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If you're like most general contractors, HVAC, electricians, or plumbers, you probably rely reasonably heavily on word of mouth marketing to generate new leads. Why shouldn't you? You put in years honing your skills, and hopefully you have a good reputation! The problem is that those leads may start to dry up as people look online to find information and companies.

Also gone are the days of having ads in the phonebook and billboards to gain traction and win business. Having an online presence and using content marketing techniques is key to being found these days. In fact, a recent study by Pew Research Center reports that 77% of Americans are online daily!

Content marketing uses online channels to attract customers during various stages of the purchase funnel. With content marketing, customers start the conversation, and you can create targeted content that makes it easier for people to find you online.

In the third quarter of 2019, we surveyed 100 respondents from various walks of life regarding their purchasing habits and how they determine from whom they will buy the products they need. What we learned is traditional marketing is dying, and the phone book is dead. Businesses using the television, newspaper, radio, billboards, and the phone book to advertise are often throwing their marketing money away. We also found that companies can make the most of their budgets by turning the majority of their resources to digital marketing. 

In this article, we are going to share some of the key findings of our survey and how your business can benefit from the proven ROI of inbound marketing strategies and quality search engine optimization. 

I've never considered myself a salesman, but that's what I've done to grow our web design business over the past 14 years. When we became a HubSpot Partner Agency in 2018, we were signing up for a platform that would help us grow our clients' businesses through great marketing & sales software and business support.

Our HubSpot channel account manager, Katie Carlin, turned me on to the Pipeline Generation Bootcamp led by HubSpot sales director Dan Tyre. If you hear us use the term "Smarketing," he's the one who coined the term that combines sales and marketing into one important team.

Recession. That is not a word you want to hear around your office. Though it is part of the economic cycle, that makes it no less scary for business owners. It has been a little over a decade since The Great Recession, but many parts of the country are still feeling the effects. From rural towns and in North Carolina to metropolitan centers like Detroit, some businesses never and communities still have not recovered. 

Are we approaching another recession? Economists believe there is a good chance the next one will come as soon as 2020, after the presidential election. One of the best practices to protect your business from an economic downturn or recession is effective content marketing. In this article, we will discuss four steps toward recession-proof content marketing: