Dialing up leads: 5 more industries that should maximize call marketing

Back in the day, salespeople across industries wore themselves out cold-calling customers who had little to no interest in their products or companies.

Fortunately, the advantages of digital marketing (combined with customer disgust over in-your-face sales tactics) have changed all that, and now companies are getting much more bang for their buck through inbound marketing. The inbound methodology focuses much more strongly on identifying customers likely to want your product, gaining credibility by providing easy access to info about that product, then encouraging them to call you to buy or simply find out more.

“The consumers you are contacting already understand they have a need for your product or services because they have already taken steps to see if your solution is the right fit for them by making contact with you,” notes Steve Olenski in Forbes. “You do not have to sell the need, just the solution. This means, instead of a sales pitch, you can take a more consultative approach to each call, helping your prospect reach the best solution and developing a feeling of trust between the consumer and salesperson.”

Research also shows inbound marketing can be much less expensive than more traditional methods; one study found content marketing costs 62 percent less than outbound marketing while generating three times the leads.

While many industries have long understood the value of a strong call marketing campaign, others have yet to take full advantage. Consider, for example, how these five segments might benefit from campaigns featuring strategically marketed ads, blogs, white papers, case studies, e-books and/or infographics along with easy-to-remember phone numbers inviting readers to follow up by calling you.

1. Manufacturing: Because manufacturing customers tend to conduct considerable research before choosing vendors, inbound marketing that starts with informative blogs, e-books, white papers and/or infographics can work very effectively. Once a customer indicates interest in a topic by clicking on or downloading content, the marketer can follow up with messaging asking him to call to make an order or ask for more information. “The premise of an inbound approach is to inform, not interrupt, the people searching for manufacturers like you,” confirms Todd Mumford on Riverbedmarketing.com. “An inbound marketing approach allows these ideal customers to build trust and credibility in you, showing off your true expertise.”

2. Lending and finance: Because this segment is so dependent on numbers and statistics, providing your potential clients with strategic, precise and informative content can be crucial in convincing them to entrust their money to you — or at least to call you for more information as they move further down the sales funnel. “Crafting content that answers questions and helps your buyers familiarize themselves with your company is an excellent start on the road to a well-oiled inbound business finance marketing machine,” advises Joey Shadeck on Hitachibusinessfinance.com.

3. Home services: Since appointments for such services are typically handled by phone, providers can often drive in excellent leads by creating and placing valuable informative content and/or ads that feature strong calls to action. You can also continually track calls to better identify the specific keywords, ads and venues driving the most calls.

4. Hotels and travel: This is another category that generally requires phone reservations, with many consumers reaching you by searching online for hotels and other amenities, visiting your website then using the phone number on your landing page to reach you. Not only can a memorable vanity phone number be extremely helpful in that regard, but call tracking allows you to follow up with click-to-call ads for website visitors that didn’t complete reservations.

5. Education: Before choosing schools or colleges, consumers typically consider many factors including location, tuition, guidance services, housing, extracurricular, career counseling, disability support, etc. When you provide potential students and parents compelling and valuable online content, they may be more apt to consider you over the competition and call you seeking more information, whereupon your skilled salesmen can guide them toward an investment.

Once you start identifying and motivating audiences likely to call you — then offering ads and/or content that speak directly to those audiences — you may well find your marketing dollar going a lot further, regardless of your industry.

“Consumers do their research online at their own pace, and are only ready to speak with a salesperson at the final stage of the buying process,” Olenski explains. “Inbound marketing works better than cold calling because it delivers warm prospects who are receptive to speaking with a salesperson.”