INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION

Your Exam Study Guide

The following guide walks through key lessons from
each of the nine inbound marketing certification
courses. Use this as you prepare for your exam.



Attract

Optimizing Your Website
I. What is optimization and why you need it
Setting your website up for success
-there are different types of optimization
-un-optimized sites do not Attract, Convert, Close or Delight
II. Who are you optimizing your site for?
Optimize for both website visitors & search engines
-focus on buyer personas to get the right website visitors
-75% of users never scroll past the first page of search results
III. How to optimize your website
Understand your buyer persona(s) & prioritize them
-who are your most promising/lucrative buyer personas, and what
services/products appeal most to them?
Build an experience that speaks to them and search engines
-build a world-class website experience
-tell your companys story through content, design and optimization
-tackle on-page SEO










INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
The Fundamentals of Blogging
I. Why blogs are essential to inbound marketing
Business blogs are different than personal blogs
-companies that blog see 55% more website traffic and 70% more leads
Great for SEO
-indexed pages, ability to rank for solutions to industry-related issues
-blogs convert leads and demonstrate authority, expertise and trust
II. Business blogging basics
Remarkable content is rewarded
-companies that blog have 97% more inbound links
-focus on your buyer persona primarily, not on Google
Blogging best practices
-pick a great title, address one topic per post, be a problem solver
-blog consistently and frequently, optimize for humans and search engines
-give your readers an opportunity to convert as a lead
III. Transforming your blog into a money-making machine
What to blog about
-long-tail keywords, recent industry/relevant news, customer questions, blog
comments, hot industry topics, repackage old content, invite guest bloggers
Ways to promote blog content
-leverage your website, use social media presence, email marketing, tap into your
network, PR releases, etc.
What to analyze / does it work?
-number of article views, blog subscription growth, most popular articles, inbound
links
-dont expect overnight success








INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
Amplifying Your Content with Social Media
I. Why inbound marketers need social media
Social media is more than just a trend
-Internet users spend 4x more time on Facebook than Google
Goal: social media helps increase visits, leads & customers
-indexed pages, ability to rank for solutions to industry-related issues
-share landing pages to direct visitors into your funnel
-build relationships, offer great customer service, grow reach, humanize your brand
Social proof
-an extension of search, adding relevance and authority
-like votes for your website
II. Social engagement strategies: why you must have one
Finding the right people
-personas are key; content blasts do not work
-mindset divide
Choosing the right network for the right content
-each network has its own personality
The big 4
-Twitter, the buzz generator: more informal and need less rapport to establish a
connection
-Facebook, the humanizer: less frequent but more valuable updates, like a
business page to receive their updates
-Linkedin, the professional: more formal, share industry and business-focused
content
-Google+, the search optimizer: GREAT for local search optimization, +1 buttons can
improve click-through rates








INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
III. How to engage the right people in the right ways
Building reach
-follow, friend and connect; share links; set up automatic publishing
The cocktail party rule
-treat your social media like being at a cocktail party; you dont want to be the
person in the middle of the room only talking about yourself; meet others, share
stories
Leverage a variety of content
-include keywords, always include a link
-new content, others content, lead generation content, breaking news, etc.


Convert

Creating Content with a Purpose
I. Why inbound marketing cant exist without content
Content marketings DNA
-60% of the sales cycle is over before a buyer talks to your salesperson
-remarkable content leads to a lower cost per lead
II. Creating content that your ideal buyers love
Solution, not product-based
-buyer personas are the basis of inbound content
Map content to the right lifecycle stage
-the 10:4:1 rule
Content is more than text
-creating visual content for visual platforms






INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
III. How to make content that converts
Content quality is the most important factor with conversion rates
-conduct content surveys and build clear conversion paths
Social conversion and social proof


The Anatomy of a Landing Page
I. What are landing pages/why you need them on your website
What are landing pages
-specifically designed to convert visitors to leads
-98% of all website visitors never come back to your website
Landing pages are like digital sales reps
-work for you 24/7
-gather information about your buyer personas for marketing and sales
All leads are not created equal
-vast majority of people are not ready to buy from you
-understand the buying process to build effective landing pages: perform research,
establish buying criteria, evaluate vendors
II. Make landing pages with your ideal buyer in mind
III. How to make landing pages that work for you
Landing page infrastructure
-conversion process = call-to-action, landing page and thank you page
Effective landing page framework
-clear, concise, compelling headlines; explain the value & importance of the offer to
your persona; use bullet points; select the appropriate number of form fields;
remove navigation and links; include a relevant image or video; add testimonials
when relevant; leverage industry awards/recognition
-measure submission rate to understand landing pages success





Perfecting the Conversion Experience

INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
I. Why the conversion process is so critical
Think about bookends
-CTA to landing page to thank you page
II. How to convert the right visitors into leads
Lead volume is irrelevant
-your goal is to attract the right kind of traffic by focusing on buyer personas
-what can you offer that person when they visit your website?
III. Mastering the CTA and thank you page
Calls-to-action guide people through your marketing process
-action oriented copy, consistent keywords with landing page, attention-grabbing,
appropriate on-page placement, and A/B testing
-use CTAs on every page of your website (except a landing page) to direct people
to your landing pages
The thank you page
-where a prospect goes after having submitted your landing page form
-deliver the offer, provide direction and next steps, send a follow-up email, include
social networking options
-test your calls-to-action and thank you pages to get the most value












INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
Close

Sending the Right Email to the Right Lead
I. Why email marketing is important
Email marketing as a profitable marketing channel
How to use email to build and to nurture relationships
-Each email you send should offer some component of value
-Build relationships: brand awareness & trust, lead generation, boost social
interaction
-Nurture relationships: drive sales, build customer loyalty, educate or upsell, track
marketing ROI
II. Segmenting your contact database
Target different buyer personas and people at different stages of the
buying process
Segment by geography, industry, content interest and more
III. How to create world-class emails
12 email marketing best practices
-Identify a specific goal, segment your list, personalize when possible, create
consistency between from name & from email address, use actionable
language, create clear & compelling subject lines and email copy, write mostly in
the second person, focus on benefits (not features), be brief, have a concise
signature and footer, test your email, analyze your email
9 of the most popular email marketing metrics
-Bounce rate, deliverability rate, list growth, click-through rate, email sharing,
conversion rate, revenue per email, open rate, unsubscribe rate
-Most important metric = conversion rate
5 different types of emails that you can send leads and customers
-Email newsletter: summary of content, news, sent out regularly
-Email digest: tend to have a more simple design than a newsletter
-Stand-alone email: email blast to highlight a new marketing offer
-Lead nurturing email: great way to engage with targeted automation
-Transactional email: tend to have high click-through rate


INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
The Power of Smarketing
I. What is smarketing and why is it critical
Two halves of the same team
-companies with strong sales & marketing alignment get 20% more annual revenue
growth
II. Smarketing = Alignment
Alignment around goal
-marketing pipeline = sales quota
Alignment around personas
-communicating across company, educating each other
III. 5 steps to integrate smarketing into your organization
Speak the same language
-it all comes down to revenue; work backwards to identify leads needed
-define your funnel stages, the hand-off process, your sales-ready lead definition
and your persona
Set up closed-loop reporting
Implement a service level agreement (SLA)
-defines what each team commits to accomplishing
-how many leads of a certain quality does a sales rep need to make quota?
-how many call/email attempts should a sales rep make to every lead to not waste
leads?
Maintain open communication
-weekly smarketing meetings, monthly management meetings
-campaign and product/service communication
Rely on data






INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
Delight

Cultivating Happy Customers
I. Why delighting your customers is so important
Why customers quit doing business with your company
-68% (the majority) quit because of an attitude of indifference toward the customer
by the owner, manager or some employee
Delight your employees and they will delight your customers
Benefits of delighting your customers
-upsells, retention, customer success, word of mouth referrals and happy customers
II. Know your audience
What do customers value?
-quality, price, results and convenience
-customers arent loyal to the business, theyre loyal to what it stands for
Aligning around persona
-everyone in your company should be able to identify a customer by persona
III. How to delight your customers
The basics
-under promise and over deliver
-exceed (dont just meet) expectations
8 steps to delighting your customers
-train your employees; practice with your employees; listen to your customers first;
make sure you understand what they are telling you; ask questions; help solve their
problems; educate your customers; follow up with them
Measure and analyze results
-customer satisfaction score
-net promoter score (NPS)
-customer effort score



INBOUND MARKETING CERTIFICATION
Sample Exam Questions

Which of the following elements are important to test in a call-to-action?

A. Color
B. Text
C. Marketing Offer
D. All are important for testing


All visitors who download a given whitepaper or eBook are qualified
leads.

A. True
B. False


When you evaluate an email campaigns overall effectiveness, the
number that best reveals whether or not that email worked is the:

A. Deliverability rate
B. The click-through (or conversion) rate
C. Open rate
D. Bounce rate

According to both surveyed marketers and an official study by the
Direct Marketing Association, what is considered to be the most
profitable marketing channel?

A. Social media
B. Email marketing
C. Blogging
D. Website Optimization


Answers: D,B,B,B