While we all yelled, “Jumanji” on New Year’s eve this year, sadly, we are not out of the COVID-19 pandemic yet. With our state one of the first with the latest COVID-19 strains, it is a guessing game on future restrictions and what may change in the months ahead. And as if this isn’t enough to reflect upon, COVID-19 turned a number of industries upside down and made companies reconsider their spending more than ever before. 

As one of the leading marketing companies Dever, Denver Media Group was able to help a number of our clients pivot their websites to offer more features online, and at the same time, when it came to marketing, find the silver lining in content, SEO and pivot to change entire campaigns on the fly while being personal and empathetic. 

It was a year of marketing and website design and development changes, but in the end, it quickly changed a number of elements that needed to be changed sooner than later. 

This changed companies marketing strategies from traditional efforts to more digital, and for good reasons with consumers' entire behavior habits changing in a short (or long) 10 months. 

More than 235 million people are on a Do Not Call list, and a couple of people that we know block any numbers immediately they do not know, or simply do not answer. As consumers ourselves, we are all guilty of this, and because of this, does one of the biggest outbound marketing strategies still as effective as most inbound marketing? 

Many streaming services now offer a higher fee to skip commercials all together, and with those switching from traditional television to streaming services, is traditional marketing the best option?

As one of the leading marketing companies Denver, we break down what is outbound and inbound marketing and the differences between inbound versus outbound marketing. 

What is outbound marketing? 

Outbound marketing, also known as traditional marketing, refers to marketing strategies that marketers use to reach the target audience. This includes purchasing email blast lists, television commercials, cold-calling, seminars, networking events and other strategies. 

The reason that outbound marketing struggles a bit in the digital age is because of the declining interest in those types of mediums because of newer, more technologically savvy generations. On top of a decreasing target audience on those mediums, traditional marketing can also be difficult to track, measure and report back the ROI of the entire marketing effort. 

Now, the commercials with “text 50690 to receive this offer” or those with specific links or coupons specific to traditional marketing strategies can be excluded from this because those can be tracked.

With this in mind, what the heck is inbound marketing? 

What is inbound marketing?

Inbound marketing, also known as “new school marketing”, is digital marketing efforts. This is search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing, blogging, content marketing and other new school methods! 

Digital marketing efforts have been around for about 20 years, but as of the last few years, this marketing strategy has really taken off! At Denver Media Group, this is what we specialize in from website design and development to social media marketing and some outbound marketing like email as well. 

Inbound marketing is typically preferred due to the fact that it has the potential to reach more consumers, advertising costs are much lower and bring in higher ROIs, and everything, just about everything can be tracked, measured and analyzed. 

What’s the biggest difference between inbound versus outbound? 

The difference between the two marketing strategies 

The biggest difference between the two is that inbound marketing takes some serious time. While online advertising can be utilized, it still takes six to nine months at minimum for a company’s website to rank, and even then, it could take longer due to a number of factors. 

On the social media side of the fence, on Facebook and other social media channels, it can be difficult to see the growth a company is searching for without paying for additional advertising. 

While traditional marketing efforts do not necessarily need to have a large following or existing presence in the industry, just a really great commercial and the money to back up the larger advertising budgets needed to get somewhere. 

That is why most companies are finding themselves turning to inbound versus outbound. 

These are the biggest differences between inbound versus outbound marketing from Vital. 

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The thing to remember is that they can both still be effective, with one another or without each other. This is because marketing strategies should always be based on the target audience of the company because those are the real customers. 

While it might be cool and “hip” to be on streaming services, is it worth the investment or is your audience on there? 

Is it time to transition some of your marketing strategies to inbound instead of mostly outbound? Not sure where to even begin or don’t even have a Facebook page yet? No worries, our experts can handle that for you. Contact us today for our recommendations for your company.