The Beginner’s Guide to Inbound Marketing Platforms

Your customers are the heart of your business. Understanding what makes your customers tick is how you personalize your content, attract new leads, and grow your business. That’s why it is vital to maximize every tool at your disposal to strengthen the depth of your customer relationships. Inbound marketing platforms are an example of these tools.

What is an inbound marketing platform?

An inbound marketing platform is one part customer relationship management tool that helps businesses track communication with customers and leads, one part marketing automation, lead generation and lead nurturing tool. The goal of these platforms is to streamline customer communications and interactions to grow your business. The information captured gives you a deeper, more meaningful understanding of your customers and the ways they engage in your brand, such as opening emails, downloading premium content, and reading blogs. This is a critical way to turn potential leads into loyal customers.

Inbound marketing platforms help companies organize and access their customer interaction data. But it is also extremely valuable as a lead generation tool. The automated workflows and capabilities in inbound marketing platforms allow marketing and sales teams a deeper understanding of the right outreach techniques needed for each lead, saving time and effort.

Ready to see how an inbound marketing platform can positively impact your business? Let’s take a deeper look at this innovative tool.

How does an inbound marketing platform work?

With an inbound marketing platform, you can bid adieu to spreadsheets and messy, tangible files. These digital systems enable you to record communication data from interviews, phone calls, and emails in one easy-to-manage dashboard. It also stores all lead and lead scoring information, including the original source, interactions with your content or team, and whether the leads are ready to become sales prospects.

But inbound marketing platforms aren’t only for sales teams. Marketing teams can leverage them to create personalized outreach, nurturing leads at different stages along the buyer journey and cross-selling to existing customers. And it can all happen in one easy-to-access system.

What are the benefits of utilizing an inbound marketing platform?

Convenience is a major perk of this digital lifesaver. Having all sales leads, customer information, and marketing workflows available in one platform makes your entire team more efficient. But the benefits don’t stop there.

Multiple teams can access the information in one system. All previous communication data is stored in one convenient space. This means all team members, from sales to leadership, can access the same information.
Streamlines the sales process by separating MQLs (Marketing Qualified Leads) and SQLs (Sales Qualified Leads). This is a major timesaver for busy sales and marketing teams.
Automated workflows. Inbound marketing platforms not only gather and store all customer-related data, but also allow you to set up various workflows for lead nurturing, marketing, sales, and other necessary campaigns.
Strengthens the capabilities of smaller teams. The beauty of this platform is that all teams, regardless of size or skill sets, can reap the benefits of this user-friendly tool. AI and automation capabilities double your productivity in a fraction of the time.

In order to optimize the benefits of an inbound marketing platform, you need to choose a knowledgeable, reliable partner that can work with your company’s unique needs. Here are a few of our favorites:

The Best Inbound Marketing Platform Companies

Looking to utilize the power of a platform in your inbound marketing processes? Here are 3 inbound marketing platforms that can get you started:

1. For those minding bottom lines: HubSpot.

HubSpot’s plans allow customers to manage up to a million contacts through a range of workflows. Real-time sales activity, scheduling tools, and prospect tracking are nicely organized in their visually-dynamic dashboard. More advanced functionality and capabilities, such as marketing automation workflows, are not available in the free plan, but can be added on at varying levels.

HubSpot’s platform incorporates:

Marketing automation tools
Multi-channel integration capabilities
Integration of email inboxes

2. For those minding bottom lines: HubSpot.

Salesforce is a literal force in the CRM and inbound marketing industry. Celebrated for its cloud-based platform and user-friendly tools, Salesforce is a great resource for companies of all sizes. Their platform also offers services beyond the CRM, including IT, marketing, customer support, and sales. Ready for a free trial? Simply fill out the eight-question interactive questionnaire to get started. Other plans start at $25 per month and their Pardot add-on allows for advanced workflows and automation.

Features include:

Streamlined communication with an integrated Slack platform
Virtual selling, communication, and forecasting tools
Automated revenue intelligence tools

3. For the technologically savvy: Marketo.

Marketing automation platform Marketo actually started off as an enterprise solution for B2B companies. This highly-technical and customizable solution blends smart lists, mobile marketing engagement, and social media advertising tools with automated capabilities, making it an ideal solution for marketing teams looking for more from their inbound marketing platform. Marketo’s plan prices are available upon request.