More than just a buzz word “In-bound Marketing” represents a big shift in how businesses big and small can attract more customers. The book of the same name by Brian Halligan (@bhalligan) & Dharmesh Shah (@dharmesh) goes into great depth in explaining how, particularly, start-ups can leap-frog over their rivals by practicing in-bound marketing techniques.

The main concept is where companies looking to sell their products and services move away from traditional marketing methods like direct mail, TV ads, trade shows and websites that are just a list of products (“Out-bound Marketing”) to a customer-centric program that attracts clients based on engaging them with compelling content. This In-bound Marketing provides the potential customer with something that is of interest and of value to them. Then as people conduct their on-line search for your particular product or service your site will organically beat out the competition who haven’t changed their approach in 15 years!

Because its primarily an on-line program In-bound Marketing feeds very nicely into the whole world of social media where people can “like” and “tweet” about your product or services, widening your potential stream of new clients at no additional charge to you. Read more at www.hubspot.com or talk to me if you’d like to start implementing some In-bound Marketing practices on your own site.