Yes, yes, I know… It’s not even October, but you know, 2014 really is just around the corner and to support you in your early 2014 marketing planning efforts, we’d like to ask you a fair question and then, give you some food for thought…
Do your marketing goals align with your marketing activities? For many businesses, there often is a disconnect between these two and identifying the missing links is the first step to bridging the gaps.
Preparedness 101:
Don’t Forget the Map and, By Gosh, Drive a Functional Vehicle
When defining your marketing goals, the first step to a successful outcome means creating a road map that will get your desired destination. Equally important, however, is the tools you’ll use to get you there. Like a clunker that leaks a quart of oil for every gallon of gas you burn, the tools you use to connect with your audience can either impede or support your successful outcome.
In a revealing survey, prepared by Annie Hung and conducted by The Sloan School of Management, we learn that businesses who have implemented HubSpot as their online marketing software platform have experienced more:
Traffic
- 92.3% of customers have experienced an increase in traffic.
- 29.8% of customers reported an increase of more than 100% of traffic.
- 85.0% of customers that saw a traffic increase noted that it began within 7 months or less, with 64.8% of customers seeing an increase within 4 months.
Leads
- 92.7% of customers have experienced an increase in leads.
- 38.4% of customers reported an increase of more than 100% in their leads.
- 83.9% of customers who saw an increase in leads noticed it within 7 months of using HubSpot, with 65.2% of customers seeing an increase within 4 months.
Sales
- 49.2% of customers experienced a higher lead-to-sales conversion rate, with 29.4% of customers noticing a “Slightly Higher Rate (1-25%)” of conversion. (Respondents said that leads converted to sales 1-25% faster.)
- 49.7% of customers who saw an increase in actual sales noticed it within 7 months.
What Makes HubSpot so Special?
Customer Marketing Behavior Shifted To Content Focus
Using HubSpot has changed the way customers approach marketing and use marketing tools in their businesses. Overall, among customers who have implemented HubSpot software, there is a noticeable increase in the use of marketing tools, primarily with blogging, social media, and email marketing.
For the survey, blogging, social media, and email marketing were selected because they are among the most commonly-used marketing tools.
Blogging
Blogging falls within the top three marketing tools that customers attribute to an increase in traffic, leads, and sales.
After using HubSpot, customers blog more frequently, shifting from:
- blogging infrequently (from once a month to less often than once a month) to “Somewhat Frequently (2-4 times per month)” and “Frequently (2-4 times per week)”.
- 98.0% of customers post blogs after implementing HubSpot, compared to 60.1% who did before using HubSpot.
- 81.45% of customers say they blog “Frequently (at least 2-4 times a month)” with HubSpot (compared to 27.82% prior to using HubSpot).
Social Media
After using HubSpot, customers use social media more frequently, showing a general trend shift from:
- “Somewhat Infrequently (several times a month)” to between two categories of frequency (1-4 times a day to 1-4 times a week).
- 98.0% of HubSpot customers now use social media after implementing HubSpot, compared to just 75.4% of customers before using HubSpot.
After implementing HubSpot, 77.02% of customers report using social media with frequency (at least 1-4 times a week).
Email Marketing
Emailing is the tool that was used by the most customers before implementing HubSpot (19.3%).
After implementing HubSpot, customers have increased frequency of email marketing (whether one-off email sends or lead nurturing emails).
- 95.6% of customers now use marketing emails after implementing HubSpot, compared to 83.1% of customers before using HubSpot.
In general, before HubSpot, customers sent emails to customers about once a month or with less frequency.
Now with HubSpot, respondents noted they send emails to their own customers several times a month.
- 73.0% of respondents now send emails to their own customers with frequency ranging from 1-4 times a week to once a month.
The three graphs below show the trends in customer use of blogging, social media, and email marketing. They illustrate a general shift from less frequent use of these tools prior to implementing HubSpot, to an increased use of each of these tools now as HubSpot customers
HubSpot Supports Your Efforts Every Step of the Way
Through their survey responses, customers have remarked on how using HubSpot software has changed the way they conduct marketing and sales practices. In particular, several customers noted that the software has contributed to their ability to maintain relationship with their own customers as part of their sales cycle.
“By adding HubSpot and a full time Marketing Coordinator, our goal is to reach out to potential clients who may not be routine purchasers of our services. Our sales cycle for a non-institutional client (private business owner/small business) is around 5-7 years. HubSpot will make it easier for us to maintain that contact and relationship until they are ready to spend again.”— Matt Graves, Strahm, Division of SGI, Inc.
“We have developed better insight into what marketing collateral we need to produce in order to become more of a resource to our customers – thus, building trust with them. The email campaigns have been a wonderful success, [and] we’ve already gotten a deal out of one of the recent workflows. Typically, our sales cycle takes a really long time, so time will tell on how well the rest of our workflows work. The reps love using HubSpot to gain insight into their customer’s behavior and interests.”
— Kristen Smith, Myriad RBM
