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Nobody likes being sold to. Digital marketers have understood this quite well over the last 10 years. Today’s buyers want to be consulted, advised and occasionally coached. “Don’t sell, help.” Because of this, the process of sales has transformed into what can only be called the “inbound revolution”. Companies of all scales and sizes and in all sorts of industries have successfully implemented this “stop selling, start helping” approach to increase their businesses. The principles on which this phenomenon is based are rock-solid. Inbound marketing is only going from strength to strength.   If you’re a marketing professional or entrepreneur wondering how you could implement inbound marketing for your business, your search ends here. This post will help you figure out how you can create an inbound marketing funnel for your business. A good inbound marketing funnel not only generates top-line revenue but also builds your brand and reputation in the marketplace. There are at least three stages to any inbound marketing funnel: Stage one of your funnel: Getting Leads The first stage has a single purpose: gathering leads for your business. To get found by the right people, you need to create educational content that speaks to your prospects and resolves their queries. You can use social media following, social media ads and email marketing to engage with your prospects at this stage. Some ways by which brands educate their prospects are through e-books, webinars, short courses, blogs, YouTube videos etc. All this content has one primary aim – to bring you leads. At the same time, this type of content positions you as a specialist who can answer your prospects’ questions related to your product. While good inbound marketing can generate a huge number of leads, most of the leads may not be qualified to actually do business with you. However, the long-term benefit of creating good inbound marketing content almost always exceeds the cost in time and money required for it. Here are some great examples of the first-stage interactions some brands are driving: An eBook: https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/email-marketing-beginners-guide A blog: https://www2.deloitte.com/insights/us/en.html An infographic: https://blog.thewholebraingroup.com/inbound-marketing-5-steps-increase-traffic-convert-leads-customers A free course or webinar: https://www.mindvalley.com/free-courses Stage two of your funnel: Building Trust by Giving Help The first stage also builds some trust by giving high quality content. The focus on the second stage is almost exclusively on building on this.  Brands can establish trust and authority with their prospects through email marketing, social media posts, webinars, newsletters and videos. In inbound marketing, you’re always trying to help your prospects at every stage of their buying journey. This is especially true at this second stage of interaction with your raw leads. Stage three of your funnel: Giving even more help (and in the process, closing) Even the third stage isn’t a typical hard sales close. At this stage your prospects are well-informed, researched, and ready-to-purchase. They know what you’re about, what you do, and they know your promises. At this stage the sales team may come in to ‘clinch the deal’, but here too the always-be-helping aspect of inbound marketing comes in. Awesome selling with inbound marketing funnels is about customizing your sales pitch to cater to unique needs of each prospective client, understanding their unique circumstances, and using the language and level of technicality that they will understand. Concluding thoughts: With these three stages clearly defined, companies can easily find out where in the sales funnel they’re weakest. Based on this information they can close any gaps they may have in their entire inbound marketing funnel design. Quantifying each level is fairly easy with standard metrics and analytics tools. About the Author: Neeraj Ramnani is the founder of GrowthFoundation.in and WebKow.com. He is a digital marketer since 2011, and has pioneered some of the most innovative approaches in this field over these years. He’s worked with over 40 brands for their result-oriented digital marketing. He’s an alumnus of IIM Indore and SVNIT Surat.

Are you interested in finding out some must-read digital marketing books? Well I have been a digital marketer for nearly a decade now, and the thing with digital marketing that makes it quite unique is: 1) It changes so fast! (If a digital marketer went into a coma for five years and come back, he or she would have to start from scratch. This is partially true for many industries these days, but very little evolves as fast as the digital media world.) 2) It is (usually) learned from practice, from books and from online courses (in that order), instead of traditional graduation or post-graduation programs. (Again the reason for this largely is point 1) So I thought of sharing some must-read books for digital marketing for the year 2019. Most of them are likely to stay relevant for at least the next few years, and some of them keep publishing new editions, so if you’re reading this blog later, you may still find them useful. Here’s my Top 10 must read digital marketing books for 2019: 10) “Launch” by Jeff Walker: First on the list is a hugely popular book for launches. This book is ideal if you’re launching a new product, especially if it is a book or info-product. (Although frankly, the strategies in this book would work for over 90% industries.) Jeff Walker is a renowned digital marketer and publisher who sells high-end training programs that cost over 100 times the cost of this book (and which are still rated amazing), so there’s a lot of meat in this little book to understand the customer and start your digital marketing with the right perspective, i.e. by always putting the human side of things first instead of getting caught up in the tools and numbers. 09) “Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook” by Gary Vaynerchuk Social media is a terribly noisy place. Gary’s book helps see social media in a whole new light and giving a blueprint to social media strategies that really work. Definitely in the must-read digital marketing list. 08) “The Art of SEO” by Eric Enge and Stephan Spencer This is another fantastic book for digital marketers who want to leverage search engine optimization to grow their business. It can be a little bit lengthy, a little bit boring, but very effective. Just like search engine optimization. 07) “Tested Advertising Methods” by Caples This classic was written way before testing your advertising became so easy. Yet it’s clear insights and hundreds of examples make this one of the best books to learn copywriting. It’ll help you write better headlines, subject lines, URLs, Facebook ad copy and even landing page copy. Easily makes the cut for my must-read digital marketing books! 06) “The New Rules of Marketing and PR” by David Meerman Scott A fantastic book for beginners, this one introduces the way the internet has changed the way people and brands communicate, and how you can cut through the clutter and have your voice in this digital space. Is filled with case studies too. 05) “DotCom Secrets” by Russell Brunson Easy explanations, relevant examples and a breezy pace make this popular book a part of this list. It has some very unique ideas for sales funnels for selling online products. Relevant for almost any online business. 04) “Youtility” by Jay Bear This one is a must-read if you’re running a small business, or planning to start a business. It is also one of the more “wholesome” business books out there, where genuine helpfulness and generosity are highlighted over scammy techniques and short-term steals. 03) “Complete B2B Online Marketing” by William Leake, Lauren Vaccarello and Maura Ginty The value of the book is obvious from the name. A fantastic book on how B2B businesses can leverage digital marketing in very practical ways to win more customers. Since B2B industries have always been (relatively) slow on the digital bandwagon, it’s a fantastic way to leapfrog over competitors. 02) “Made to Stick” by Chip Heath and Dan Heath Why do some ideas thrive and others die? How do you improve the chances of worthy ideas surviving? This book explores this with a surprisingly funny book with a Freakonomics-feel. 01) “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion” by Robert Cialdini This classic book on persuasion has influenced digital marketers from the very early days of the internet and continues to be a must-read for those striving for success in the digital marketing world. Insightful with amazing breakdowns of all the principles discussed, filled with easy-to-get examples, this book should be read with a notepad next to you to jot down all the ideas that will pop up in your head as you read it. About the Author: Neeraj Ramnani is the founder of GrowthFoundation.in and WebKow.com. He is a digital marketer since 2011, and has pioneered some of the most innovative approaches in this field over these years. He’s worked with over 40 brands for their result-oriented digital marketing. He’s an alumnus of IIM Indore and SVNIT Surat.