Neil is Scottish so when he's not writing for PPC Protect he's eating haggis and watching Braveheart.
Marketing is an exciting industry that has seen massive changes during its digital revolution. Less than 20 years ago, SEO and pay per click where basically unheard of, while today they make the foundations of any successful online campaign.
Through this digital evolution of marketing, many new strategies, buzzwords and technology have been born. One of those new strategies and buzzwords is inbound marketing.
You might have already heard of the term before, but what is inbound marketing and why has it recently become so popular?
This relatively new marketing concept has transformed many businesses in recent years, turning them into industry leaders and gigantic companies with little effort.
Compared to traditional marketing efforts, inbound marketing is often more effective (and cheaper!). But that’s just one of the many benefits of this new popular strategy.
To fully show you the power and effectiveness of inbound marketing, we’ll have to take a closer look at some examples and how other companies use it.
By the end of this article, not only will you understand what inbound marketing is, but you’ll also have all the necessary details to make your own strategy. To get things started, let’s take a look at the history of inbound marketing and where the name came from.

The History Of Inbound Marketing

Magnet representing inbound marketing
The term inbound marketing can be traced back to the mid-2000s when digital marketing really started to take off. It was the CEO and co-founder of HubSpot, Brian Halligan that initially coined the term with his partner and colleagues.
It was around this time that Brian noticed the shift in marketing that the internet was bringing to the industry. Instead of marketers attempting to find customers via billboards, cold-calling and printed leaflets (known as “outbound marketing”). He discovered that utilising digital marketing methods such as SEO and PPC to attract users searching for an answer resulted in higher quality and cheaper conversions.
This change in the customer’s journey and behaviour was down to the internet and the new doors it opened to marketers. The change allowed marketers to target different customers depending on what stage of the buying cycle they were in. A brand new customer starting their journey will often need different information compared to a customer at the end of the journey. Moreover, the best way to do this is by utilising different digital marketing strategies to make sure you can reach them all.
Compare this to traditional “outbound marketing”, inbound marketing is designed to attract and draw in visitors rather than promote a brand, product or service in the hope that someone converts. It’s this difference in the approach which has made inbound marketing become so popular.
To summarise what we’ve learned so far, inbound marketing can be defined as:
“The process of attracting, converting, closing and delighting customers using various types of content at different stages of the buying cycle.”

Inbound vs Outbound Marketing

inbound vs outbound marketing poster
Now you’ve got a good idea of what inbound marketing is, how does it compare to outbound marketing?
Well, to be honest, the differences are super obvious. Trying to force your product or service in front of customers is quickly becoming a thing of the past. People can skip TV ads by using the likes of on-demand services such as Netflix and BBC iPlayer, while users can also skip radio ads by using streaming platforms such as Spotify.
Online banner ads and popups are also quickly becoming a thing of the past thanks to the growing trend in adblockers. Just like sales emails that also end up in your spam folder.
As you can see, the times are changing, and people just don’t like having products and services forced in their faces anymore. It’s not to say that it’s completely redundant yet, but if inbound marketing is much more effective than outbound marketing, then shouldn’t you be investing your money in the better strategy?
To give you an idea of the differences between the two, here are some of the major points where the strategies differ.