Why is everyone talking about “Inbound Marketing?” Who cares about the “Real-time Web?”

Several years ago when Google modified its Pagerank Algorithm, and started factoring in how other influential websites link to yours,  few people really could imagine the explosion of social media engines like Linked-in, Facebook, and Twitter. Your search engine visibility is determined not only by the quality of the content on your website, but by who is linking to you.

Just recently, Google has launched the real-time web. Now more than ever there is an extraordinary opportunity for small businesses to carve out a niche in their social media marketplaces — effectively creating their own channel to communicate with their customers and prospects.

In an article in Huffpost by Manish Mehta, the Vice President, Social Media and Community at Dell Inc. (who can attribute $7 million in sales to Twitter for doing nothing at all!),  Mehta affirms “Social media isn’t a means to further a corporation’s strategy, it’s a means to help determine it.”

Sometimes pictures (or mindmaps) are better than words, so I’ve created a Mindmap that illustrates a general Inbound Marketing/Social Media Strategy.

Inbound Marketing / Social Media Strategy Cashmap for Small Businesses

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Marketers the world over, with much greater resources than you or I, have worked relentlessly, and have spent millions and millions of dollars, so that their products and services can be seen and heard in an overcrowded marketplace.

So how is a small business with limited resources supposed to compete with companies that have much greater resources and greater budget?

The secret is positioning: “It’s not what you do to your product, or how you market it, it’s how you position your product in your customer’s mind.”

Don’t bet the farm on changing someone’s mind

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