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Inbound marketing campaigns are the process of gaining customers attention by means of landing pages, SEO, content, customer engagement, calls to action, titles, headings, blogs, free resources and more. This report will look at how two popular websites undertake some of these common inbound marketing techniques on their websites, HubSpot and HelpScout.
Each organisation’s approach to inbound marketing
Each company’s use of common inbound marketing techniques includes: bold headings, product information with links, free signup options, client logos and testimonials/case studies, statistics along with an automated chat popups that contribute to a positive landing page experience.
Calls to Action on both websites consist of: Free Offers, Free Demonstrations and Product Tours.
HubSpot has Free Versions of their packages that can be upgraded to a paid version at any time. Each package option identifies features and pricing for comparison.
HelpScout offer a Free 15-day trial of the software and subscription call to actions allowing them to collect the email address of potential customer.
Strenths & Weaknesses of the inbound marketing approach used by each organisation
| Strengths | HUBSPOT |
Landing Page - use of inbound marketing techniques
Brand recognition
High quality content
Free Signup
Live Chat
Free Resources
SEO
|
| HELPSCOUT |
Personalisation
Live Chat
Testimonials
Free Trial Period
Free Resources
Blog Navigation
|
|
| Opportunities | HUBSPOT |
Social Media Links
Blog Navigation
Subscription Call to Action on Blog
|
| HELPSCOUT |
Content Information ie: Who / What
Landing Page – use of inbound marketing techniques
|
|
| Weaknesses | HUBSPOT |
Navigating website to get back to home page from a blog
Lack of personalisation
|
| HELPSCOUT |
What is the product about
Brand recognition
|
|
| Threats | HUBSPOT |
Live Chat Auto Popup interrupting user experience
Lack of menu headings in different resource areas of website
|
| HELPSCOUT |
No Free Version
SEO
Minimal Calls to Action on Landing Page
|
How each organisation could improve its inbound marketing
HubSpot could improve their website navigating back to the home page after selecting one of their resources as it is not as simple as clicking on the company logo as with most websites. Adding a more personal touch to their website with customer testimonials would also improve on user experience providing warm and fuzzy’s about HubSpot and their employees.
HelpScout could take some of their product content and add it to their home page to provide a little more information about what the software package is about, enabling more keywords for search engine optimisation leading to more relevant search hits. Providing a Free version of the software package would also be advantageous.
Which organisation was best?
So, who did it right? In my opinion HubSpot – as they have pretty much ticked all the inbound marketing checklist criteria. HubSpot have a wider range of valuable content and resources that explain what they do and can provide as a company. The Free version option is very enticing and as I had signed up for Free CRM as part of my research in a matter of 10 minutes I had a phone call from HubSpot asking if they could help me with inbound marketing as they could see I was looking around their website!