Inbound Marketing Commandment #5: You Must Have Someone Responsible

As part of the LeadG2 series on "The 10 Commandments of Inbound Marketing" we will look at each of these ten commandments and why these principles are ones that you can’t ignore. The fifth of The 10 Commandments of Inbound Marketing is: You must have someone responsible for your inbound marketing program. (Tweet This)

Every successful inbound marketing program has someone accountable and in charge of the inbound marketing program. Note that even though many companies use inbound marketing agencies like LeadG2, there still should be someone that’s leading the charge and keeping the internal team moving in the right direction and at the right pace.

Responsible Not Just in Title, but Also in Actions

During the Inbound Marketing and Planning Day that we conduct with every new client, we emphasize the need for identifying someone responsible for a company’s inbound marketing program. The reason for having a designated person responsible is so that someone is ultimately accountable and can make important decisions.  

When you are just getting started planning your inbound marketing program, there's a lot of information to take in and lots to accomplish. You need to determine who is going to be involved in your inbound marketing program and what resources will be needed. You also have to determine who your target persona is, develop a content strategy, create a blog and find a way to get your content in front of prospects. That’s a lot to grasp, even before you push the publish button on your first blog post.

It’s at this point in the process that you need to have someone firmly in charge of guiding these efforts, making critical decisions, and putting everything together. While every company is different and not all advice should be followed "to the T," there are best practices to follow.

Defining Roles  

At this early stage in the planning process, having a few roles identified will make this planning process go more smoothly and create some clear lines of responsibility.

The first role that needs to be defined is the Blog Manager.  

The Blog Manager’s Role Includes:

• Maintaining and updating your content calendar.
• Learning and using the HubSpot software.
• Coordinating and motivating blog writers.
• Editing, optimizing, and publishing blog posts.
• Creating landing pages and conversion forms.
• Creating calls-to-action.
• Drafting lead nurturing emails and setting up workflows.
• Managing keywords and SEO efforts.
• Setting up lead scoring and distributing leads to sales for follow up.
• Setting up and managing social media outlets and messaging as part of promoting your blog.
• Building relationships with community contacts and organizations to help cross-promote your blog.

Another key role, as every successful inbound marketing effort needs a champion or executive ultimately responsible and accountable for results, is the Blog Publisher.

The Blog Publisher’s Role Includes:

• Ensuring that inbound marketing activities, blog posts, premium content, and the overall spirit of the blog is consistent with the blog pledge.
• Confirming that leads are being followed up on in a timely manner by facilitating ongoing communication between sales and marketing.
• Cultivating strategy and the direction of inbound efforts.
• Giving the final word on creative decisions, blog post topics, and other issues that may come up. For example: If there’s a controversial blog post written or one not exactly in line with the blog pledge - the publisher would decide whether to use it or not.
• Build relationships with community contacts and organizations to help cross-promote your blog
• Responsibility for the overall success of the inbound marketing efforts.

Making sure that roles and responsibilities of the Blog Manager and Blog Writers are being successfully carried out:

• Are blog writers hitting deadlines?
• Do you need to solicit more writers?
• Is your team adhering to the blog pledge and style guide?

Following this commandment doesn’t guarantee your success, but your chances of success are much higher than if you don’t have anyone on your team responsible for the results of your inbound marketing program.

The 10 Commandments of Inbound Marketing

1. Thou shall not put pen to paper before conducting research and understanding your target persona.  (Tweet This)
2. Sales must be involved in your inbound strategy at each stage from conception to implementation to follow up. (Tweet This)
3. Your website must be mobile optimized or responsive. (Tweet This)
4. You must have a written plan for lead follow up that’s agreed upon by both sales and marketing. (Tweet This)
5. You must have someone responsible for your inbound marketing program. (Tweet This)
6. Consistently be publishing content on your blog. (Tweet This)
7. You must have premium content (white papers, guides etc) on your website if you intend to generate leads. (Tweet This)
8. Do not ignore SEO / Organic search.  This is your website’s lifeblood. (Tweet This)
9. Thou shall not publish content for the sake of Google. Write for humans not Google. (Tweet This)
10. You must use a CRM. (Tweet This)

Make sure to subscribe to the LeadG2 blog to get each of The 10 Commandments of Inbound Marketing and other great blog content delivered to your inbox. Or you can download The 10 Commandments of Inbound Marketing, which includes all 10 of the blog posts and some added content.