We've previously shared our inbound marketing success stories and case studies. What we haven't discussed are the challenges that accompany all this success. With more qualified leads come more sales and increased demand for your products and services from a growing customer base. If you are properly executing your inbound marketing strategy, you should also be thinking of optimal ways in which you can handle your inbound marketing success. Here are three areas to consider when planning for success.
- Leadership - assuming your inbound marketing machine is firing on all pistons, your leadership team should be preparing for an influx of sales. As a CEO or business owner, you should be prepared to grow your organization to support your increased delivery needs. At Kuno, as our implementation of inbound marketing expanded, it was supported by a 40% growth of our agency. This included the addition of account managers, developers, and additional support staff. If you don't have an infrastructure to support increased demand for your products or services, don't expect continued growth in sales to continue. If the quality of your product or services suffers, people will stop buying from you.
- Repeatable and Consistent Processes - whether it's a client kick-off meeting, fulfilling an order or series of orders, or tracking employees' time accurately, establish a process that assures consistency across your organization. At Kuno, we maintain an internal wiki with videos and documents on a variety of topics like switching domains for clients, areas to cover in creative briefs and client meetings, and even how to set up your remote VPN connection. An internal wiki is a very efficient way to ramp up or cross-train team members without having to take away resources from client-serving activities.
- Culture - every new hire should align with your company's culture. Whether you're a Type A stock brokerage, a creative agency, or a global consulting firm, if your employees can't internalize your culture they likely won't be employees for very long. Track the vigor of culture by measuring the things that typically aren't measured - like laughter, resistance, and cynicism.
The first rule of the inbound marketing club is - don't talk about inbound marketing, just do it (consistently). The second rule of the inbound marketing club (assuming you are following the first rule) is to plan for your success. How are you planning for your success?
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