Weird Data: Outbound Marketers Say Outbound Marketing “Overrated”

For the past seven years marketing software company HubSpot has published an extensive annual research report called State of Inbound. The report includes data collected from marketing professionals on their biggest challenges, priorities, and the tactics they utilize to meet their goals. HubSpot favors a less traditional brand of marketing, known as inbound marketing, that has been growing rapidly in popularity over the last several years. Inbound marketing differs from conventional ‘outbound’ marketing in that it employs useful content to attract visitors and engage them with your company on their own terms, rather than using tactics such as interruptive ads to attract customers who may or may not be interested in your brand.

This year’s State of Inbound report contains an interesting chart on what both inbound and outbound marketers consider the most overrated marketing channels:

As you can see, strangely, the two most overrated channels according to both inbound and outbound markers alike are paid offline and online advertising. Together, these two methods make up the bedrock of traditional outbound marketing. What does this mean? Even outbound marketers are beginning to see how ‘overrated’ outbound marketing techniques are in today’s marketplace. Though companies with larger budgets still have the ability to spend large amounts on paid advertising, creating compelling content that appeals to targeted demographics continues to show better ROI than a one size fits all, outbound advertising approach. Want to learn more about the growth of inbound marketing and other trends in the marketing industry? Download the full 2015 State of Inbound report below.

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