Allbound: Is It Inbound vs. Outbound Anymore? Do Labels Matter?

This episode of HubHeroes took a delightfully unexpected turn as George, Max, and I dove headfirst into the evolving conversation around inbound and outbound marketing. What started as a playful exchange about who's driving the proverbial content car quickly escalated into a spirited debate over the merging of these two marketing worlds.

We've always been firm believers in the power of inbound, but as the landscape shifts, so too does our perspective. This discussion is not just about rebranding old tactics; it's about recognizing the need for a more holistic approach in today's complex marketing environment. We’re not just talking inbound or outbound anymore—we’re talking "allbound."

💥 Related Content:

• Inbound vs. Outbound Marketing: Which Is Better for Results?
• How HubSpot + Inbound Have Changed with Kyle Jepson of HubSpot

Together, we challenge the rigid boundaries that once defined our strategies and explore how blending the best of both worlds can create a more robust and effective marketing playbook. From the humorous banter about domain names to the serious business of redefining how we engage with our audiences, this episode is packed with insights and laughs that are sure to resonate with inbound marketers who are hungry to learn how they can stay on the leading edge of what works.

So, buckle up as we navigate through the semantic jungle of marketing buzzwords and uncover the real value in merging these once distinct approaches. Whether you're an inbound purist like Max, or someone who's always believed in a blended methodology, this episode will challenge your thinking and perhaps even inspire a new way of approaching your marketing strategy.

Keywords

inbound marketing, outbound marketing, blended methodology, customer-centric, personalized, cohesive experience, growth, lasting relationships, all bound, inbound marketing, outbound marketing, customer platform, holistic approach

Key Takeaways

• The concept of 'all bound' marketing combines the strengths of both inbound and outbound strategies.

• A more diverse toolbox is needed in today's marketing landscape.

• Creating a cohesive and personalized customer experience is crucial.

• The all bound strategy drives growth and builds lasting relationships with the audience.

• There is a distinction between outbound marketing and outbound sales. The concept of 'all bound' represents a combination of inbound and outbound marketing strategies.

• HubSpot may be introducing 'all bound' as a way to expand beyond the perception of being solely an inbound marketing tool.

• Inbound marketing enables outbound sales efforts by creating valuable content and attracting potential customers.

• A holistic approach to marketing and sales involves incorporating both inbound and outbound tactics to create a comprehensive customer platform.

• The industry is shifting and evolving, and it's important to adapt and embrace new strategies and concepts.

And so much more ... 

Additional Resources

• Why Go HubSpot? Your Free Ultimate Business Growth Guide
• Why Go HubSpot Service Hub?
• What Is Customer Delight + Who Is Responsible?
• How Have Inbound + HubSpot Changed?

Episode Transcript

George B. Thomas: There's no reason for that. Like, I can't wait till he's back. And I

Liz Moorehead: he will be coming back.

George B. Thomas: can, yes, and I can play the intro fully, but for right now, there's just

Max Cohen: I miss him.

George B. Thomas: I know, dude,

Liz Moorehead: you, Devon.

George B. Thomas: Devin. Yes, I was, I was talking to Liz about this the other day. I like man, uh, where is he like, come on, but you know, it is what it

Max Cohen: Hold on. There's just one thing, there's one, one thing that I wanna, that I wanna witness at Inbound this

George B. Thomas: oh, oh,

Max Cohen: thing that I have any vested interest in seeing happen It's not products on the, like new products on the stage we didn't hear about. It's not, you know, seeing friends and all this stuff.

It is watching the moment where Devin meets Ryan Reynolds.

George B. Thomas: oh, do you

Liz Moorehead: my god!

George B. Thomas: do you think he'll wear the Deadpool suit

Max Cohen: He f ing better. Cause if he doesn't, I don't know what to do. He's thinking.

George B. Thomas: I would be shocked. I'm

Max Cohen: that is just, Devin if you're listening, I need to be there at that moment just to see what you do. Um,

George B. Thomas: like, like, uh, like, you know, how girls like young girls are like a Bieber fan or like, or like, uh, like back in the day it was new kids on the block or, or like, I'm just, I'm in, yeah, yeah, I'm envisioning like, Or like a Swifty, like I'm envisioning Devin like, me not even knowing kind of

Max Cohen: he's a, he's a poolie.

George B. Thomas: the first couple minutes of like, ah, like,

Liz Moorehead: Like Donald Glover, it like, like Donald Glover when he was Troy in Community and he meets LeVar Burton for the first time and

Max Cohen: Yeah, that's what I think. I think it's gonna be

Liz Moorehead: It is, it's

Max Cohen: I don't know if he's gonna

George B. Thomas: a statue, a Devin statue in the middle of inbound like, oh,

Max Cohen: well.

George B. Thomas: yeah.

Liz Moorehead: will be healing folks. Nature will be healing, but we, we have a different, we have a, we have different conversation we needed to have

Max Cohen: Hmm. Oh,

Liz Moorehead: said the word of what we were going to be talking about today, you're like, yes, I like this. And Max went, well, I don't like this word, not necessarily what it represents, but we are going to have a little bit of a semantic argument.

And Max likes, we don't need to get into them.

Max Cohen: God.

Liz Moorehead: we do. Yes, we do. Because ladies and gentlemen, we are talking about the marriage. Of inbound and outbound today. That's what we're talking about. And this is a topic we've not necessarily danced around in that we've been avoiding it. It's more that, you know, we've had, we've had guests on who represent more outbound opportunities, right?

We've talked about direct mail. We talked about SMS texting. We even George, you and I, with our clients, we talk about the marriage of. Using paid advertising strategies to amplify inbound strategies, bringing those things together. And then when you and I had our conversation a few weeks ago with Kyle Jepson talking about how HubSpot had changed, how inbound is evolving, he brought up a term that I, I love a good branding term.

I don't like things like smarketing, but he said the word all bound. And I went, huh. And there's Max's feeling. Max, before we get into the conversation around the blending of inbound and outbound, could you, could you put, could you put some words to those sides? Like

Max Cohen: What, you want me to define them? I have no friggin idea how to define them. I mean, this is like one of those things where it's like, I remember we had that, uh, person on to come around and explain, um, you know, what, uh, account based marketing was. And I don't know if, like, we were all thinking the same thing, but I was sitting there just being like.

This guy just explained inbound, like it wasn't even like ABM, you know what I mean? And like, we talked about it. We had a conversation around it, but like, I don't know the, the all bound thing, like if all bound is just. I mean, I don't, I don't know how people are defining it, but if the answer is, it's doing inbound and outbound at the same time, I'm kind of sitting here just wondering like, Hey, when we were like getting all these people into the idea of like doing inbound, it's not like they stopped doing outbound.

So like, is this really a new concept? You know what I mean? And I feel like it's just another one of those things. To just be another marketing buzzword to fuel like the next generation of like AI assisted, you know, scraping and stuff like that, that it's just like, I don't know, it's kind of freaking me out a little bit, but I also don't know what it means.

But I just hate like, what has everyone already forgotten about? Near bound that we were talking about, like not too long ago with the whole partner led motion. Yeah, exactly.

Liz Moorehead: I am today years old hearing about

Max Cohen: was here. Right. Especially when, um, reveal was talking about, there was this whole near bound thing.

And then I heard Matt bullying over at super love talking about like surround bound and like all this, I'm like, dude, how many bounds do we. Freaking need dude, and it's just like there's too many and i'm just like stop calling

Liz Moorehead: Surround bound sounds

Max Cohen: It's the it's the new putting dot ly or dot io at the end of your like business's name like I'm saying i'm not saying there's no dot right, but we're not we're we're we're no better, right?

But like I don't know just maybe I don't know what all bound is but yeah

George B. Thomas: So, so here's the thing. Like, well, first of all, I think we're going to have that conversation of kind of what it is, or at least when, when I hear the word and when Kyle says the word, where my brain goes, because I want to step back for a second. I want to talk about humans. Yeah. Yeah.

And usually us humans are good at one thing and not necessarily good at another. And what I mean by that, Max, is most humans, if you stop and think about it for a second, we're really good at living in the land of or we're going to do this. we're going to do that. And I will tell you that I can remember when people started talking about content marketing, then inbound marketing showed up, you would see articles, uh, about how print design is dead and it's dying and people quit placing ads in magazines.

And, um, you can drive down the road and because of what happened with inbound, uh, there are a plethora. Of wooden large boards that have nothing on him, uh, down the freeway because people did, or that we're going to do inbound because we're not going to do what, what we thought we were doing no longer works.

This is the new way. And again, humans live in the, or what, what I think we're talking about today is that business has, um, especially in today's environment, It's, there's no other word. It's fricking challenging. Like things are always changing. Humans are changing. Um, it's just crazy. And so I think what we're almost saying at a fundamental level is we have reached a point, not have we, but we have reached a point where like, it's less about or, and it's more about and, but, but when we're talking about the inbound and outbound, it's inbound. And outbound with modern buyer, human, human centric servant based strategies that can be measured in ways that historical air quotes outbound people weren't doing. So like it's a this and this with. Two X, three X amplifiers on the thing that we left behind long ago.

Liz Moorehead: So here's what I want to jump in here for a moment. So I know we're getting caught up in the semantics of it here. And Max, I do hear what you're saying. It's like every what, two

Max Cohen: There's a new bound,

Liz Moorehead: some marketers. Yeah. Somebody, somebody's running out of a, yeah. Somebody's running out of a, of a meeting going, I've got it guys.

I've got it. I spent a bunch of time with whiteboard and a marker and I figured it out. And they have a new name for something of something that we're already doing.

George B. Thomas: making fun of me right now?

Liz Moorehead: No, you just, you just like take a nap and

George B. Thomas: Whiteboard and

Liz Moorehead: like I have to watch, I can't, I can't leave you alone for too long or I'll start getting things like, hey, look, I wrote a whole book while you were asleep.

And I'm like, wait, what?

George B. Thomas: There might be a fourth company on the way, by the way, but anyway, okay.

Liz Moorehead: What's the third?

George B. Thomas: No, I'm just, well, we've got George B. Thomas LLC. We've got sidekick strategies and we've got beyond your default. We literally already have three companies, but there might

Max Cohen: And then, and then, and then George's, uh, wacky, uh, all bound Emporium. It's gonna be a new one. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: have wacky, waving, inflatable, arm flailing tube men?

George B. Thomas: Hang on. Let me let me let me check the let me check the domain if that's

Max Cohen: Yeah. George's, George's wacky, wild, all bound Emporium.

George B. Thomas: I'm gonna trademark

Liz Moorehead: can he set up a, can he set up a booth in club inbound with wacky waving

Max Cohen: see if someone's already bought all boundly. Yeah. Yeah. Please, I guarantee you,

George B. Thomas: boundly.

Max Cohen: boundly, no, no, no, you know what, I'm checking it, let's do it, yeah,

Liz Moorehead: it up. Allbound. ly, guys.

George B. Thomas: If it's available, there's a party happening like we're gonna pop

Max Cohen: be reached, let's see, uh, let's get a,

Liz Moorehead: um, I'm going to go daddy. Let's see what they got. What do we

George B. Thomas: real time domain searching. That's what you signed on for. Ladies and gentlemen, we're, we're literally

Liz Moorehead: Remember that time I was driving, remember that time I was driving the car? Oh my God, guys, it's unavailable. Somebody bought it.

Max Cohen: I f ing hate everything, dude, I

George B. Thomas: I

Max Cohen: f ing hate everything,

George B. Thomas: now.

Max Cohen: this is like, so like, God. And you know, they've probably gotten like seven, seven offers for like a million dollars for that domain. I literally hate everything. Oh, wow. IO is available according to Chad.

That's wild. That's going to be gone in two seconds. Chad, buy it, make a bag, dude.

George B. Thomas: Let me go buy that. Hang on. I'll be right back guys.

Max Cohen: Oh my god.

Liz Moorehead: okay. All right. Well,

George B. Thomas: grab that domain. I'll pay you back in sandwiches.

Max Cohen: I'll pay you back seven thousand dollars.

Liz Moorehead: pickle and peanut butter sandwiches or whatever

George B. Thomas: butter sandwiches at inbound. Yes. Yeah, let's go.

Max Cohen: Brother, eww.

Liz Moorehead: so

George B. Thomas: Not why we're here. We should we should who's driving this car.

Max Cohen: dude, Liz.

Liz Moorehead: I don't know. I, I, what are you talking about? I don't

Max Cohen: Ugh.

George B. Thomas: I don't even think we're in a car

Liz Moorehead: now.

George B. Thomas: now.

Liz Moorehead: No, well, let's get away from the semantics of it for a second, because I think you bring up a really good point, Max. Like we have this kind of like nomenclature, like, do we like the name? Do we not like the name? It doesn't really matter.

Let's step away from the name for a moment and talk about the principles behind it. Because we started. And the inbound ecosystem of like, outbounds bad, don't do it anymore. The only way is inbound. You have to earn everything. And we're starting to see this creep back toward the center. This starting to creep back toward moderation.

So George, I actually want to start with you for a moment. Has your position evolved with the idea of Inbound versus outbound or inbound and outbound. Like, did you start as a purist and then bring outbound methodologies back into the folder? Have you always been a, an all boundly kind of

George B. Thomas: No, God no. Um, literally when 2012 HubSpot inbound, I was like, and by the way, you have to remember I come from like print design, like first, like that's my mentor, Eric Jacobs literally was like, we were designed. And then in 2012, Uh, learning about HubSpot and inbound. I literally was a or guy, Max. That's why I brought that up.

Like, I'm like, Oh, uh, let's go do this thing. It's shiny and it's bright and it's inbound. And it makes sense because I hate fricking phone calls when I'm eating dinner and I, I hate spam messages and direct call like, yeah, let's hop on this train. And so literally to the point, if, and if you, if you've been in this space for a while, there didn't always used to be an ads tool. Cuz ads wasn't inbound, ladies and gentlemen. Like, and then all of a sudden the ads tool showed up. No, no, no. There was many a year where ads was looked at by inbound purists of like, Ooh, that's kind of like a, I don't know, that's interruptive. Interruptive

Max Cohen: no, I remember yeah

George B. Thomas: and, and, and so, so like I think about this and I literally was like an inbound purist and then all of a sudden it started to change and like some of the things that were just diehard tried and true inbound strategies all sudden you start to hear people, which sometimes they were doing it for effect.

X, Y, Z is dead and you're like, well, that's part of

Max Cohen: Yeah, yeah the best part the best part was when you'd see inbound marketing is dead and go read my blog post and download My ebook to tell you why and it's like you're insane

George B. Thomas: like dude or dudette, you're like an idiot. You're literally using the channel to talk about the thing that's dead. Anyway.

Liz Moorehead: No, my personal favorite, hold on. My personal favorite is when everybody was going after SEO is dead. Here's why, but it was called SEO is dead because that's the term that people were searching for. So they were only getting all the traffic to the SEO is dead content. By optimizing

Max Cohen: I hate everything, I hate everything.

George B. Thomas: so here's the thing though, right? If I think about this, then all of a sudden I started seeing things, uh, working with clients. Where all of a sudden there was these massive successes. Like, um, one historical client, we went ahead and did a print ad in a magazine and we sat back and we had like a, Oh God moment.

I have another client right now that one of the best sources for lead generation. I kid you not. And so all of these, like, historical, outbound tactics that people left to the wayside that all of a sudden got real quiet because there wasn't a lot of competition Now, the folks who that are have embraced inbound embrace the, uh, methodology philosophy of inbound, but also are starting to play or tease in these other non competitive areas that still have viewerships eyeballs can gain attention.

Now all of a sudden there's becoming this understanding that there's actually probably a healthy mix of certain strategies on both sides that when combined create potentially a more powerful strategy mix for a business than just inbound or just outbound. And therefore we get to coin a phrase that makes Max itch called.

All bound.

Liz Moorehead: Tell me more how you love that phrase, Max.

Max Cohen: Man, I don't love the phrase. I, I, uh, I mean, am I, so am I, just to like make sure like I'm understanding how we're defining it, is like, are we saying all bounded, oh my god, that's a huge spider, oh my god I don't like that at all. Um. Um.

George B. Thomas: yes. I

Max Cohen: Good god, how am I gonna do this now? Oh, anyway, alright, so, I mean, Is the way that I'm under Dude, there's a huge, huge f ing

Liz Moorehead: Are you just going to be worried the whole time? You're going to sit here, try to dispense like inbound advice. You're worried you're about to get eaten alive.

Max Cohen: spider just went by the f ing wall! Yeah! Oh my god, I saying before I saw that dog walk across my wall? Um, I think like the

George B. Thomas: You were saying like, how, how are we

Max Cohen: Yeah, like, so like, you know, if we kind of had to smooth brain this down just for me, like, is it, is, are we just saying like, all right, all bound is like, you're doing inbound plus you're not doing shitty outbound?

George B. Thomas: Well, here, here, here. Here's the deal. Like inbound

Max Cohen: Cause like, what, cause, hold on, because I feel like that's what I was telling everybody to do forever, even if they were doing inbound. So I'm like, me sitting here, I'm just like, wait, what is

George B. Thomas: been the creator, you. You might have been the creator of all bound you just didn't name

Liz Moorehead: Founder at inboundly. io.

Max Cohen: feel like I

George B. Thomas: founder of all bound dot

Max Cohen: I was just deploying common sense because when I would get customers that would have the marketing come and say Cool, here's a great way to like, you know Get folks leads that actually want to talk to you and they're like, you know I don't think anyone ever said should our sales people stop doing what they're doing and if they ever did say that be like No, this is just another way that they can get you know, better fleeds back then like

George B. Thomas: Well, first of all, we got to be careful because as much as I love the humans Sometimes when we use the word common sense

Max Cohen: Yeah, they ain't no they ain't

Liz Moorehead: sense ain't so common.

George B. Thomas: it's not so common sometimes, um, because we're, we're, again, we're really good at getting blinders on and following the shiny object and having the squirrel moments, but, but Max, if I can step back for a second.

Like when I think about inbound marketing, inbound marketing revolves around creating a man, a magnetic force. Literally, if you remember back many, well, several inbounds on stage, they've had some type of magnetic or magnet in a, in a PowerPoint presentation that, um, and it's, it's to naturally draw customers to your brand.

It's. By, uh, offering helpful, relevant content. Um, and it positions your business as a trusted advisor, guiding potential customers through their decision making process, we call it the buyer's journey. And this method is more about engaging with the customer on their terms in a way that feels natural and organic.

Okay. So if we take that thinking, and then we're just like, let's run over here real quick to outbound. Outbound marketing is the classic approach. Where businesses broadcast their message to a broad audience, hoping to capture the attention of potential customers. It's more aggressive strategy, often associated with pushing products or services directly to consumers, whether they're actively looking for them or not.

Well, it can be effective for brand awareness immediate sales. It often lacks the personalized touch of inbound marketing. So here's where we get to the crux because now we've like looked at inbound, we've looked at outbound. When we use the word Oh, I'm going to start doing that for max just to give him a little extra oomph with

Max Cohen: you

George B. Thomas: but all bound marketing, all, all,

Liz Moorehead: Wait, I wasn't on mute when I just screamed, did I? Because normally I try to keep myself on mute.

George B. Thomas: you are not muted. You're like, oh my.

Liz Moorehead: that was violent. That was violent.

George B. Thomas: so all bound marketing. Is this comprehensive approach that recognizes the strengths of both inbound and bound outbound marketing, but redefines them through this. And this is, I think the important part that I would want everybody to get. It redefines them through a customer centric lens, and it's about using outbound tactics in a way that feels as personalized and valuable as possible.

As we've been doing with inbound and making sure inbound efforts are as scalable and impactful as historical outbound ones could be the all bound strategy ensures that every touch point with the customer is designed to add value. Foster trust and be measurable, creating a cohesive experience that aligns with the customer journey.

This approach not only drives growth, but also builds lasting, meaningful relationships with your audience. That's how I would take and, uh, chunk these three out amongst each other.

Liz Moorehead: I have a question, even though I'm the one,

George B. Thomas: Yeah. Asking questions. Yeah.

Liz Moorehead: So, okay. Because I kind of, I see what Max is saying in that we're putting a fancy label on something that I think a lot of people also naturally organically doing. But is this a situation where. We spent what, almost a decade saying that inbound was not only the way it was the only way, and we, we rejected everything else.

And now we're trying to kind of walk it back and be a little bit like, so my bad. Uh, we don't want to get rid of everything. We don't, we don't want to get rid of everything. And, and now we're putting a nice label on it and pretending like we founded something new.

Max Cohen: But

George B. Thomas: I mean, you could, you could, well, first of all, we got to be careful because While we might have been thinking this way, I can tell you that I've worked with a hundred, if not hundreds of businesses that have not been thinking this way. But if I go into what you're kind of laughingly saying, Liz, yes, we could, we could sum this up in whoops,

Liz Moorehead: might say that. Yeah. Like that's, that's where it gets real. That's where this gets very interesting for me because, and what you just said there, right? I have not gone a single day, month, week, or year in the inbound space without having a client Or having a conversation where a blended methodology was either recommended, considered appropriate, or there was pushback on the just totally pure, inbound, only forever and ever type of approach.

Right? And so it, it's, It, it, I'm, I know this is kind of like a half baked idea that I'm getting at, but it's like, did we just take ourselves to all bound therapy and figure out as the practitioners of this, that maybe we should have a more diverse toolbox?

George B. Thomas: I, well, yes, I do believe diversity in strategy, especially in the world that we live in right now, Is that a, it's paramount because trust me as somebody who is trying to do this. And, uh, have happy humans inside happy humans outside and figure out all the ways to make it successful. I, I, I need more strategies.

I need more ways

Max Cohen: George, can you, can you read the tail end of that, like, um, the last thing you were saying of how they were explaining, like, the sales side of all bound where it was like providing value at these touch points throughout the, like, what was that last, like, sort of bit?

George B. Thomas: Well, so now that's interesting because you said sales and I never said sales, but, uh, but I said, well,

Max Cohen: Wasn't it, wasn't there a bit of

George B. Thomas: specific to

Max Cohen: definition that was talking about the sales side of it Or

George B. Thomas: Uh, no, that was

Max Cohen: of it

George B. Thomas: Outbound talked about the sales, uh, being more aggressive

Max Cohen: just thinking sales when I think outbound. Yeah

George B. Thomas: which, and that's the thing we literally did a whole video. I'm trying to think if we released it yet, but the, uh, outbound marketing versus inbound marketing and how

Liz Moorehead: Yep. And we have an article about it

George B. Thomas: how many people think what outbound marketing is actually outbound sales and outbound sales and outbound marketing are totally different.

And I immediately, when we created the first video, I go, holy crap, we probably need to do a video that is. Uh, outbound marketing versus outbound sales because people just so, so, so for some reason lump it all in, like it's the same thing it's not. But to get back to your ending that you asked for, it's, um, the very last sentence of it, uh, says this approach not only drives growth, but also builds lasting, meaningful relationships with your audience. Yeah. And there's a part about value and fostering trust

Max Cohen: It's the part before that I think it was like the part before that where it was like saying what you did by like valuable touch points or something like that or

George B. Thomas: So here, uh, all bound marketing is a comprehensive approach that recognizes the strengths of both inbound and outbound marketing, but redefines them through a customer centric lens. It's about using outbound tactics in a way that feels as personalized and valuable as inbound and making sure inbound efforts are as scalable and impactful as outbound.

The all bound strategy ensures that every touch point with the customer is designed to add value, foster trust, and be measurable, creating a cohesive experience that aligns with the customer journey, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Max Cohen: Like that last

George B. Thomas: the spider.

Max Cohen: That last part is just like, I feel like that describes every single strategy like this that we hear about. Like, right. And like the other part too is like the outbound side of things to me also feels a lot like, I mean, remember when we had the inbound sales certification, right?

Like, it seems kind of familiar , you know, like, you know what I mean? But it's just, again, it's just like I, that's why I just get, so there's like a big piece of me that it's just like when you say. Or like, when I hear that, I'm not saying this is your definition. I'm saying when I hear that, I'm just like, we've heard this before, like just plain old describing inbound, right?

Like customer centric, valuable touch points, deep in relationships, like all this kind of stuff. But it almost just feels like they added the word outbound in there and called it all about, and it's like the same definition of inbound. Cause if you were to say all that back to me again, I'm like, Without the word outbound in there. I feel like it's also still just describing inbound, right? Or am I crazy?

George B. Thomas: I don't think you're totally crazy, but I think there's a, a subtle mind shift in slight directions, both ways. And again, I think maybe the bigger part of this is trying to embrace the fact that And I started with this, by the way, we live in a world that instead of, or we need to focus on and, and when we focus on and it's how do we, um, I think of like, uh, uh, what's that strengths, weaknesses, like SWOT analysis, how do you SWOT analysis inbound and how do you SWOT analysis outbound and how do you make both of them for your organization?

Be the dopest, most human centric, strategized, measurable thing that now you're, you're living like in this kind of, I'll call it different world or a different mindset because it's almost like, and again, I'm, I'm going in analogy mode, right? It's almost like firing on six cylinders instead of four or eight instead of four, in this case.

Max Cohen: Is, there's a piece of me that wonders. And I think, I guess I'm okay with it if this is like the case. But do you think HubSpot kind of very intentionally introducing this allbound concept? Because here's the thing. Have you heard, like can you go on HubSpot's website and see the word allbound? Like is that a thing?

George B. Thomas: I've never, HubSpot.

Max Cohen: you haven't, you haven't seen Brian Halligan spin an all bound flywheel, right? Uh, they haven't, like, said, We're all bound, we're all bound, we're all bound. But all of the sudden, they release a card with the word all bound on it. The all bound timeline card, right?

Liz Moorehead: That's the only thing I just found. Yeah.

Max Cohen: And, very interesting, because one, talk about a completely pointless name for a CRM UI card, right? Because all, hold on, I know, I know, I know, I know, it's inbound and outcoming stuff, I get that, right?

George B. Thomas: well, but be careful because HubSpot has not said this yet. The CRM is only a small portion of what is a customer platform. And if you are building a customer platform, you must pay attention to that. Some of your customers come from inbound and some of your customers come from outbound efforts.

Therefore, you need to have a cord that measures the amount of All bound in your customer platform versus your CRM. That is the holding space for all data. I

Max Cohen: allbound is this big beautiful definition that we just gave. The card is saying here are things that you sent out here are things they sent you That like know what I mean, and so what I almost

George B. Thomas: if it's that

Max Cohen: no No It's just like you could just call it like the income like you could just call it like the communication time like the Calendar, I don't know.

There's I think there's

George B. Thomas: Well, even Nick said just a

Max Cohen: I get it. Yeah,

George B. Thomas: He literally just said

Max Cohen: exactly, right? But why did they give it this name? You Right. And there's almost a piece of me. Cause here's the thing. When you look at it and you see all bound, which is this big, fancy word that none of us really have been using, and all of a sudden it's a card in there, it's kind of awkward to name it that because then it almost seems like when I first saw it, I was like, Oh, is this like an integration with some other tool called all bound, right?

And that's immediately what I thought. I was like, Oh wait, no, this is just like a native extension showing. Incoming and outgoing emails and calls and stuff like that. Right. In this like kind of awkward way. I could get it. It's cool. But it's like, It's like, here's a horizontal version of the thing that you're looking at that's just up and down.

Like, I almost feel like it was a way for them to test putting the word all bound out into the universe and see how it was received, right?

George B. Thomas: Yeah. Well,

Max Cohen: I think what HubSpot has probably found itself in is being locked into this inbound narrative while the outside world is saying it's not just inbound anymore, it's outbound led inbound and surround bound and near bound and all inbounds getting left in the dirt.

And I feel like HubSpot's noticing that. I think they're probably saying, Hey, we have to change the perception that we're not just this inbound marketing tool. We also have all of these great outbound sales tools. And we're building a whole, you know, huge investment in AI. We went out and purchased Clearbit.

We did all these, like we're doing all these things and putting all this investment. Into saying like, Hey, we kind of realized people want more than just to like create content and get people to come to them. They also want their salespeople to be absolute vipers and have the tools that they need to go, go, go, go, go, go, go, and go outbound.

Right. Because not everyone's going to get inbound spun up so quickly. And we've got to be able to sell the CRM on its own without marketing hub. Right. So like, you know, cause so then where's the inbound thing there when you're just selling like sales hub. Right. And so like what I think they're probably doing.

Is there like it just seems like kind of like a lot to call that time card this big word that we've never seen that is way different than the one word we've always seen, right? And I almost feel like they're testing the waters to see how the community reacts to it. And I think one day they will ditch inbound for all bound because, and I think this was them testing this because they realize it can't just be an inbound tool.

It has to be an outbound tool, but outbound's a yucky

Liz Moorehead: it is now a customer platform. It's not an inbound

George B. Thomas: I, I, I literally, I, I, yes. So Max, now you've had an epiphany moment.

Max Cohen: I'm, I'm a conspiracy theorist right now is what I'm being. Yeah,

George B. Thomas: that, but it's good. That's, that's good. So how does it feel to be the first person creating a piece of content? That's going to be testing the waters that we're paying attention to what they're challenging, and we're challenging, and we're using inbound SEO words that Max hates to put an article in an episode

Max Cohen: the word inbound. It's the

George B. Thomas: Yeah, yeah, no, all bound. It's all

Max Cohen: the Rance

George B. Thomas: But, but how does it feel to know that you're part of a piece of content that we're creating right now in the moment? That we will have people will come and read, come and listen, and they'll be able to weigh their opinion on if they love the idea of all bound, if they've been always using a mixed strategy, if they are some of those humans that live in the world of or instead of the world of and, like, we're on the ground floor.

customer platform, the new position of CRM, the fact that there is a new card in there with this term in it, like, why do you think we're here today,

Max Cohen: like I feel, I feel great. It's cool talking about it. I'm also slightly terrified that maybe I'm uncovering some massive conspiracy. And a hit squad could show up to my house. Because I'm, you know, uh, I'm, I'm blowing up the Hub Illuminati here. Yeah.

George B. Thomas: but here's the thing. I love that kind of stuff. Like I love being able to create stuff and lean into what we think might be happening. Because like I told somebody the other day, the day That HubSpot launches the HR hub. I have a clip from like four or five years ago where I said, the next hub needs to be the, I will release that on the internet and be like, told you, same thing here.

Like I'm, I'm working with Chris Carolyn. We have a HubSpot. Customer platform hug. We're knee deep in the trenches. We're paying attention to all the conversations that need to happen there. We're, we're looking at like, Oh my God, things are shifting and changing. And when things shift and change, it's, it's from, uh, words and associated words and software start to move around.

And like, and I don't think. Enough people realize what is shifting underneath our very feet from a SAS platform, because they're paying attention to how the modern customer is buying and what they're paying attention to and where they're paying attention to, and they're doing their best to build a platform that fits all of those needs for businesses.

Liz Moorehead: So I want to interject here because I think what is interesting is that this reminds me of a conversation that you and I, George, have a lot with one of our clients where they get really squirrely when we use words like always or never. Right? And you know who I'm talking about. Shout out to Sean and his team at QDS.

We

George B. Thomas: Hi guys and gals.

Liz Moorehead: Hi. You know, and, and he brings up a good point because you never want to put yourself into a kind of an box yourself into an absolutist corner because they're very strong in terms of the language they use about, we keep our promises. We have penalties around our, like they are very, they are absolutist in that way, in their purpose, in their mission, how they fulfill those promises.

But it, Max, you're bringing up a really good point here. In that, We have, and George as well, we, we did, we absolutist box ourselves into a corner with inbound. And now we're seeing the reaction, the expansion, the going back into this idea of, you know, when I was first writing this episode and thinking about what I wanted to talk about today, that one of the questions I have here is, and you guys already answering it is, is it either or anymore?

And the answer is no, it's not. And I think that's what we're realizing here,

George B. Thomas: Well, well, but be careful because what we have to realize is what we may have needed in the moment was inbound.

Liz Moorehead: We needed an intervention.

George B. Thomas: an intervention. Inbound was an intervention. It was, it was a movement. It is a movement. Still should be. There was a methodology. There was literally a Bible. The methodology to the religion inbound, right?

If you, if you really want to break it down, here's the thing though, over this last 10, 12, 14 year period, cultures have changed, humans have changed, there was massive chaos, you know, years back that just changed the way that we think, the way that we act, the places we work, and so. Maybe now the smart people that knew we needed an intervention are realizing there's a next level, there's a new intervention, there's a shift, there's a change, which by the way, if you pay attention to Brian Halligan's, this is not an inbound episode, but if you pay attention to Brian Halligan's historical keynotes, it was always about what was changing and they were lettuce letting us know it was changing before we actually kind of knew it was changing.

And then all of a sudden we paid attention to that. It was changing very interestingly. We need to know things are changing and they'll continue to change. And those of us that can pivot and become transition specialists in our business. again, what we're talking about today is all bound. Lean into a more and, and Liz, I can't get away from it.

Now that I'm starting to use these H frameworks, a more holistic approach to what we're doing from a marketing and sales perspective. Strategy.

Liz Moorehead: I just can't help this feeling though that like If any of our clients are listening right now, they'd be like, well, duh, this is not brand new information to us. Like our inbound marketers just waking up from a fever dream. That's, that's what, cause I'm, I'm genuinely challenging myself here. I can't think of a single client I work with a single business I work with out there where I would be breaking their brains open in some sort of like lightning rod way saying, so, you know, we could do both.

Max Cohen: Wild. No.

Liz Moorehead: It's very rare that I say something that makes you both silent. I've got to know what you're

George B. Thomas: Well, I thought Mac started to say something. So I was like, let me hear what he, where homey's at right now.

Max Cohen: Oh, no. Um,

Liz Moorehead: You just love this conversation. I can feel it with every fiber of my being. Or are you still hiding from the

Max Cohen: looking. I'm actively seeking the spider. Yeah, I brought my, I got my bug assault. How did you not notice

George B. Thomas: got the, a while back, he brought that in and I think it was Chad was like, or maybe Nick was like, do you feel safe now?

Max Cohen: do feel safe now. I

Liz Moorehead: Does he?

Max Cohen: Um, kind of. My dog's here, so hopefully she'll fight it or something.

George B. Thomas: Oh, the dog

Max Cohen: dog deleted it. Yeah. I already deleted the dog. I don't know. It's pretty big. Okay. Yeah, I don't know. It's like, I do think it's, I do think it's just another example of like, you know, hopping on the, Hey, we need a new name for something to make it sound new, but we're doing the same thing.

Right? Like, I don't know. Like, if they, like, if they were, if they, if they do a whole new, like, all bound flywheel or like some other, methodology thing. I don't know, I'm probably going to lose my mind because it's going to end up just being the same version of the same thing. Much like the, you know, when they changed from the inbound methodology to the flywheel, it literally was the same thing, only they just combined two things and turned into a circle, right?

And it's like, I really just hope, because like, the flywheel is just, it's honestly just, it's perfect. It's perfect. And I don't think it can, it needs to get more complex than that, right? Um, but like, if we do something Weird with an all bound flywheel and it's different or something like that and it just makes it more complicated than it needs to be I'm not gonna be happy about it and I'm gonna be verbal about it But I don't know.

I'm just I'm just so sick of bound bound bound bound bound bound bound bound bound like I'm just so over it

George B. Thomas: We should make a song and just use the

Liz Moorehead: Boum, boum, boum. Boum, boum,

Max Cohen: Bound town

George B. Thomas: oh, that's actually already a song. Isn't that,

Max Cohen: down to bound town

George B. Thomas: Is that what you're doing?

Liz Moorehead: I was doing Barbaranne, but

George B. Thomas: Oh, Barbara, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Beach

Max Cohen: Actually, hold on. I do love this take from Nick and chat. It says all bound is a way for them to reclaim inbound without being tarnished by outbound stigma. I agree completely. Like I don't like I don't think HubSpot wants to like do the defeatist thing to say like, oh, you know, we were so hard on inbound the whole way, right?

And and and if there were Any sort of public sense of like, here's what we want to do to help outbound. What happens is the public Backlash from that was like, Oh, see, they were wrong. The whole time about inbound and us sales, bro. Do it outbound smashing the phones, smiling and dialing and using AI driven lists we scraped off of, you know, the back of a van or whatever was like, awesome, warm up those IP address guys.

Let's use some cold email outreach. Like they just don't want to look like they're losing to that crowd. Right. It's like what I feel like, so, you know, and they're not losing to that crowd. That crowd is cringe, like totally it's cringe. Um, but like, you know, they're creating tools that like serves that audience and serves those customers that want that stuff that still don't want to do the tough work that inbound is right.

Like, you know, say what you want about all the stuff that we've done with, uh, you know, AI and content hub and like all this stuff, it's like, Creating content and doing inbound marketing is still 10 times harder than blasting a billion emails out like to a list of people, right? Like it still is harder to do.

Um, you know, while sure, there are things that make that stuff easier, like you still see people deploying it in like a really terrible way, right? Um, you know, because humans are humans are great human, right? Um, yeah, totally. And it's just, I don't know. Um,

George B. Thomas: is the whole reason for the other side of things that we do. Humans are gonna human.

Max Cohen: a good human.

George B. Thomas: So we, so we created Beyond Your

Max Cohen: but like the thing is, is like, I don't think HubSpot needs to get away from inbound, right? Inbound can be A strategy within a group of strategies you're deploying, right? I think that's okay I don't think we need to totally rename the idea of what all bound is because all bound if it means all things Then it doesn't mean anything It doesn't mean anything.

It takes away the the physical fundamental difference of what inbound is Right? People coming to you instead of you just going to them. Yes, your salespeople are going to have to deploy a certain amount of going to them without them coming to you. There are good and bad ways of doing that. Sure. Right?

But the fundamental process of saying, Hey, are we creating reasons for people to find us? Consume our stuff, trust us, and buy a, like, buy from us, right? Because they're coming to us, right? They're finding out we exist when they have no idea that we exist. We are helping them figure out that they have a problem that they didn't even know they had.

We are educating them. We are creating things for them. We are building things for them. That is a whole thing by itself. I think to just say, Oh yeah, it's all that. And plus like better ways of like getting your sales reps to go outbound on people. I think it totally devalue, it like almost makes it, that is that much more important and that much easier than this other big thing.

When the truth is, that whole outbound thing is also really, really tough if you don't already have a good inbound motion. Because where's all this like wonderful content they say to use to create these valuable touchpoints with people going outbound if you have no inbound motion creating that content?

Right? Like, I just,

George B. Thomas: yeah,

Max Cohen: inbound amplifies outbound so much. And it's really hard to just stand out outbound on its own without expecting to just like spend a ton of money on like paid lists or use some weird sketchy data scrapers or like really do some crazy invasions of privacy, right? But it's like, oh, it's all fine because it's AI assisted and it's this and it's that and it's whatever it's the next big thing.

Thank I just don't want the art of inbound to be devalued by saying it's the same thing as you. I'm a f ing purist, dude. I

George B. Thomas: He is

Max Cohen: I am. I'm a little bit. I'm realizing this now. I am really.

George B. Thomas: yeah, he's an inbound

Max Cohen: no, no, no, no. But that's not me. I think a purist is someone who says, you just do this and you don't do that.

I'm not that person. I'm an inbound realist, my friend. Where, yeah, the,

Liz Moorehead: This is like an art movement. We're moving from like inbound impressionism to

Max Cohen: yeah, because dude, dude, inbound is based a lot on like, just the reality of how things work. I talk about inbound physics all the time, right? How's someone gonna find you if they don't know you exist? They're not, right?

So they're looking for other stuff. Okay, make that stuff that they're looking for, right? That's realism, right? Another part of the realism is like, yeah, sure. Your marketers and your team and your whatever could do the whole inbound motion, right? But one, is it going to take time to get off the ground?

Yeah. Bet your ass. Is it going to take a lot of experimentation to figure out what works? Yep. It bets, but you bet your ass, right? But do your salespeople need to sell in the meantime? And also be flexible? Deploying their own efforts in like different ways that they can do it without totally relying on what marketing's doing.

Because hey, guess what? Maybe hire some inbound marketers, right? And they don't do that good. And it takes a little while to figure out how to get the right people on board that have the talent to create the content, put it all together in a good story, deploy it, get the right software, do whatever. Sales people still gotta be sales people without a hundred percent relying on marketing to just feed them MQLs.

So you do got to figure out the right ways and the wrong ways of doing inbound. You got to do both at the same time. That's realism, not purism. Right.

George B. Thomas: so, so there's a couple of takeaways here. I just want to unpack this a little bit. Um, one, uh, it almost sounded like you said inbound enables outbound, which it like marketing inbound marketers. Enable or, uh, you know, sales to do better, be better because of the content. So I love that piece. Um, the other thing I heard is next week on hub heroes, max is going to do the physics of all

Max Cohen: Fine.

George B. Thomas: Uh, he's got a slide already built out for it. Um, but, but here's the thing. I also, give me a second. Cause I, I, I want to jot a note down in my travel guide. Um, I officially have decided that I need to pack a defibrillator. Uh, to bring to inbound because, um, when Max is in the audience and somebody from stage, Andy Petrie, Dharmesh, whoever it

Max Cohen: Here's the all about pentagram.

George B. Thomas: Yamani, uh, when, when all of a sudden from the stage, somebody says the word all bound, I will run over, I'll use my defibrillator and brother, I will save your life in the middle of the crowd at inbound, because I think you would have a Of an aneurysm or a heart attack.

If you heard the word allbound come from the main

Max Cohen: Ah, it's gonna, dude. It's gonna, it's gonna happen. I'm telling you man, like this is the, what an unnecessary name for that CRM card, right? Like, it confused me, right? And it's just like, they're testing the waters to change the name of it, that's what I feel, you know?

George B. Thomas: Yep.

Liz Moorehead: Well, I mean, think about how, think about how we heard about it, George. It came up so organically and naturally during our conversation with Kyle and we did

Max Cohen: Oh, so they're sending, hold on, Kyle's the GOAT, I love Kyle. Kyle. So they're sending their people out there to workshop the name and reporting back to I want hmm I wonder if Kyle's

George B. Thomas: and I don't know if it was I, I, but here's the thing. I don't know

Liz Moorehead: It's the Illuminati.

George B. Thomas: I don't know if it was on purpose, but here's the thing, for someone to use the word, like they're used to using the word. They have to have been hearing the word. So it makes you wonder, which again is why we're here.

There's a card with it. We heard it dropped for a brief second in another episode. And, and I was like, Liz inbound versus outbound versus all bound. We got to do an episode. We got to unpack

Max Cohen: it's gonna be next it's gonna be found bound and it was just like a lead you found on the side of the road You decided to go found bound is just when you find business cards and you call

Liz Moorehead: It's when you, it's when you pull all of the pants and, uh, pants, pens and stickers and all those things that you got at the, like, Inbound one year and you're like, you just start cold calling people.

Max Cohen: yeah, it's it's when you, uh, it's when you call DM people go, Oh, I found your profile on LinkedIn and I saw that you're also with the internet technology space.

Liz Moorehead: Wait, hold on. Question, do I need to create a custom object for Foundbound Leads? Is that like a separate channel?

Max Cohen: Yeah, dude. Found bound. That's the next one.

George B. Thomas: it's right next to the gum underneath

Max Cohen: Dude. You know what it is? It's all clown bound. My guy. Clown bound, dude.

Liz Moorehead: Hey, George, ask me again who's driving this episode.

George B. Thomas: Liz, who's driving this episode?

Liz Moorehead: I have no idea because we've abandoned the outline long ago. We have, we have gone found bounding on the side of the road

Max Cohen: now.

George B. Thomas: I, I almost can't keep going because, because Chad, I don't even know if I should say this, but Chad, I hope we don't get canceled. But Chad literally said it's the number on the inside of the stall. That's found bound.

Liz Moorehead: Call found bound for a good time.

Max Cohen: Oh my

George B. Thomas: God help

Max Cohen: oh geez, dude, yeah.

Liz Moorehead: Well, George, why don't you help me land this plane here as best we can. I would love to hear from you because This was a conversation we knew we needed to have and I knew that there was a 50 50 risk of like, I, I will just start setting the outline on fire within five minutes of the, the episode being, well, because it's highly, it's not a highly experimental topic, but it's just one of those things of like, We all have a lot of feelings about this and it is, it is a conversation that we needed to have.

And I think we're going to have to have it again. I, it's one of those things where I'm like, I wish Devin was here, but I almost want him to listen to it and then come back and read us the riot act in a way that only Devin can do with his eyeball and inch from the camera where he yells at us and then we say, we're sorry.

But George.

George B. Thomas: either going to be a slack message that says, yes, you guys are awesome, or what the F are you

Max Cohen: No, that's, see, that's why, hold on, hold on, that's why he's not here, cause they're putting him through some like, uh, you know, all bound, uh, all bound, uh, brainwashing bootcamp or

Liz Moorehead: found bounding.

Max Cohen: Yeah,

George B. Thomas: that is not live. Anyway,

Liz Moorehead: Is it, is that like one of those things where like remember like at like Outward Bound where like you have to go, it's like outward found bound. Like, is that what we're

Max Cohen: Yeah, what's outward bound now? Like, that's, that's why we gotta, it's like you just, it's, it's, you're doing inbound, but you're doing it in the wilderness. Yeah,

Liz Moorehead: to you. You can't go out and create

George B. Thomas: your mosquito repellent.

Max Cohen: god.

Liz Moorehead: I'm like, I'll write a blog to the mosquitoes. Here's why you shouldn't bite me. So George, land this plane

Max Cohen: Don't don't land it

Liz Moorehead: we, we need help. Don't land it. Just keep

George B. Thomas: No, I need to land this bad boy, holy crap.

Liz Moorehead: George, I would be so curious to hear what your takeaways are from this conversation, because you and I both came into this conversation on a fact finding mission to find out what we actually feel about this.

So what are the things that you learned that you want our listeners to be paying attention to?

George B. Thomas: Yeah. So there's a couple of things. One, we now know that Max, his new title at Happily will be inbound realist, uh, will be hit instead of a chief evangelist of Happily. So we're going to change his title. Um, but, but in all honesty, for, for me, it's interesting because I didn't know where this conversation was going to go.

I was excited to see where this conversation would go. Um, Um, the fact that Max is paying attention to micro pieces of the software and saw the card, uh, the fact that we aligned because of something we heard on an episode and we're able to sit here and create this piece of content that people will be able to listen to, have their own feelings, have their own opinions that serves the purpose that I'm actually trying to get here.

My big takeaway for the listeners though is, and it's funny, cause Liz, you said you haven't met a client that wasn't thinking of it from a, uh, this and that process or pushed against, I can tell you, I've met many that the only thing they were doing was like inbound slash content marketing and they had left to the wayside, this piece.

My takeaway is those days are over. Um, I don't give a rat's. Caboose, what you call it, but you need to be, um, playing and teasing out the idea of things that you once thought were off base. Um, have you sent postcards lately? Have you done a print brochure, like a booklet style and actually tried to put it on, you know, a decision maker's desk?

Have you, have you actually tested billboards? Um, have you done. A calling system in a way that is different than the historical way that we hated. Like if you're sitting here and you can't say yes to any of those things that historically were outbound or traditional marketing or traditional sales, I would challenge you to test it again, but test it in a way that That aligns with the methodology and philosophies that we've picked up over the last 10, 12 years of being a good human, of adding value, of building trust, of it being an interaction that is more based on future relationship than immediate transaction.

Liz Moorehead: Max,

Max Cohen: oh I

Liz Moorehead: did you get the spider buddy?

Max Cohen: I thought he was gonna end the episode on that because it was epic and now you got me just awkwardly being Like what? I didn't have anything to say