Jon DiPietro is Domesticating IT

Brian Halligan presenting at Inbound Marketing Summit 2011

One of the first presentations came from Brian Halligan, co-founder and CEO of Hubspot. As one of the people who literally wrote the book on inbound marketing, it makes sense that he would give us his vision of the future of inbound marketing. He didn’t disappoint!

Shifting the Funnel

Brian began with a review of inbound marketing and its effects on marketing. In the beginning, he said, sales reps had all the power. They controlled the information flow with catalogs and collateral. If the buyer wanted information, they had make the sales rep part an integral part of the buying cycle.

Not anymore. The sales process (more often than not) now begins with an Internet search. The buyer has all of the information and, therefore, the power. This has shifted the sales funnel and requires a new approach, since the buyer now keeps the seller at arms reach.

Top of the Funnel

Inbound marketing 1.0 was about expanding the top of the sales funnel. By creating remarkable content, optimizing it for search, promoting it via social media and building effective landing pages, businesses can expand the top of the funnel. It’s not just about generating more visits – it’s about generating more qualified visits. Good inbound marketing achieves exactly that.

Middle of the Funnel

Where inbound marketing 1.0 is about expanding the top of the funnel, version 2.0 is about improving the conversion rates throughout the funnel. Halligan spoke about the gaps in the funnel and losses from them:

The aim of inbound marketing 2.0 is to reduce those losses as much as possible and to improve the conversion rates throughout. So how do we do that? Like so many other answers to business questions, it’s “Do what successful companies are doing.” Halligan points to companies like Amazon, Google and Netflix as examples. What’s one secret to their success? Personalization. The more you use their services, the better the user experience becomes and the more value users gain from it.

LinkedIn profile percent complete - irresistible

The inbound marketing takeaway is to keep track of every activity your lead takes on your site and personalize that marketing experience. The more I use your website, the more personalized it gets. The more personalized it gets, the more valuable it is. The more valuable it is, the more likely I am to convert to a customer. One example he offers is the “percent complete” profile builder on LinkedIn. “It’s irresistible!” Halligan insists.

And he suggests you incorporate similar marketing profiles into your websites. The entire goal is to segment the crap out of your leads toward the ultimate goal, which I think is absolutely brilliant:

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Weekly High Five lists the most interesting, compelling, and/or useful links of each week.

Amazingly, this week’s High Five largely ignores the iPad announcement.  This is a reflection of how important I believe it to be, since I’ll be blogging about that in the upcoming week.  Instead, this week’s links are focused on digital rights and net neutrality.

#5: Settlement Rejected in ‘Shocking’ RIAA File Sharing Verdict

I’ve been following this case for quite some time, and the defense team seems to feel like they have the courts on their side.  Having the judgement reduced from $1.92 million to $54,000 is still not enough for them, as evidenced by their decision to reject a settlement offer of $25,000 from the RIAA.  That the settlement was even offered seems to indicate that the RIAA is also concerned that the courts are on the side of the defendant.

Link: Wired

#4: iPad is iBad for freedom

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) has organized an online petition named “Defective by Design,” asserting that Apple’s implementation of Digital Restriction Management (DRM) goes too far and will restrict the distribution of free software by disallowing applications to run on the iPad unless they are downloaded from the Application Store.

Link: Free Software Foundation

#3: Mozilla leader worries about Internet limits

Mitchell Baker, leader of the Mozilla Project, expressed concern over “the increase in laws that make it difficult to run an open network,” and especially over rules concerned with policing content.  She spoke at the opening of athree-day conference on digital innovation and creative ideas in Munich, Germany.

Link: Yahoo! Finance

#2: Netflix to FCC: scary loophole in net neutrality rules

While they generally support the proposed nondiscriminatory rules put forth by the FCC, Netflix‘s general counsel is expressing concern over a potential loophole. “In short, if left unchecked, the ‘managed services’ category could engulf the Commission’s open Internet policies altogether” and let ISPs end run any regulations.  This is no small matter given blurring between content providers and Internet service providers as exemplified with the sale of NBC Universal to Comcast.

Link: ReadWriteWeb

#1: Australia bans graphic games … sort of

The final story in this theme is a cautionary tale of unintended consequences.  Australia has passed a series of laws attempting to restrict adult content from children.  This story shows that the laws have, in fact, increased the amount of adult content reaching children age 15 and under in games like Call of Duty 2: Modern Warfare.

Link: Global Post

Feel free to provide your thoughts and/or contributions…

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Oklahoma Bricktown Land Run

By now, many people are familiar with Cybersquatting – a process whereby a person registers a domain name in bad faith with the intent of reselling it later for a profit. Recent legislation has made it easier for trademark holders and famous persons to obtain their domains from squatters, but the process is by no means full-proof (just ask Kevin Spacey and Bruce Springsteen).
However, this is just one layer of an increasingly complex wired world…

I Registered, Therefore I Am

All large and most small/medium/micro businesses (though still not enough) are finally coming to the realization that online invisibility is a tremendous liability. But what about your personal online visibility? Many people have registered their personal names as domain names. Indeed, most domain registrars beat you over the head with requests to do so. But this article is about far more than domain names – that ship pretty much sailed years ago along with Gmail and Hotmail addresses. This is about establishing your online homesteads to be prepared for the current and future waves of social networking.

“Do you have a flag?”

This is a brilliant and hilarious skit by comedian Eddie Izzard. He satirizes imperialistic England, who claimed ownership over indigenous civilizations “through the cunning use of flags.” And so it goes with the new wired world – possession, as they say, is nine tenths of the law. You need to claim as much territory as possible as soon as possible and all you need is a flag: your name.

More and more every day, web sites are becoming tools for learning more about individuals. Sites like LinkedIn and VisualCV are becoming de facto online résumés. Blogger and WordPress are windows into peoples’ expertise and opinions. Flickr, Delicious, and Netflix allow people to share their interests and experiences. Of course, there are the mothers of all personal identity sites; Facebook and MySpace. Finally, there are aggregators like FriendFeed and Plaxo that attempt to tie them all together. You may utilize few if any of these sites right now, but do you want to bet your online future on the fact that you never will?

He Who Hesitates Is Lost

I’m fortunate in the sense that my name is not all that common. My identity is pretty readily available on most platforms. However, I’m not leaving it to chance. I registered my domain name years ago and have been on a land-grabbing tear recently, snatching up my identity on any site with which I come into contact regardless of whether or not I think I will use it. It’s the sports equivalent of “the best offense is a good defense.” I firmly believe that more and more prospective employers and customers will be using online searches for individuals sooner rather than later. If nothing else, don’t let them find the other “Jane Smith” before you.

On Your Mark, Get Set, Register

If you’re new to social networking and/or personal branding you may have no idea where to begin and that’s understandable. In my opinion, these are the top priorities:

• General
  • Domain name (e.g. www.janesmith.com)
  • Email (e.g. [email protected], [email protected])
  • Twitter (e.g. twitter.com/janesmith)
• Professional
  • LinkedIn (e.g. www.linkedin.com/in/janesmith)
  • Blogger (e.g. janesmith.blogger.com)
  • WordPress (e.g. janesmith.wordpress.com)
  • Technorati (e.g. www.technorati.com/people/tecnorati/janesmith)
• Personal
  • Facebook (e.g. www.facebook.com/people/JaneSmith)
  • YouTube (e.g. www.youtube.com/user/janesmith)
• Sharing and Aggregating
  • FriendFeed (e.g. friendfeed.com/JaneSmith)
  • Delicious (e.g. delicious.com/JaneSmith)
  • Digg (e.g. dig.com/users/JaneSmith)
  • Flickr (e.g. www.flickr.com/photos/janesmith)

Have I left anything out?

Photo credits:
‘Oklahoma Bricktown Land Run’ courtesy of Serge Melki from Flickr (creative commons)

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