Why Media Companies Need to Drop Tradition and Embrace the Inbound Movement

Things have fundamentally changed in the media industry, and I’m excited to have the privilege on November 8^th to discuss why inbound marketing will be critical to the next evolutionary phase for media companies.

Currently, a majority of the media companies (TV, Radio, Print etc.) are not using inbound marketing (blogging, thought leadership, lead generation, email marketing and social media) as part of their strategy to increase the number of leads their salespeople are getting—or leveraging it as a way to drive a more retainable revenue stream via their service and advertising offerings.  
As media companies have had to adapt to doing business in the age of the Internet, and new competition for ad dollars has emerged from small marketing services firms, SEO experts, and social media gurus, traditional media companies should be looking at new ways to structure their sales teams and client offerings with a focus on digital marketing services, not new “innovations” in online advertising.

Everyone has tried to find a way to make online advertising alone replace what was a nearly five decade run of revenue that came month over month from traditional media. The trouble is that companies who measure ROI are going online. These companies have many options in the online venue, so you cannot simply expect to get them to spend the same in traditional online offerings.

To be successful selling to these businesses, you’ll need to figure out how to deliver more ROI and differentiate yourself and your company. The way some media companies are doing this is by expanding into marketing services. At this stage, very few media companies have figured it out. Meanwhile... over the imaginary fence, thousands of marketing agencies have figured it out and gotten a head start.

During my presentation at the Inbound Marketing Forum on November 8^th, “Crush the Competition & Book More Appointments with Inbound Marketing” I intend to tell the story of how you can leverage inbound marketing to drive more sales appointments for your sales team, develop deeper client relationships, and discuss how you can develop a successful marketing services firm inside your traditional media company.

In the meantime, if you are looking for information on why Inbound Marketing is important to media companies, you can download the Quality Leads eBook, designed to help media salespeople increase the number of quality appointments they go on each week.

Corey Beale is a Sales Manager at Hubspot. You can follow him on Twitter.