From Impossible to Inevitable, 2nd Edition

CHAPTER 6Nets—Marketing

Nets are one-to-many campaigns to generate leads, with tactics like inbound marketing, in-person and online events, and online advertising (Figure 6.1). EchoSign, HubSpot, and Marketo have all driven $100 million–plus businesses mostly through Nets.

FIGURE 6.1 What content is loved by your market and creates measurable results?

These leads create quantity over quality, because you're literally “casting a wide net.” For example, if 50% of word-of-mouth leads (Seeds) might turn into customers, perhaps 1%–3% of marketing-generated leads will convert into customers. So, you want a lot more of them.

Out of a trillion ways to market, inbound marketing (or content marketing) is the most popular kid in school. It works, and it works for every company—unlike, say, outbound prospecting. The idea is creating marketing that customers love or learn from, inspiring them to want more from you, eventually buying your stuff.

But … inbound marketing has matured enough that we can see the dark side: “inbound lead dependency” and reactive cultures. Marketing entrepreneur Meena Sandhu dives into this in the next section, and introduces Outbound Marketing, in “Three Uncommon Approaches of Hypergrowth CMOs.”

Still, every business benefits from creating content. Beyond creating leads, making your ideas and customer stories public speeds “time to trust.” People get to know ...