Inbound marketing is one of the few strategies where advertising isn’t involved. Instead, inbound marketing focuses on building an audience that comes to you rather than you going to them. Hence the name inbound. 

So how do you get your ideal target audience to come to you? 

You do it by engaging with them through consistent, high-quality content that builds long-term trust and dependency. You offer a value for free, and users are capturing that value. 

Inbound marketing is one of the most cost-effective and all-around effective marketing strategies. 

In this article, I’ll touch on some of the most recent inbound marketing statistics covering what it is and why it’s beneficial. 

One mainly being the ROI of inbound marketing. These inbound marketing statistics will cover everything from specific industries like SaaS marketing statistics to marketing channel trends and SEO ROI statistics.

Here are 251 inbound marketing statistics you should know. 

General Inbound Marketing Statistics

  1. “Inbound marketing costs 62% less per lead than traditional outbound marketing.” (Invesp)
  2. “80% of business decision-makers prefer to get company information from a series of articles versus an advertisement.” (Invesp)
  3. “Inbound marketing doubles the average site conversion rate, from 6% to 12% total.” (Invesp)
  4. “61% of marketers say improving SEO and growing their organic presence is their top inbound marketing priority.” (UserGuiding)
  5. “Marketers who prioritize blogging efforts are 13x more likely to see positive ROI.” (UserGuiding)
  6. “Inbound leads cost 61% less on average than outbound leads.” (UserGuiding)
  7. “Companies that blog receive 55% more website visitors than businesses that don’t.” (MarketSplash)
  8. “B2B companies that blogged 11+ times per month had almost 3X more traffic than those blogging 0-1 times per month.” (MarketSplash)
  9. “Companies that published 16+ blog posts per month got almost 3.5X more traffic than companies that published 0-4 monthly posts.” (MarketSplash)
  10. “B2B companies that blogged 11+ times per month had almost 3X more traffic than those blogging 0-1 times per month.” (Precision Marketing Group)
  11. “Companies that published 16+ blog posts per month got almost 3.5X more traffic than companies that published 0-4 monthly posts.” (Precision Marketing Group)
  12. “75% of marketers see inbound marketing as effective while 25% think it’s not.” (FinancesOnline)
  13. “74% of organizations worldwide rely on an inbound approach to marketing.” (FinancesOnline)
  14. “Majority of marketers are expecting to increase spending on AI initiatives by up to 50%.” (FinancesOnline)
  15. “An inbound marketing survey revealed that the most effective digital marketing techniques are content marketing (20%), AI (14%), big data (14%), social media marketing (10%), marketing automation (9%), and mobile marketing (9%).” (FinancesOnline)
  16. “2.8 billion – the number of monthly active Facebook users as Q4 2020.” (FinancesOnline)

Inbound Marketing ROI Statistics

  1. “For every $1 spent, brands recoup $36 in email marketing.” (Weidert)
  2. “About 25% of marketers chose to put their marketing dollars into video.” (Weidert)
  3. “Videos under one minute grab about 50% of viewers.” (Weidert)
  4. “Nearly 30% of marketers use social engagement as a benchmark for understanding content effectiveness.” (Weidert)
  5. “Inbound leads on average cost 61% less as compared to outbound leads.” (Invesp)
  6. “82% of marketers who blog see positive ROI for their inbound marketing.” (Invesp)
  7. “79% of companies that have a blog report a positive ROI for inbound marketing.” (Invesp)
  8. “The average cost per lead drops 80% after 5 months of consistent inbound marketing.” (Invesp)
  9. “75% of inbound marketing teams believe their marketing strategy is effective.” (93x)
  10. “Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates about 3 times as many leads.” (93x)
  11. “Persona-driven content can increase the volume of Sales Qualified Leads (SQLs) by 45%.” (93x)
  12. “63% of B2B Marketers believe video marketing is effective for their business.” (93x)
  13. “Average cost per lead drops 80% after 5 months of consistent Inbound Marketing.” (93x)
  14. “Mid-sized businesses save 31% on Inbound Marketing costs compared to paid search.” (93x)
  15. “B2B companies that blogged 11+ times per month had almost three times more traffic than those blogging 0-1 times per month.” (93x)

B2B Inbound Marketing Statistics

  1. 80% of B2B companies use content marketing for lead generation.
  2. 86% of B2B marketers use content to create brand awareness.
  3. 70% of B2B marketers use content to generate demand and leads.
  4. 68% of B2B marketers use content to nurture subscribers and leads.
  5. 63% of B2B marketers use content to build customer loyalty.
  6. 59% of B2B marketers consider email as the most effective channel for generating revenue.
  7. 57% of B2B marketers expect investment in social media/community building during 2023.
  8. 89% of B2B content marketers use short articles/posts, making them the top type of content used.
  9. 75% of B2B content marketers use video.
  10. 60% of B2B marketers measure success with web traffic.
  11. 51% of B2B marketers use sales lead quality to measure success.
  12. 45% of B2B marketers use social media sharing to measure success.

B2C Inbound Marketing Statistics

  1. 77% of internet users read at least one company blog
  2. 40% of B2C content marketers only look at competitors once per year
  3. 46% of B2C companies changed their promotion strategy due to the pandemic
  4. 83% of B2C businesses relied on blog posts and short articles during the pandemic
  5. “In 2020, 75% of B2C marketers used email marketing as their top content marketing strategy.” (ThriveMyWay)

SaaS Inbound Marketing Statistics

  1. “In the first 3 years, public SaaS companies spend 80 to 120% of their revenue in marketing and sales.” (ZenPost)
  2. “SaaS companies spend $342,000 to $1,080,000 per year (or more) on content marketing.” (ZenPost)
  3. “High-quality content marketing can generate an ROI of 448% or more for SaaS brands.” (ZenPost)
  4. “98% of top-performing SaaS companies have blogs.” (ZenPost)
  5. “83% of SaaS company blog traffic comes from organic search.” (ZenPost)
  6. “The fastest-growing SaaS companies average 1,700 website visits each month.” (ZenPost)
  7. “SaaS companies that use educational blogs receive 14% more organic traffic than PR/news-focused blogs.” (ZenPost)
  8. “Feature announcements (22%), tech walkthroughs (18%), and landing pages (15%) are the most popular types of SaaS content.” (ZenPost)
  9. “Help articles, original research, and landing pages receive the most amount of backlinks on average.” (ZenPost)
  10. “Around 20% of top-performing SaaS companies don’t have a CTA in any of their posts.” (ZenPost)
  11. “Educational content is 7x as likely to have a CTA than PR/news content.” (ZenPost)
  12. “Publishing 2-4 times a week offers the highest inbound marketing returns.” (ZenPost)
  13. “89% of SaaS companies use content types besides blogs, like webinars (65%) and case studies (62%).” (ZenPost)
  14. “18% of SaaS companies have their own podcast.” (ZenPost)
  15. “A SaaS content marketing strategy typically includes stock images (65%) and named authors (87%).” (ZenPost)

Inbound Marketing Statistics by Marketing Channel

SEO Statistics

  1. “90.63% of pages get no organic search traffic from Google.” (Ahrefs)
  2. “The average page will need 534 days to get to the top 10.” (Ahrefs)
  3. “Only 5.7% of pages will rank in the top 10 search results within a year of publication.” (Ahrefs)
  4. “The average top 10 page is 2+ years old.” (Ahrefs)
  5. “The average word count of a Google first page result is 1,447 words.” (Backlinko)
  6. “The #1 result in Google’s organic search results has an average CTR of 31.7%.” (Backlinko)
  7. “The average Google first page result contains 1,447 words.” (Backlinko)
  8. “60% of marketers say that inbound (SEO, blog content, etc) is their highest quality source of leads.” (Demand Sage)
  9. “61% of marketers say improving SEO and growing their organic presence is their top inbound marketing priority.” (Demand Sage)
  10. “The average click-through rate for a result in the first position in Google’s organic search results is 31.7%.” (Inter-Growth)
  11. “The average page’s age that ranks on the first page is 2+ years.” (On The Map)
  12. “Google makes for 93.87% of the mobile search engine market.” (On The Map)
  13. “The #1 Google’s organic search result has an average click-through rate (CTR) of 31.7%, and this result is 10x more likely to get a click compared to the tenth result.” (On The Map)
  14. “Only 0.78% of Google search engine users clicked on something from the second page.” (On The Map)
  15. “Pages with URLs that contain a keyword have a 45% higher CTR.” (On The Map)

Content Marketing Statistics

  1. According to the Content Marketing Institute, 73% of B2B marketers and 70% of B2C marketers use content marketing as part of their overall marketing strategy. (Search Engine Journal)
  2. 91% of marketing pros surveyed by (Semrush) achieved success with their content marketing in 2021. (Search Engine Journal)
  3. A B2B Content Marketing Study conducted by CMI found 40% of B2B marketers have a documented content marketing strategy; 33% have a strategy, but it’s not documented, and 27% have no strategy whatsoever. (Search Engine Journal)
  4. The pandemic increased content usage by 207%. (Search Engine Journal)
  5. 83% of marketers believe it’s more effective to create higher quality content less often. (Search Engine Journal)
  6. 47% of marketers attribute their success in content marketing to researching their audience. (Semrush)
  7. 69% of businesses plan to increase their content marketing budgets in 2023. (Semrush)
  8. 73% of marketers use organic social media posting as a content promotion channel. (Semrush)
  9. 53% of marketers saw an improvement in engagement rate after performing a content audit. (Semrush)
  10. 27% of high-performing content was a month or less old, indicating that fresher content performs better in search. (Semrush)
  11. 91% of businesses use video as a marketing tool. (HubSpot)
  12. Instagram is used by 65% of social media marketers, just behind Facebook at 67%. (HubSpot)
  13. 22% of marketers say Instagram has the most growth potential in 2023 than any other platform. (HubSpot)
  14. 50% of Millennials trust product recommendations from influencers. (HubSpot)
  15. 44% of marketers say the most significant benefit of working with small influencers is that it’s less expensive. (HubSpot)
  16. 82% of marketers are actively investing in content marketing. (Ahrefs)
  17. 69% of marketers actively invest time in SEO. (Ahrefs)
  18. 67% of marketers report that content marketing generates demand/leads. (Ahrefs)
  19. 73% of people admit to skimming blog posts, while 27% consume them thoroughly. (Ahrefs)
  20. 51% of the businesses that invest in content marketing publish content every day. (Ahrefs)
  21. 82% of companies report using content marketing. (Blogging Wizard)
  22. The average person spends around 7 hours consuming content daily. (Blogging Wizard)
  23. 79% of content marketers use content marketing to generate high-quality leads. (Blogging Wizard)
  24. 51% of content marketers rate the performance of their strategy as ‘good’. (Blogging Wizard)
  25. 75% of marketers say SEO is their most efficient content marketing tactic. (Blogging Wizard)
  26. 96% of marketing decision-makers say content marketing has been effective for their brand. (Oberlo)
  27. 51% of marketers use organic traffic to measure content marketing success. (Oberlo)
  28. 88% of marketers have successfully reached their goals of creating brand awareness and building credibility and trust through content marketing. (Oberlo)
  29. 70% of marketers are investing in content marketing actively. (Oberlo)
  30. 57% of companies have a content marketing strategy in place. (Oberlo)

Social Media Statistics

  1. 91% of retail brands use 2 or more social media channels (SproutSocial).
  2. 81% of all small and medium businesses use some kind of social platform (SproutSocial).
  3. Social media users are most active at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m. local time (SproutSocial).
  4. 73% of marketers believe that their efforts through social media marketing have been ‘somewhat effective’ or ‘very effective’ for their business (NealSchaffer).
  5. Facebook is the most popular platform for both B2C and B2B businesses, with 96% using the platform (NealSchaffer).
  6. 54% of social browsers use social media to research products (Hootsuite).
  7. There are now more than 3.8 billion social media users around the world, representing 49% of the world’s total population (Hootsuite).
  8. 71% of consumers who have had a positive experience with a brand on social media are likely to recommend the brand to their friends and family (Hootsuite).
  9. Instagram has become the fastest-growing social media platform, with over 1 billion monthly active users (TrueList).
  10. 90.4% of Millennials, 77.5% of Generation X, and 48.2% of Baby Boomers are active social media users (TrueList).
  11. 54% of people use social media to research products (TrueList).
  12. 49% of consumers depend on influencer recommendations on social media (TrueList).
  13. 500 million daily active Instagram stories are uploaded worldwide ((HubSpot)).
  14. LinkedIn is the most-used social media platform amongst Fortune 500 companies ((HubSpot)).
  15. 92% of marketers chose Facebook as the most important social media platform for their business (DreamGrow).
  16. 21% of consumers are more likely to buy from brands that they can reach on social media (DreamGrow).
  17. 96% of the people that discuss brands online do not follow those brands’ owned profiles (DreamGrow).
  18. Visual content is more than 40 times more likely to get shared on social media than other types of content (DreamGrow).
  19. There are 60 million active business pages on Facebook (DreamGrow).
  20. 50 million businesses use Facebook Business Pages (DreamGrow).
  21. Twitter has nearly 4 times as many users internationally as in the U.S. (DreamGrow).
  22. YouTube is the second most popular channel for businesses sharing video content (DreamGrow).
  23. 83% of all marketers actively pursue social media marketing initiatives (DreamGrow).
  24. Instagram earns $595 million in mobile ad revenue per year (DreamGrow).
  25. 33% of marketers cite the ability to understand and leverage social data as a major challenge (DreamGrow).

Email Marketing Statistics 

  1. 35% of email recipients open email based on the subject line alone
  2. IP addresses appearing on just one of the 12 major blacklists had email deliverability 25 points below those not listed on any blacklists
  3. Email lists with 10% or more unknown users get only 44% of their email delivered by ISPs
  4. 17% of Americans create a new email address every 6 months
  5. 30% of subscribers change email addresses annually
  6. If marketers optimized their emails for image blocking, ROI would increase by 9+%
  7. 84% of people 18-34 use an email preview pane
  8. People who buy products marketed through email spend 138% more than people that do not receive email offers
  9. 44% of email recipients made at least one purchase last year based on a promotional email
  10. Subscribers below age 25 prefer SMS to email
  11. 35% of business professionals check email on a mobile device
  12. 80% of social network members have received unsolicited email or invites
  13. 21% of email recipients report email as Spam, even if they know it isn’t
  14. More than 59% of marketers say email is their biggest source of ROI ((HubSpot))
  15. 78% of marketers have seen an increase in email engagement over the last 12 months ((HubSpot))
  16. 35% of marketers send their customers 3-5 emails per week ((HubSpot))
  17. 80% of business professionals believe that email marketing increases customer retention ((HubSpot))
  18. 81% of B2B marketers say their most used form of content marketing is email newsletters ((HubSpot))
  19. 73% of millennials prefer communications from businesses to come via email ((Oberlo))
  20. 49% of consumers said they would like to receive promotional emails from their favorite brands on a weekly basis ((Oberlo))
  21. 80% of retail professionals indicate that email marketing is their greatest driver of customer retention ((Oberlo))
  22. The average open rate for a welcome email is 82% ((Oberlo))
  23. Marketers who use segmented campaigns note as much as a 760% increase in revenue ((OptinMonster))
  24. Personalized emails deliver six times higher transaction rates ((OptinMonster))
  25. 60% of consumers say they have made a purchase as the result of a marketing message they received by email ((OptinMonster))
  26. 72% of customers open emails based on personalization in the subject line ((OptinMonster))
  27. Email marketing has an average ROI of 3800% ((OptinMonster))
  28. 58% of adults check their email first thing in the morning (Snov.io)
  29. 89% of marketers use email as the primary channel for generating leads (Snov.io)
  30. The average open rate in 2022 was 19.66% (Snov.io)
  31. 22% of marketers report email click-through-rates over 20% (Snov.io)
  32. 77% of B2B buyers prefer to be contacted over email (Snov.io)
  33. 31% of marketers use email newsletters as a top channel to nurture leads (Snov.io)
  34. 43% of email recipients click the Spam button based on the email “from” name or email address
  35. 69% of email recipients report email as Spam based solely on the subject line

Landing Page Statistics

  1. The average landing page conversion rate is 9.7%. (KlientBoost)
  2. A typical landing page bounce rate benchmark is 60-90%. (KlientBoost)
  3. 77% of “landing pages” are home pages. (KlientBoost)
  4. 48% of marketers build a new landing page for each new campaign. (KlientBoost)
  5. Squeeze pages, prioritizing email address collection, are the most popular landing page type. (KlientBoost)
  6. Companies with 31 to 40 landing pages get seven times more leads than those with one to five. (KlientBoost)
  7. Click-through landing pages perform best for most industries, but 62.6% of landing pages use forms. (KlientBoost)
  8. 58% of landing pages include clickable graphics. (KlientBoost)
  9. 73% of customers find live chat the most satisfactory form of communication with a company. (KlientBoost)
  10. By 2022, 85% of companies are expected to adopt live chat support. (KlientBoost)
  11. 48% of landing pages contain more than one offer, but including more than one offer can decrease conversion rates by 266%. (KlientBoost)
  12. Organizations see a 55% increase in leads when they increase the number of landing pages from 10 to 15. (KlientBoost)
  13. A one-second delay in load time can decrease conversions by 7%. (KlientBoost)
  14. 37% of the top landing pages include testimonials. (KlientBoost)
  15. Only 50% of landing pages are optimized for mobile. (KlientBoost)
  16. 46% of marketers consider landing page form layout to have a significant impact. (KlientBoost)
  17. The average landing page conversion rate is 4.02%. (Blogging Wizard)
  18. Including a video on landing pages increases conversions by 86%. (Blogging Wizard)
  19. Testimonials and reviews on landing pages build trust and are trusted by 9 out of 10 customers. (Blogging Wizard)
  20. A one-second delay in page loading reduces conversions by 7%. (Tech Jury)

 Webinar Statistics

  1. 73% of B2B marketing leaders say webinars are the best way to generate high-quality leads. (Zippia)
  2. 57% of marketers use webinars in their marketing efforts. (Zippia)
  3. 91% of webinar attendees feel that a live Q&A session is crucial. (Zippia)
  4. 58% of marketers use webinars for promotion. (Luisa Zhou)
  5. 32% of all webinars are training webinars. (Luisa Zhou)
  6. 45% of webinar attendees attend more than one webinar per week. (Luisa Zhou)
  7. 60% of webinars are designed to create customer engagement. (99 Firms)
  8. 20-40% of webinar attendees turn into qualified leads. (99 Firms)
  9. 67% of webinars are designed to increase brand awareness. (99 Firms)
  10. 87% of marketers use visuals in their webinars. (RingCentral)
  11. 83% of marketers prefer webinars for their content marketing strategy. (RingCentral)
  12. 64% of users will watch a webinar for up to an hour. (RingCentral)
  13. The percentage of webinar attendees is 40-50% approximately. (Webinar Care)
  14. Around 40% of the total webinar audiences convert into lead generation. (Webinar Care)
  15. In the case of B2B marketing, webinar hosts make the most out of it. 73% of the total attendees turn into lead generation. (Webinar Care)
  16. In B2C webinars, the lead generation survey shows 20% to 40%. (Webinar Care)
  17. Following the recent surveys, the overall conversion rates are from 40% to 55% in 2018. (Webinar Care)
  18. Only 2-5% of attendees purchase offers by the host at the end of the webinar. (Webinar Care)
  19. Be it B2B marketers or B2C, webinar content is massively used (around 60%) as a part of content marketing. (Webinar Care)
  20. Hosts have to spend at least $100 for conducting a webinar. The average webinar cost can go up to $3000. (Webinar Care)

Blog Statistics

  1. 77% of internet users read blogs regularly. (Ahrefs)
  2. 60% of consumers feel more positive about a company after reading custom content on its site. (Ahrefs)
  3. 36% of Fortune 500 companies have a public blog. (Ahrefs)
  4. 94% of people who share posts do so because they think it might be helpful to others. (Ahrefs)
  5. 68.5% of consumers feel more positive about a brand after consuming content from it. (Ryrob)
  6. 77% of internet users read blogs. (Ryrob)
  7. Websites with a blog have 434% more indexed pages. (Ryrob)
  8. 70% of consumers learn about a company through its blog versus ads. (FirstSiteGuide)
  9. 61% of U.S. online consumers have made a purchase based on recommendations from a blog. (FirstSiteGuide)
  10. Blogs have been rated as the 5th most trustworthy source for gathering online information. (FirstSiteGuide)
  11. 60% of marketers reuse content two to five times. (OptinMonster)
  12. 70% of marketers are actively investing in content marketing. (OptinMonster)
  13. 409 million people view more than 20 billion pages each month on WordPress. (OptinMonster)
  14. There are more than 600 million blogs on the internet. (Blogging Wizard)
  15. Over 2 million blog posts are published on a daily basis. (Blogging Wizard)
  16. There are 31.7 million bloggers in the US alone. (Blogging Wizard)
  17. Internet users leave around 77 million comments per month on blog posts. (Blogging Wizard)
  18. It takes around 3 hours 55 minutes to write a blog post on average. (Blogging Wizard)
  19. 2164 words is the median length of blog posts in 2021. (Blogging Wizard)
  20. At least 54% of Fortune 500 companies have public-facing blogs. (Blogging Wizard)

Video Marketing Statistics

  1. 85% of all internet users in the United States watched online video content monthly on any of their devices. (Oberlo)
  2. 54% of consumers want to see more video content from a brand or business they support. (Oberlo)
  3. 87% of marketing professionals use video as a marketing tool. (Oberlo)
  4. 88% of video marketers reported that video gives them a positive ROI. (Wyzowl)
  5. 95% of video marketers plan to increase or maintain their spend on video in 2023. (Wyzowl)
  6. 86% of businesses use video as a marketing tool, up from 63% in 2017. (Wyzowl)
  7. 93% of brands got a new customer because of a video on social media. (Wyzowl)
  8. 96% of people have watched an explainer video to learn more about a product or service. (HubSpot)
  9. 84% of people say that they’ve been convinced to buy a product or service by watching a brand’s video. (HubSpot)
  10. 79% of people say a brand’s video has convinced them to buy a piece of software or app. (HubSpot)
  11. 81% of businesses prefer to use Facebook for their video marketing. (InVideo)
  12. 90% of Twitter video views happen on a mobile device. (InVideo)
  13. YouTube is the second most popular website after Google. (InVideo)
  14. 85% of businesses use video as a marketing tool. (Blogging Wizard)
  15. 92% of marketers make videos with assets they already have. (Blogging Wizard)
  16. 99% of marketers who already use video say they’ll continue to do so. (Blogging Wizard)
  17. 72% of customers would rather learn about a product or service by way of video. (Neal Schaffer)
  18. 5 billion videos are watched on YouTube every single day. (Neal Schaffer)
  19. 50% of viewers aged 18-34 would stop what they’re doing to watch a new video by their favorite YouTube creator. (Neal Schaffer)

Lead Generation Statistics

  1. “53% of marketers spend approximately 50% of their budget generating leads.” (Salesmate)
  2. “80% of marketers believe marketing automation is crucial in generating massive leads.” (Salesmate)
  3. “The US digital lead generation market will reach approximately $3.2 billion by 2023.” (Salesmate)
  4. “66% of marketers generate quality leads by spending 6 hours per week doing social media marketing.” (Salesmate)
  5. “The amount of money spent on digital lead generation advertising in the US is 3.05 in 2021.” (Popupsmart)
  6. “According to the Demand Gen Report, 53% of marketers believe that email is the most effective channel for early-stage lead generation.” (Popupsmart)
  7. “In a recent study, it was found that 49% of companies are using marketing automation tools as part of their marketing efforts.” (Popupsmart)
  8. “80% of B2B marketers consider lead generation to be the top goal of their content marketing.” (Popupsmart)
  9. “61% of marketers say generating high-quality leads is their biggest challenge.” (Startup Bonsai)
  10. “80% of marketers use lead generation metrics to prove return on investment.” (Startup Bonsai)
  11. “79% of B2B marketers credit email as the most effective distribution channel for demand gen efforts.” (Startup Bonsai)
  12. “53% of marketers allocate at least half of their budget to lead generation.” (Startup Bonsai)
  13. “61% of marketers say generating traffic and leads is their top challenge.” (Blogging Wizard)
  14. “53% of marketers spend at least half of their budget on lead generation.” (Blogging Wizard)
  15. “Only 10% of marketers are very confident in their lead nurturing process.” (Blogging Wizard)
  16. “80% of new leads never translate into sales.” (Blogging Wizard)
  17. “Companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales-ready leads at a 33% lower cost.” (Ruler Analytics)
  18. “Nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured leads.” (Ruler Analytics)
  19. “Companies that blog generate 67% more leads.” (MarketSplash)

FAQs about Inbound Marketing

What is Inbound Marketing?

Inbound marketing is a marketing tactic that attracts customers by creating valuable and relevant content. 

Inbound marketing works by drawing potential customers in (inbound) with quality content that interests them instead of outwardly pushing a brand, product, or service. 

What Are the Benefits of Inbound Marketing?

Inbound marketing has many benefits with the most notable being a significantly lower customer acquisition cost. 

Outside of customer acquisition cost, inbound marketing can also increase brand awareness, be cost-effective, bring in higher quality leads, and help build stronger relationships with your audience.

Over time Inbound marketing builds a sense of trust between your brand and the customer. 

Most importantly, you have to have an all-around solid product or service.

Inbound marketing is the most effective when you take a product-led approach with your content. 

So not only creating high-value content but also creating content that leverages your product or service and shows how the reader exactly why they need it. 

Now this doesn’t mean you’re pitching your product, you’re moreso showcasing your product and ultimately helping the reader understand how this product can help them reach their goals and/or fix their problems. 

That’s why inbound marketing is so effective for SaaS. 

Customers are constantly looking for solutions through search, so with inbound, you’re not only positioning your company as a thought leader, but you’re also positioning your company as the solution for your audiences problems. 

A big distinction is that your audience doesn’t care what your product does, they care about how your product can help them. 

Something that’s much harder to achieve with outbound marketing.

What are the Best Practices for Inbound Marketing? 

Best practices for inbound marketing include: 

  • creating high-quality, relevant content
  • optimizing your content for search
  • leveraging social media by posting quality content consistently
  • personalizing customer experiences by leveraging market research and audience data.

Which Tools Are Best for Inbound Marketing? 

(HubSpot), Google Analytics, Mailchimp, and SEMrush are some of the best tools for inbound marketing. Each tool is different in one way or another. 

(HubSpot) is more of an all-around inbound marketing tool. Google Analytics is used to track user data. Mailchimps is used to create newsletters and SEMrush can be used for keyword/content topic research. 

Why is Inbound So Effective? 

Inbound marketing is effective because it perfectly aligns with consumer purchasing decisions and how they develop trust with a brand. 

Inbound marketing strategies allow customers to find the information they need at multiple touchpoints in each channel. 

Brands can’t expect to create one piece of content and then reap the rewards. Inbound marketing is an ongoing effort that captures your target audience at every touchpoint, including both search and social. 

This requires consistency and quality at scale, which can be very hard to accomplish. 

So this means posting helpful and relevant content on social media, creating high-value content at every search touch point (this means being present for every relevant search), and engaging your existing audience through email marketing. 

You’re not paying for an audience, you’re capturing and building an audience. 

Is Inbound Marketing Better Than Outbound Marketing? 

While both inbound marketing and outbound marketing have their pros and cons, inbound marketing is often considered better since it generally leads to more qualified leads and better customer relationships at a fraction of the cost.

For inbound, you’re only paying for the operational cost to create that content. With outbound, you’re paying advertising costs on top of operational costs to capture that lead. 

Not to mention that inbound leads are typically higher quality too, especially if the customer has been engaging with your brand for a while. 

Inbound is a longer-term strategy, but it will become the most consistent strategy if your brand messaging, SEO, content, social, and email were executed properly. 

What’s a Good Conversion Rate for Inbound Leads? 

A good conversion rate for inbound leads typically falls between 2-5%, but this can easily vary depending on the industry, the quality of the content, and the effectiveness and execution of the marketing strategy.

Why is Inbound Marketing Cheaper? 

Inbound marketing is typically cheaper than traditional marketing because it leverages digital platforms and content creation without the financial investment of advertising. 

Pair that with the long-term delivering nature of inbound, like SEO, and you have a significantly lower customer acquisition cost. 

For SEO, the only cost you have to factor into CAC is the total SEO budget. Say if you pause your SEO budget, the CAC for SEO will continually drop as no additional costs are factored in while leads are still coming in. 

On the flip side, PPC only puts out what you put in. Meaning, the moment you turn off your ad spend, your ad loses all its visibility.  

So while PPC and SEO might have similar CACs in the beginning, SEO will eventually start compounding while PPC will remain as a flat line. This is why the ROI of SEO is always seen as positive.

What is the Average Cost Per Lead in Inbound Marketing? 

The average cost per lead in inbound marketing is between $25-$50. However, the average cost per lead in inbound marketing can vary heavily based on the industry, but it’s still generally lower than outbound marketing. 

Are There Any Downsides to Inbound Marketing? 

Potential downsides of inbound marketing include the time investment required to create this content, the need for ongoing SEO efforts like link building and technical SEO, and the challenge of standing out in a crowded digital space.

These downsides will depend heavily on the industry. As an example, it’s significantly harder to get visibility in the legal space compared to a company that sells exterior signage for sports stadiums. 

It’s a weird and random example I know, but the more niched down you are, the more success you’ll have with standing out. 

What Are The Limits of Inbound Marketing? 

Inbound marketing can be limited by factors such as the time it takes to see results, the time it takes to implement, and audience reach.

With outbound, you have more flexibility in finding the right audience. Whether it’s social ads, display ads, or Google ads, you have more flexibility with targeting them whereas inbound is focused more on attracting and capturing audiences.

So in other words, outbound marketing you can go out to meet your audience, and inbound you have to capture your audience in very select channels. 

What Are Some Examples of Companies That Do Inbound Marketing Right?

Companies like (HubSpot), Airbnb, and Shopify are excellent examples of inbound marketing done right. Each company has unique approaches to leveraging content creation, SEO, and social media, which helps them attract and convert customers.

Specifically (HubSpot), which is known as an industry leader in the digital marketing space. They’re very active on LinkedIn with posting quality content, they publish 100s of articles per month, and they have a dedicated following via their newsletter. 

They even have an entire course dedicated to inbound marketing. I highly recommend it since it’s free and you even get a certification after completing it. 

What Percentage of Leads Should Be Inbound? 

While it can vary based on the business model and industry, a healthy marketing strategy often sees around 70-90% of leads coming from inbound marketing. 

What’s the Difference Between Inbound Marketing and Outbound Marketing? 

As mentioned previously, inbound marketing focuses on attracting customers with content through unpaid mediums, while outbound marketing involves more traditional methods like paid ads to push a product or service.

Inbound Marketing Statistic References

Last updated on October 26, 2023