Good business-to-business (B2B) marketing is the lifeblood of any brand that has other businesses as its customers. Even Microsoft, the top B2B brand in the world, still invests heavily in sales and marketing.
Marketing is the only way to convince decision-makers in another organisation to be not just your customers but loyal customers who engage in repeat purchases.
But what does B2B marketing mean, who is it for, which channels should you use, and how can you improve your odds of success? We’ll explain everything in this article. If you’re ready to start executing B2B marketing ideas, let’s begin.
What Is B2B Marketing?
B2B marketing—also known as business-to-business marketing—is the process of selling to other businesses rather than individual consumers. Usually, a B2B marketing funnel starts from customer awareness to consideration and the eventual purchase. B2B buyers are more motivated by efficiency and getting an ROI on their investment. Therefore, B2B marketing efforts have to be educative and convincing enough.
Who is B2B marketing for?
As we already mentioned, B2B marketing targets other businesses. Therefore, your efforts should be targeted at the decision-makers in these businesses. These decision-makers include C-level executives, VPs, deputies, and heads with strategic authority and influence. However, the influence can shift from one role to another during different stages of the buying process.
How to Develop a B2B Online Marketing Strategy
To succeed in your B2B online marketing, you must develop a marketing strategy that addresses your audience’s pain points and meets their needs. Here are proven B2B marketing strategies you can use to grow your business.
Define Your Brand Identity
Your brand identity is how you want to present yourself to the public. It typically includes logos, typography, colours, and messaging. You need to be clear about your brand identity because it helps customers recognise your brand and encourages them to choose you over other brands.
If you’re interested in learning more about brand identity, you can read our thoughts on The Importance of Brand: Why a Strong Identity Matters for New Businesses. We also have an interesting piece on The Importance of Branding in Marketing For Startups.
Set Your Business Goal
Your business goal is the target your organisation wants to achieve in the short and long term. Defining this would help you create marketing goals that are measurable enough to support your overall business goal.
For example, if your goal is business expansion, your marketing goals might include increasing brand awareness, boosting brand engagement, and driving more traffic. Executing a marketing strategy without a business goal is like building a house without a foundation.
Define Your Target Audience
Your target audience is the businesses you want to attract to your brand. You might want to narrow them by categories such as industry and location before arriving at the decision-makers and their demographics.
Knowing who your audience is will help you know how to speak to them, create more personalised experiences for them, and offer products that meet their needs. All these can only be possible through thorough audience and market research.
Create Buyer Personas
A buyer persona is a profile representing the ideal customer you create from audience and market research. It gives you more personalised information about your audience, including how they buy and how you can reach this type of buyer with relevant, timely information.
Develop Your Content Pillars
Content pillars are the themes around which you plan all of your content. They are core topics relevant to your business and promote your company’s products, services, and values.
These pillars allow you to expand on a topic and create additional assets for different channels and audiences. For example, a fitness supply business may break up its content into three pillars: fitness training, health and wellness, and supplies. With this, you can design your content calendar and execute a successful B2B marketing strategy or plan.
B2B Marketing Content Formats
B2B marketing can be executed in different formats, from blog posts and case studies to eBooks and webinars. Let’s look at various B2B marketing formats businesses can use to grow their brands.
Blogs
Blogs are a proven way to establish your brand as an industry expert and have become the heart of many B2B marketing strategies. While there’s been a lot of talk about blogs dying off, people are still reading quality blogs that are informative and engaging.
However, adapting to changing reader behaviours and search engine algorithms is crucial. The goal should be to promote your business by sharing information that positions your products and services as solutions to your users’ questions.
Case Studies
A marketing case study is a detailed examination and analysis of a specific marketing campaign or strategy that your business has implemented. They are designed to be an all-inclusive illustration of a real-world business situation and its outcome.
They serve as social proofs—to provide potential clients with the context to determine whether they’re making a good choice. A marketing case study proves that your process, product, or service can solve a specific problem.
eBooks
An eBook, or electronic book, is, simply put, the digital form of a traditional book created to be read on a computer, tablet, or mobile device. An eBook for marketing is designed to discuss topics that improve an organisation’s brand awareness, help your users with a common problem, or help boost your brand profile as an authority in your industry. Many businesses utilise eBooks as lead-generation tools to attract and communicate with the right audience.
Podcasts
Podcast marketing is a strategy that implies promoting your brand through audio content. It can offer insights, trends, and advice on topics that affect your industry.
It helps reach new audiences, tell the brand’s story, build authority, and encourage word-of-mouth marketing. This is another way to showcase your brand as an authority in your industry.
Videos
Videos have become integral to every aspect of 21st-century marketing, including B2B. They can communicate a company’s information faster than text, brochures, or graphics. Therefore, they are valued assets that businesses use to augment written marketing content online.
Webinars
B2B webinars are web-based seminars, including online presentations, meetings, and workshops that businesses use to educate, engage, and convert their audience.
B2B businesses are using webinars to reach new audiences and drive engagement from all around the world, from professional platforms like LinkedIn and Twitter to fun-orientated platforms like Instagram and Facebook.
In B2B email marketing, you use email to promote products and services to other businesses. It allows companies to directly connect with their target audiences, build brand awareness, and ultimately increase sales. With email marketing, you can make your customers aware of new products, discounts, and other services.
Social Media
B2B social media marketing uses social media platforms to share industry-relevant content, network, and engage in expert conversations to build relationships with potential and existing business clients.
B2B Marketing Platforms
There are countless B2B marketing channels you can use to promote your brand. Let’s quickly run through some of the most popular ones below:
Your Website
Your business website is a digital platform where you provide information about your business, such as your products or services and who you are as a business. Other information most businesses provide on their websites includes operating hours, address specifics, and photos of their facilities, which can be valuable for physical assessment and to gather insights about the organisation’s layout and security measures.
One of the most common purposes of a website is to generate traffic and sales. So, beyond being a means of identification, your website can help you reach more leads looking for your products and services online.
Search Engines
So many marketing activities go on in search engines like Google, the most popular being click (PPC) advertising. PPC is a Google Ads where you only pay when people click on the ads. You can get a high digital marketing ROI if you understand how Google Ads works and optimise your campaign effectively.
Email marketing means using email to promote products or services and incentivise customer loyalty. The purpose of an email marketing campaign could be transactional, promotional, informative, or for retention. Email marketing is essential for businesses to promote, build relationships, and drive customer action.
Social Media
Social media marketing is a form of digital marketing that leverages the power of popular social media networks to connect with your audience, build your brand, increase sales, and drive website traffic. Social media marketing involves strategy design, content creation, engagement, analytics, and advertising. LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram are the most effective platforms for B2B social media engagement, with LinkedIn being the best for traffic and lead generation.
SMS
B2B SMS marketing, or text message marketing, is an incredibly effective way for businesses to send targeted, personalised promotions to customers via text messages. When properly implemented, SMS marketing is a powerful tool for B2B sales that can help you cut through the noise and stand out in a crowded digital landscape.
OOH
With out-of-home advertising (OOH), brands can reach and activate consumers on the go, amplify existing marketing efforts, and reap the rewards of a high ROI channel. Studies have shown that business decision-makers are 20% more likely to discover new brands through OOH ads.
OOH advertising offers a physical and tangible presence that digital ads lack. So whether you place that billboard in front of your company building or on a busy highway, out-of-home advertising packs can be a powerful tool to increase your brand visibility.
Events & Conferences
B2B events and conferences that bring businesses together present opportunities for cross-channel marketing. Such events could be virtual, hybrid, or in-person. Attending such conferences can put you directly before established business executives and decision-makers you might not ordinarily meet elsewhere. These events are great for building business connections and relationships.
Emerging Trends | B2B Marketing Facts and Stats
The following are quick trends and facts you should look out for in your B2B marketing:
1. Increasing adoption of podcasts as a mainstream B2B marketing channel
2. LinkedIn continues to grow as a go-to platform for B2B engagements.
3. B2B brands are producing more content.
4. B2B content marketing has become more competitive.
5. There is continuous growth in chatbot adoption.
6. Increased AI integration for B2B marketing
7. B2B content is increasingly becoming human-focused and personalised.
8. Reduction of AI-generated content.
If you’re interested in the B2B industry, here is more on SaaS B2B Content Marketing Strategy | By Pandora Agency
B2B Marketing Facts and Stats
- 77% of B2B customers conduct extensive research before making a purchase.
- 80% of B2B business purchases are influenced by customer experience, and 80% of B2B customers want a comparable or better experience than B2C.
- 54% of all B2B leads come from customer referrals, which are more cost-effective than other marketing strategies.
- 91% of B2B marketers say content marketing is an important part of their overall strategy, and 81% say email newsletters are their most used form of content marketing.
- 84% of B2B buyers use social media as part of their decision-making process, and 80% of social media leads for B2B marketing come from LinkedIn.
- 59% of B2B marketers say email marketing generates the most revenue.
- 75% of B2B content marketers use video, up from 66% last year.
- B2B markets can be categorised into four broad categories: producers, resellers, governments, and institutions.
Summary
B2B marketing is one of the most important strategies for businesses to connect with potential clients. There are many B2B marketing strategies and channels that different businesses can explore. What is your favourite B2B marketing strategy? Let us know in the comment section.
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