9 Inbound Marketing Terms You Should Know
As an inbound marketing specialist, I sometimes forget that not everyone spends all day buried in marketing jargon. The concepts seem simple to me now, but I remember how overwhelmed I was when I was getting started. Here are nine of the most often used inbound marketing terms and what they mean.
1. Target market - Who is your ideal customer? What group of people would most enjoy, or best be served by, your company’s product or service? Answering these questions may be easy, but don’t stop there; develop buyer personas for your company to narrow down your target market further.
2. Landing page - A landing page is any page on your website that allows you to collect relevant information from people interested in your content. The goal of every landing page is to entice visitors to complete an accompanying conversion form, thereby providing you with valuable information (their name and email) in exchange for exclusive content that you have created (like a whitepaper or ebook). You can optimize your landing pages and use them to grow your newsletter subscription list, as well as your pool of possible future customers.
3. Copy - A page’s copy is all of its text — headings and main content. Your goal is to write copy that pulls in prospects and encourages them to remain on your site, fill out a form, and/or become customers.
4. Above the fold - The portion of a webpage or email message than can be seen without the user’s having to scroll down. This is a term from the newspaper industry, where content that is “above the fold” in the paper is read more often than the content below the fold. Many marketing companies suggest keeping all the copy on a landing page above the fold, increasing the likelihood that more people will read it.
5. Call to Action (CTA) - A call to action is the part of your copy that tells the reader to respond by downloading a whitepaper, requesting a quote, calling your business, etc.
6. Conversion - A conversion happens when a visitor to your website takes an action that you deem valuable. In most cases this refers to filling out a form or downloading a whitepaper, but a conversion can be any action, such as someone visiting a specific page or using a widget on your website. Conversions are good things because they result in more leads and customers.
7. Lead - A visitor becomes a lead when they fill out a conversion form. They are eligible for nurturing campaigns, and are considered more qualified than the prospects who visit your website without requesting more information or downloading an offer.
8. Lead nurturing (Nurture campaign/Drip campaign) - Lead nurturing is a process by which you continue to develop a relationship with your leads after they have left your website. Because they have provided you with their email address in exchange for one of your offers, you now have the ability to nurture these leads down the sales funnel by providing them with extra free content over a set period of time. Doing so will keep you in the front of their minds, increasing the likelihood that they will seek you out when they are ready to make a purchase.
9. Return on Investment (ROI) - Your ROI is a calculation of the money you spent on a particular effort compared to the amount of money you earned from that effort. ROI is a great determiner of an effort’s value: if you’re spending $1,000 to promote a sale, but that sale only nets you $500, it’s time to reconsider the sale’s efficacy.
There are many more inbound marketing terms, some of which are more or less important than others. But the nine discussed here are the major ones, and should give you the leg up you need when you first get started with inbound marketing.
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In my opinion, number four should be scratched off this list. Whether you know the term or not, page fold is not important and hasn't been for quite some time.
In short, http://www.thereisnopagefold.com/
In depth, http://51bits.com/articles/drop-the-fold/
I'm tempted to agree, but it's a bit of contentious subject. And I understand both sides.
The idea behind keeping things above the fold" is that Internet readers want their information fast: they skim, they skip, they move on. So the idea is to be as brief as possible.
On the other hand, if you have a lot of information, all of which is important, keeping it above the fold is impossible.
If you're worried that your page is too long or too short, it's a good excuse to do some A/B testing. Whichever page performs better, is the one you keep.
If the content is well written, compelling and relevant # 4 should be ignored. Always.
I agree, Elizabeth. If people are reading it, and finding it helpful, worrying about being above or below the fold is a waste of time.
Does audience play a factor. If I'm targeting AARP members, I don't know if I want to count on 'em scrolling down. Not picking on old folks, but rather pointing out that the web still has a ton of users that don't "get around" like the savvy set.
Good point. However, I think that at this point, most people understand the concept of scrolling — and if they don't, they're not terribly likely to be surfing the Internet.
You've not watched my mom or dad surf. I'm tellin' ya, the world is full of those who will never be proficient with a mouse or keyboard, but still feel the allure of the web. Still, I'm with you and your previous comment about A/B tests. All else is speculation in any given circumstance.
Write your comment here...AARP members will surely scroll down with all that time in their hands. ;)
Indeed. :) Yet another reason to A/B test at every opportunity!