audiences are typing into Google, asking on social media, or discussing internally at work. Now do the research – is that what people are actually searching for? For smaller organizations, I’ve recommended Keywords Anywhere as a very inexpensive Google plugin that does research. For larger, SEMrush is a great tool – more pricey, but it will help you find the right topics.
Next, create a content strategy around these topics that includes blog posts, guides, videos, case studies, FAQs, and landing pages. The content should reflect the topics and questions that people are searching for directly. The goal is not just traffic – it is attracting the right traffic.
Your website should also be designed to convert attention into leads. That means clear calls to action, simple forms, valuable downloadable resources, and landing pages tied to specific offers. If people find your content but do not know what to do next, your inbound efforts will stall.
Search engine optimization is another key foundation. If your content is not discoverable, it cannot generate inbound leads consistently. Focus on relevant keywords, useful page structure, internal linking, and content quality. SEO is not just about ranking – it is about making sure your business shows up when potential customers are actively looking.
It also helps to create a lead magnet: something valuable a visitor can get in exchange for their contact information. This could be a checklist, ebook, template, webinar, pricing guide, or industry report. The best lead magnets solve a real problem quickly and feel worth the trade.
Once leads come in, have a process to nurture them. Not every inbound lead is ready to buy immediately. Email sequences, retargeting, educational content, and timely follow-up can keep your business top of mind until the lead is ready to take the next step.
A Simple Starting Plan
If you are just getting started, keep it simple:
- Define your ideal customer and their top 5-10 pain points.
- Do the keyword/search research to find the most relevant related topics to those pain points.
- Create a content strategy that includes blog topics, FAQ pages, and downloadable resources.
- Optimize those pages for search and user experience.
- Add clear calls to action and forms to capture leads.
- Set up follow-up emails so new leads continue hearing from you.
- Measure what content drives traffic, conversions, and qualified opportunities.
Inbound marketing is powerful because it turns your expertise, website, and content into a lead-generation engine. It may take longer to build than outbound tactics, but the payoff is often stronger, more cost-effective, and more durable. Businesses that invest in inbound are not just chasing leads – they are building a system that helps the right customers come to them.
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What is a Marketing Content Strategy, and Do We Really Need One?
What is a Marketing Content Strategy, and Do We Really Need One?
Being across both start-ups and companies that have to rebuild their marketing engines has opened my eyes to the importance of marketing content strategy. An engineer has a great idea – and out goes a random blog post. Trend du jour is all over TikTok, so let’s create a piece of content that looks like it as a fun idea. While the intent for these are good, rarely do they actually make an impact and move your target customer closer to a decision. They also unnecessarily waste time and resources, as they will become shelfware on your website as they lack relevance. This is why every organization needs a good content strategy.
A content strategy is a plan for how your business creates, publishes, manages, and uses content to achieve specific marketing goals. It is not just about posting blogs, social media updates, or videos whenever you have time. A content strategy connects every piece of content to a purpose, a target audience, and a business outcome. A content strategy helps make sure your content is working as a marketing asset, not just filling space.
What a Content Strategy Includes
A strong content strategy usually defines a few key things:
- Audience – who you are trying to reach, what they care about, and what problems they need solved.
- Goals – whether the content is meant to build awareness, generate leads, support sales, improve retention, or strengthen brand authority.
- Topics and messaging – what themes your company or organization should consistently talk about and how those topics connect to customer needs.
- Formats and channels – whether the content should live on your blog, email, LinkedIn, YouTube, landing pages, webinars, or elsewhere.
- Process – how content gets planned, created, approved, published, and measured.
- Measurement – how you will know whether the content is actually performing.
In simple terms, a content strategy answers: who are we talking to, what are we saying, where are we saying it, and why does it matter?
Why You Need a Content Strategy in Marketing
The biggest reason you need a content strategy is focus. Marketing can easily become noisy, and content is one of the first places that happens. When there is no strategy, businesses often create too much of the wrong content, spread themselves across too many channels, or fail to build consistency.
A content strategy also helps improve efficiency. Instead of reinventing the wheel every week, your team works from clear priorities. That saves time, reduces guesswork, and makes it easier to repurpose content across campaigns and channels.
Just as importantly, a content strategy improves results. Good content should do more than get views or likes. It should attract the right audience, build trust, answer objections, support SEO, generate leads, and help move prospects through the buyer journey. Strategy is what makes that happen intentionally.
It also creates consistency, which is essential for building a strong brand. If your content sounds different every week, covers unrelated topics, or targets everyone at once, customers struggle to understand who you are and why they should pay attention. A strategy keeps your messaging aligned.
What Happens Without One
Without a content strategy, marketing teams often run into the same problems:
- Content gets created based on guesswork rather than customer insight.
- Publishing becomes inconsistent or rushed.
- Teams focus on volume instead of value.
- Different channels send mixed messages.
- It becomes hard to measure ROI because nothing is tied to a clear objective.
This is why many businesses feel like they are “doing content” but not seeing meaningful results. The issue usually is not the effort. It is the lack of direction.
How to Start Building a Content Strategy
You do not need a massive document to get started. A practical content strategy can begin with a few simple steps:
- Define your ideal audience and their biggest pain points.
- Choose your main marketing goals, such as awareness (tofu), preference/education (mofu), conversion (mofu). To get laser focused, my teams have done this for every campaign and motion as well – greenfield (new customers), upsell, cross-sell, or customer retention.
- Identify the core topics your brand should own.
- Decide which channels matter most for your audience.
- Create a content strategy map with tofu, mofu, bofu content for EACH audience – I recommend about 5 pieces of content for each stage with a laser sharp audience like “Technical Decision Maker, Commercial, <Solution X>, Upsell” and build a content plan around that for each.
- Track performance and adjust based on what works.
The goal is to make content more deliberate. Every article, email, video, or post should have a reason for existing.
Final Thought
A content strategy is important because it turns content from a series of disconnected activities into a coordinated marketing system. It helps your business create content that is relevant, consistent, and tied to real outcomes. If content is part of your marketing, strategy is what makes it effective.