{"id":231,"date":"2012-01-09T17:50:43","date_gmt":"2012-01-09T22:50:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/steinvox.com\/?p=231"},"modified":"2012-08-11T12:26:43","modified_gmt":"2012-08-11T17:26:43","slug":"inbound-and-outbound-marketingwhat-are-we-talking-about","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/inbound-and-outbound-marketingwhat-are-we-talking-about\/","title":{"rendered":"Inbound & Outbound Marketing – What Are We Talking About?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Like many things we colloquially call \u201cMarketing,\u201d there is ambiguity in the language we use, and the terms inbound marketing <\/em>and outbound marketing are<\/em> not immune.\u00a0 We need a common language, and when one does not exist, we need to clarify our meaning.<\/p>\n

This is the first of many articles I envision that will try to unearth this ambiguity, and help us to ask questions of one another to ensure we are both speaking and hearing the same definition as we operate.\u00a0 This disambiguation is becoming critical as older executives and managers communicate with younger team members and staff, and recent definitions in use can cause confusion, or worse, ambiguously set and subsequently missed expectations.<\/p>\n

Inbound & Outbound<\/h3>\n

I like the disambiguation found on Wikipedia for the terms<\/a>. Definition set 1.<\/strong> Wikipedia says \u201cinbound marketing<\/span> (implies as recent) is a marketing strategy that focuses on getting found by customers<\/span>.\u201d The article further suggests that it is synonymous with relationship marketing (attributed to Seth Godin) and permission marketing<\/span>, a more common term.\u00a0 The complementary term \u201coutbound marketing <\/span>is a pejorative term for traditional marketing <\/span>that focuses on interrupting customers through excessive and inappropriate advertising <\/span>and promotion<\/span>,\u201d and the term is synonymous with interruption marketing<\/span>.<\/p>\n

This can be summarized as: inbound marketing is the tactics, programs, and initiatives that make a company visible and findable such that customers want to come \u201cinto\u201d and engage with the company and outbound marketing (brand, positioning and core messaging) is secondary, at best<\/em>.\u00a0 The visual metaphor in my mind, is not having a clear destination in mind while waiting for a train in Grand Central Station, a place with dozens of trains every hour, inbound and outbound.\u00a0 Which one is looking for you?<\/p>\n

Definition set 2.<\/strong> Wikipedia (calls out as \u201colder\u201d) says \u201cInbound marketing<\/span> is market research<\/span>.\u201d it goes on to say that in this definition, \u201c\u2026information about customer needs and interests, not customer themselves, flow into the company.\u201d\u00a0 The complementary term \u201coutbound marketing is the non-pejorative term for marketing communications, [\u2026] information that flows out to prospective customers who have a need.\u201d In this definition, customer needs and requirements for solutions are \u201cinbound\u201d to the company, and it is up to Marketing to digest that information, and lead the Company to create products and services and develop those into solutions that satisfy the needs and requirements of the customer.<\/p>\n

This pair of definitions can be summarized as inbound and out bound marketing are defined by direction of flow of information<\/span>, inbound tells companies what solutions are needed by customers, and outbound is the communication of solution value in order to motivate customer interest and sales using a broad set of marketing methods based on a central positioning and messaging framework<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Analysis<\/strong>.\u00a0 The difference based on its claimed origin (less than 10 years old), is greatest between inbound marketing definitions 1 and 2.\u00a0 Outbound marketing while pejorative or non-pejorative (the new definition disparages, is derogatory or belittles \u201cadvertising and promotions\u201d) is functionally similar in terms of customer outreach, and targeted prospective customer engagement.\u00a0 Based on the Wikipedia definitions, let\u2019s look at these side by side:<\/p>\n

\n\n\n\n\n\n
<\/td>\n\n

Inbound<\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

Outbound<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

Widely Known Traditional Definition<\/td>\n\n
    \n
  • \n
    Market research<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Customer needs<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Product requirements<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Involves entire company<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Identify best solutions<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n
\n
    \n
  • \n
    Marketing communications<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Brand visibility<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Measured advertising<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Effective promotions<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Builds customer relationship<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
Lesser Known Recent Definition<\/td>\n\n
    \n
  • \n
    Getting found<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Optimize internet traffic<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Converts clicks, SEO<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Delivers canned product<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Disparaging\/derogatory to marketing profession in an organization<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n
\n
    \n
  • \n
    Considered pejorative<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Excessive and inappropriate<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Unmeasured Advertising<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Ineffective Promotion<\/div>\n<\/li>\n
  • \n
    Secondary or unessential<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n
    I personally don\u2019t believe that the new more recent definition works.\u00a0 It is limited, and implies that marketers are getting lazy.\u00a0 Why, because it suggests that if you build a good inbound marketing program and they will come<\/em>.\u00a0 That\u2019s bull.\u00a0 It further suggests that marketing as a\u00a0 function really has little to no function in the traditional \u201cinbound\u201d sense of two-way interaction with customers to ensure that the solutions provided are satisfying the customer\u2019s true requirements.\u00a0 Why doesn\u2019t the new definition work? Traditional well-grounded positioning and value-based messaging must still follow time-tested marketing processes completed by real marketing professionals, or the find-ability <\/em>and visibility<\/em> messages will not work.\u00a0 Worse than that, customers with social media as their sword of truth, will call out a Company on anything that doesn\u2019t pass the truth test of least astonishment<\/em>!\u00a0 Like being findable as a Company,\u00a0 negative customer feedback can destroy a Company by reversing the same approach.<\/div>\n
    <\/div>\n
    Of course, we do need to make companies easily findable, and do it in a competitive way, that is an absolute to be effective in any marketplace.\u00a0 This has been true since the first yellow pages phone book were ever published, and even before that with signs hanging outside storefronts identifying what goods and services a vendor sold to passer\u2019s buy.\u00a0 Albeit accelerated and more digital today, getting found has been on a continuum of ubiquity since the first chunk of meat was hung up in an open air market sending out a smell to entice peasants to purchase it for the nightly stew.<\/div>\n
    <\/div>\n
    Getting back to the better term, relationship or permission marketing is really a new marketing method or activity that is dependent on digitally social media tools that we now have available.\u00a0 Recognizing this ensures the very success of it, as it is then not a replacement for traditional inbound\/outbound marketing, but a new tactic that leverages the core marketing fundamentals in a company.\u00a0 Let’s not change our language in such a way that marginalizes the pervasive strategy and executio required for developing two-way (inbound and outbound) relationships with our customers.<\/div>\n
    <\/div>\n
    Write a comment and tell us what you think?<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Like many things we colloquially call \u201cMarketing,\u201d there is ambiguity in the language we use, and the terms inbound marketing and outbound marketing are not immune.\u00a0 We need a common language, and when one does not exist, we need to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":240,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[59,10],"tags":[58,42,16],"class_list":["post-231","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-definitions","category-marketing","tag-disambiguation","tag-failing-learning","tag-fearless-marketing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/150px-Icon_talk_svg.png?fit=150%2C150&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p25ukk-3J","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/steinvox.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}