B2B Marketing has been tagged with a long-standing sentiment of being dull, colorless, and boring. However, of late due to varying factors such as the shift of social values, market dynamics, and the psychology in buyer behavior the landscape has seen a momentous shift to being as lively, colorful, and vibrant as B2C marketing. And at times even livelier and exciting, due to its scope.
One important mutual characteristic of B2B and B2C marketing is the fact that both are marketing to humans, and humans are triggered by diverse factors of emotions, market dynamics, and social factors. These factors are said to be loosening up B2B marketers to move out from using a 'Shirt and Tie' tone to be more human, relatable, and lively. Below are some marketing strategies to better your B2B marketing in 2024
1) Presenting your brand as simple and easy to understand
It's apt time that B2B brands break the long-standing bias and move out of the unconventional by pitching themselves as a more simplistic and easy-to-understand business and brand. This could be actioned with some initial steps, such as simplifying their website and providing clear and easy navigation for their customers, moreover the content on owned social spaces should be less salesy and more educational and increasingly focussed on the impact the product or service has on the customer and the society at large.
2) Going pass the customer and showing the benefit and impact the brand makes on its customer's customer
The B2B arena is increasingly seing more emotion-based decisions. And B2B brands should go beyond their traditional scope and illustrate the impact it makes on their customer's customer, society, planet and the generations to come. This change in direction creates a legacy for the brand and gives the B2B buyer a sense of achievement in partnering up with the brand and drives them to feel they made a correct and responsible choice.
3) Showing empathy and being relatable
Positioning a B2B brand as one that has a pulse on its customer, its customer's customer, and the society garneres immense benefits. By progressively position it self to be more relevant and relatable and taking the responsibility to answer questions they may have. smoothness friction that may arise in the buyer journey giving the customer a sense that the brand empathizes with them.
4) Giving the brand a more human touch by simplifying what it does and educating the society of the products
B2B marketers should increasingly make their brands more human by simplifying their brands and products. Marketing leaders should ditch the chatbots and place actual teams to interact with prospects, which would see a significant increase in conversion rates and create deeper relationships as opposed to the relatively insignificant cost of maintaining a team. Brands should further move to educate the society on how it impacts them by simplifying things. For instance, a jet engine manufacturer would focus on how its products are helping move people around the globe uniting loved ones and how their favorite products are brought to their local supermarket from factories miles away.
5) Account-based marketing
In a world where personalization is now more important than ever account-based marketing would take deeper root in world of B2B marketing. Account-based marketing (ABM) simply means conducting marketing activities directed at a particular customer, typically a large corporate account which the marketer is assisting the sales team to acquire. Tools such creating blogs, videos and content that answer specific needs the targetted company would be facing (primarily derived through research). ABM garners significant benefits of landing bigger deals, where some account based marketers witnessed 10% increase in revenue, where 19% of them reported over 30% revenue growth. A significant point is that account based marketers reported >100% engagement on their content in the C level.
6) Thought leadership content
B2B Brands who intend to grow amidst tough competition should take the position of a thought leader in the industry and the sphere they operate. The position of a thought leader would drive brand authority creating a positive perception of your brand and in return create a loyal audience and community around it. Thought leadership garners immense benefits, where B2B marketers have reported to see 75% of leads convert, driving decision-makers sign on the dotted line. Moreover, 'The thought leadership impact study conducted by LinkedIn and Edelman 2019 reported seeing 70% of decision-makers conclude on an organization's ability to deliver based on their thought leadership.
7) Maintaining a blog & creating a stock of digitally consumable resources
B2B Brands are encouraged to understand the importance of full-funnel marketing and to focus on the top of the funnel creating brand and product awareness. B2B Marketers should begin curating knowledge on blogs and creating digital content focussing on answering FAQs and assisting prospect to move effectively down the funnel to the purchase stage
8) Building communities and representing them and the problems the brand solves
Building a community around a brand extracts immense benefits, such as increased loyalty that leads to advocacy when executed effectively. Brands should ensure consistent communication, tone, and personality across all channels. It's no more about what products the brand sells, but about how the brand contributes to what matters to them. Moreover, brands should stay authentic and could go to the extent of featuring its community on its platforms which in return would compound its marketing efforts.
9) Content Marketing
Content marketing is increasing in importance in the B2B marketing world, which is evident by research conducted by LinkedIn Marketing solutions depicting that 66% of B2B marketers are increased their content budgets in 2022. Content marketing is based on educating, entertaining, and adding value to customers and prospects which in return provides brands with multiple ways of return on investment.
10) The rise of video & the increased use of storytelling
Video has risen up to be the most consumed form of content, and storytelling-driven marketing is parallelly taking a position of prominence. B2B marketing content should move from having the 'suit and tie' tone towards a more human and 'let's be real' tone. customers and society are increasingly showing interest to see the people behind the brands and the stories to tell
11) Increase of nostalgic marketing
Decision-making in the B2B arena is increasingly becoming more emotion-based. One key driver to arouse emotions is the use of nostalgic marketing. The concept of nostalgic marketing simply means connecting a brand with positive concepts or ideas from the past. The strategy would better perform when the campaign is focussed on the age group your prospective customer would potentially be.
12) Empowering & spotlighting employees to be vocal and share their opinion on social media
Customers are heading away from believing superficial marketing adverts and are finding better appeal in more authentic and real marketing campaigns. A powerful strategy to execute is empowering the employees to speak up, share opinions and be subject matter experts, as society tends to find higher credibility in opinions driven by employees which they tend to perceive as authentic.
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