Mobile usage has exploded; and with it, mobile-specific design strategies have been created. Some of them are amazing, such as responsive websites. Some of them are not so amazing, such as the "hamburger" menu, which we will be discussing (and hopefully killing off) in this article.

What is the hamburger menu?

You've probably seen the hamburger menu without really knowing what to call it. It's the little 3-line icon in the top right or top left of most sites when you access them on mobile. 

(Sometimes you even see it on desktop sites; which, you'll realize is even more awful after reading this article.)

It was created a few years back, and it's simply exploded in usage. It's ubiquitous at this point; if you have a mobile site, you likely use a hamburger menu. 

Unfortunately, it's explosion in usage is a terrible thing for company website owners everywhere. If you have one, you've made a mistake--albeit one that is easily correctable.

Why is it so popular?

Well, to be honest, it is an elegant solution from a design standpoint. Desktop sites have the space to include the traditional menu you see on most sites around the web. So when designers were asked to design sites with smartphones in mind, that presented a serious problem: how can we get all these menu options on a screen so small?

This is why the hamburger menu was created; instead of trying to get all of those options on the mobile screen...why not just hide it behind an icon that allows you to access the menu when you want it? BOOM. It exploded. It seems like an obvious and elegant solution, right?

Except it's not.

A lot of designers design things because they look good, because they are easy, or because every other designer does it that way so it must be a good idea. What happens is that they don't incorporate user psychology into their design; not every designer has an understanding of the way that a user's mind works when they are using a site. In other words, a designer often designs for looks, not user experience.

The hamburger menu seems like a good strategy, but when you evaluate the way that users navigate sites, you learn that it's actually fundamentally flawed.

I get this question a lot: “Does your inbound marketing agency use freelancers or is all the talent in-house?” When clients or prospective clients ask me this, I have to wonder, what’s behind it?

• Do they assume an agency that does everything in-house is better at inbound marketing?
• Do they think an agency that outsources is somehow lacking in inbound expertise?

Granted, there are plenty of horror stories out there about finding and working with freelance writers. You may have experienced a few yourself. I know I have. But I’m proud to admit (much like Mike Brown at nDash Marketing did a few months ago) my agency does use freelancers — and we, and our clients, are stronger for it.

Your B2B company’s ecommerce site — and the customers who use it — could be an untapped trove of marketing opportunities.

In B2B, online shoppers are looking for more than prices and specs. They’re looking for answers. Every time someone visits one of your catalog pages, it’s an opportunity to provide those answers. It’s a chance to steer them towards helpful content — and in the process, capture their information for your marketing database.

But for too many B2B companies, the gap between ecommerce and marketing is a yawning chasm. Their ecommerce and online marketing platforms (like HubSpot) are black boxes, neither revealing their valuable secrets.

But shouldn’t you be able to market to the people who are already shopping for your products? Aren’t the people who already know your brand the ones most likely to become new or upsold customers?

One company, Boiler Supplies, thought so. Here is how they, with the help of our agency and the HubSpot APIs, spanned the divide between ecommerce and marketing.

Too often, businesses embark on an inbound marketing campaign with the full power of the HubSpot platform but no idea where to focus that power.

They flit from tactic to tactic — blogging, creating landing pages and calls-to-action, building social media campaigns, tracking keywords — hoping to gain traction by chance.

Or they put on their blinders, narrowly zeroing in on an arbitrary tactic with no plan to pivot away if it doesn’t work.

The results rarely make a convincing case to re-up that costly HubSpot subscription. But as the five case studies here show, inbound marketing can be worth it. It can generate quality sales leads and new customers. But you can’t get there with either the tunnel vision or shotgun approach.

As a provider of hypnotherapy training for mental health professionals, the Wellness Institute competes in a field saturated with “kooky,” low-quality websites. Wellness’ leadership team hoped a well-branded, high-quality website would stand out, establishing the institute’s credibility among an audience of experienced therapists with advanced degrees.

When you first access your HubSpot portal, there are so many things to do: You can start by importing contacts, placing tracking code on your website, inviting your team (and each team member needs certain permissions, too), and the list goes on.

With so much to do, it’s easy to forget the important tasks.

Here’s a list of eight things you don’t want to forget to do in your brand new HubSpot portal.

“Where do you find your writers?”

I brace myself for this question any time I’m called into a meeting with prospective clients of my inbound marketing agency. It’s what anyone who has tried inbound marketing for any significant length of time wants to know.

Social media and inbound marketing go together like beer and pizza. Sure, you could have one without the other, but dang it, it just doesn’t seem right.

If you’re lucky, your company is big enough (and wise enough) to hire a specialist to fill each role. For many marketing departments, that’s more a dream than a reality. So what’s a time-strapped marketer to do?

For the answer, I went to Chelsea Hunersen, social media and community growth manager at HubSpot.