Inbound vs. Outbound Marketing

Today I had a great conversation with a recruiter talking about a marketing position with a very interesting company.  There was one very awkward moment for me when he said they needed someone more heavily into outbound marketing as opposed to inbound marketing.  I hope I didn't look like a deer in the headlights, because it really took me off guard.  I haven't thought of marketing in those terms in a very long time.   I view the marketing conversation as a two way street.  A full duplex kind of thing.  And totally integrated with the entire company: sales, operations, development, support, etc. 

Something Doc wrote a while back puts it in context for me:

A bazaar is a real market: a chaotic and noisy public place where all the reciprocal abstractions of economics -- supply and demand, production and consumption -- are a handshake apart. In real markets, the clues from customers have a lot more impact on vendors than any vendor's "marketing strategy" has on "consumers." Since marketing likes to be "strategic" and doesn't like to touch customers (that's sales' job), it becomes progressively more useless in the bazaar environment. "Consumer marketing" becomes an antique conceit and something else takes its place. Something that involves participation in markets at a much deeper, more organic level.

Even if your "product" is pretty well defined, when you talk to people about it (be it whitepapers, through analysts, articles, customer talks, blogs.....), you find that they all come from different places and are interested in different things.  It's the blind men and the elephant in reverse.  Some people like trunks.  Some people like legs.  It's the same "product" but you really need to be listening to what they are interested so you stay relevant to their part of the conversation.  To me the distinction between inbound and outbound marketing blurs.

Comments

[Richard Villasana]

I understand outbound marketing. I must have been outside when they talked about inbound marketing so I would appreciate if someone can offer some insights or further clarification on inbound marketing. As for listening to customers, I ask lots of questions which is hard because there's always the urge to tell the story rather than shut up and listen.

[Mike Volpe]

I'm a big believer that outbound marketing is going away and inbound marketing really is a new trend and the future of marketing best practices.

Here is an article comparing Inbound Marketing to Outbound Marketing. http://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/2989/Outbound-vs-Inbound-Marketing.aspx

[Chuckle Head]

Marketing strategy determines the choice of target market segments, positioning, marketing mix, and allocation of resources.The key direction is customer segments .