INBOUND ACCELERATOR

Outsourcing some aspect of a marketing program is a reality for half of all marketers today. There are simply so many tasks to be performed and channels to understand that doing everything within a small department is often impossible.

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Topics: Collaboration, HubSpot, Management, Agency Partners

As fourth quarter of 2019 began, none of us could have predicted what 2020 would mean to the budget proposals and marketing strategies we were getting ready to finalize by the end of the year. And now next year’s plans are anything but certain.

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Topics: Resourcing, Agency Partners

When it’s time to find extra resources—staffing, expertise, technology—for your company’s marketing strategy, there are many options and a number of considerations that will influence your decision.

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Topics: Collaboration, Public Relations, Strategy, Management, Marketing Lessons, Integrated Marketing & PR, Agency Partners

It has now been 4 months since a large majority of America’s “knowledge” workforce left their cubicles and corner offices for the kitchen table or guest room folding table. And it is likely that even as some return to the office space, a large majority will be working from home for some time yet, perhaps indefinitely.

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Topics: Management, Client Success Stories, Agency Partners

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We understand how stressful it can be as a CMO to turn work over to an outside agency and just step back and put trust in them. You know that whatever the results are, you as the CMO will have to answer to the rest of the leadership team on your company. And that makes it tempting to want to stay right on top of everything.

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Topics: Collaboration, Planning, Public Relations, Infographics, Client Success Stories, Agency Partners

Inbound marketing is a holistic approach. You can’t focus strictly on one aspect (for example, an advertising campaign to increase website traffic).

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Topics: HubSpot, Sales, Infographics, Sales-Marketing Alignment, Agency Partners

Developing and implementing a complete content marketing strategy that delivers results comes with its share of challenges, as Semrush discovered in a survey of nearly two thousand marketing pros. When asked what they found the most challenging and time consuming tasks, the answers ranged from developing content that resonates with the target audience to finding places to publish their content.

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Topics: Strategy, HubSpot, Resourcing, Management, Agency Partners

Who do you rely on for marketing content creation: an in-house team, outside agencies, or some combination? Chances are that each brings different strengths to the table, judging by the response of 300 B2B marketers to a survey by Walker-Sands.

What advantages does an in-house team have over outsourcing? What do outside firms tend to do better? And how can you get the best of both worlds when you work with an agency?

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Topics: Public Relations, Resourcing, Infographics, Management, Integrated Marketing & PR, Agency Partners

Sometimes the most important lessons are those that may seem obvious or simple, but which are overlooked and ignored in the search for the next big thing. We, as humans and as marketers, sometimes convince ourselves that success is complicated and that the best strategy is something we haven’t yet tried.

We forget to go back to the basics upon which a successful marketing strategy should be built. This can be especially true of agencies that strive to differentiate themselves by being creative and innovative and coming up with new ideas to wow and woo potential clients. But when the very foundations of a marketing strategy are ignored, the whole thing tends to collapse.

This Marketing Lesson post focuses on the three simple (not easy, but simple) steps that every marketing strategy should build from.

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Topics: Goal Setting, Marketing Lessons, Agency Partners

Did you know that the average client-agency relationship in the marketing and PR world is 3.2 years or less? That’s really not much time when targeting strategies and campaigns that can extend for months and generate results years down the road. And with turnover that rapid, it means that the average agency is spending a lot of time prospecting and trying to land new contracts to replace the ones that are closing.

(Sources: The Drum and Bedford Group Consulting)

What would happen if the energy dedicated to finding new accounts was instead focused on building relationships that maintain the clients you already have and increase the likelihood that the contacts you have in those businesses may bring you even more business in the future?

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Topics: Strategy, Resourcing, Management, Marketing Lessons, Client Success Stories, Agency Partners