Ultimate B2B Marketing Strategy Guide
According to Digital Authority Partners, about 93% of the most successful B2B content marketers say their organisation will be ‘extremely’ or ‘very’ committed to content marketing in 2019. The rest of the industry, however, is struggling to keep up the pace – as only 67% of all companies want a content marketing strategy, and even less (39%) have an actual plan.
This is an open invitation to be part of that 39% – but you can do better – because you have a plan. A detailed, well thought out plan. With the right tools, a ton of motivation, and a ‘handy guide’ like this one, you’ll be sure to stay on top of the playing field.
Our digital marketing agency has created the 8 Best B2B Marketing Strategies:
The Research
According to Pardot’s 2013 State of Demand Generation Report, 72% of product research for a future business purchase start on Google.
Research is the foundation of all B2B marketing strategies. Before you take the plunge, you need to know how ‘deep’ the market is. Conducting a great deal of market and brand research will help you understand the flow of things – allowing you to develop the best kind of strategies for your business.
According to SkillsLab.io, research helps you understand the market and your clients, presenting you with data that can help you craft a solution that appeals to those clients. Through this and market research, you can gauge how your solutions are faring and which services or processes you need to change to improve your business’ overall performance.
Professional Website Design
Blue Corona states that having a professional website design plays a huge role in every single stage of the buyer’s journey – half of all B2B customers today expect a supplier’s website to be a helpful channel and more than a third expect the site to be their most helpful channel.
They listed down these five ‘must-haves’ for successful B2B lead generation and sales:
- It has to be fast – 40% of users will abandon a webpage if it takes longer than three seconds to load.
- Keep it secure – 85% of consumers won’t browse an unsecured site. The padlock visualises what the HTTPS already announces – the data being sent through the website is encrypted and secure.
- Make it mobile-friendly – Mobile drives an average of more than 40% revenue in leading B2B organizations, and 50% of B2B search queries today are made on smartphones.
- The page has to be actionable – Approximately 44% of B2B marketers say the main reason they abandon websites is that there’s no contact information that’s immediately visible.
- Have it professionally designed – 37% of buyers will leave a website because of poor design or navigation, and 46% will leave if the page lacks a clear message.
Visual Content Marketing
According to SEO Expert, 32% of marketers say visual images are the most important form of content – with 51% of B2B marketers prioritising creation of visual assets as part of their content marketing strategy.
Improve your business’ usage of visual content through the creation of highly informative and engaging infographics. HubSpot states that infographics have had the biggest increase in usage among B2B marketers in the last four years (now at 65%), and that people who follow directions with text and illustrations do 323% better than those who don’t.
Image Source: Lyfe Marketing
Another great reason as to why B2B content marketing really works is that it makes the whole selling part so much easier. According to Lyfe Marketing, when you regularly publish relevant high quality content for your target audience, you achieve two important things that help your audience trust your brand:
- It positions your company as an industry expert that people can count on.
- It helps your target audience find the answers or solutions to complex niche-specific problems.
Search Engine Optimisation
Image Source: Google
According to Google, 90% of B2B researchers use online search to do research on business purchases. On average, B2B researchers do a total of 12 searches prior to engaging a specific brand’s site.
This image from Blue Corona shows the percentage of users that click on the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth positions – with 55% choosing the first three entries at the top of Google’s search page. From a technical standpoint, this means that you need to make sure that search engines can easily crawl, understand, and index your website. How exactly? You can start by having your SEO audited for FREE.
Mobile Marketing
Mobile marketing drives an average total of more than 40% revenue in leading B2B organisations – with more than 90% of buyers stating that they are more likely to buy again from a vendor that delivered a superior mobile experience over those that didn’t (poor mobile experience).
Think with Google also states that B2B researchers are not just using mobile when they are out and about, but rather wherever they are – with 49% of B2B researchers using their mobile devices for product research while at work.
Social Media Marketing
Content Marketing Institute published their 6th Annual B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends – North America Report, in which they highlighted the following:
- 93% of B2B marketers use social media content for their content marketing tactics – with case studies and blogs close behind at 82% and 81% respectively.
- B2B marketers rated LinkedIn (66%) as the most effective social media platform of all.
- LinkedIn is also the most used social media platform for B2B content marketing, raking in a total of 94%, surpassing Twitter at 87% and Facebook at 84%.
Over half of all the people on social media interact with brands more than once a month, and that 88% of companies are now marketing on social media.
Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC)
According to Blue Corona, over 41% of clicks go to the top 3 paid ads on the search results page. These are called Pay Per Click Ads. The term ‘PPC’ is pretty much self-explanatory. Every time your ad gets clicked on, you pay the business that is showing your ad.
One perk of this strategy is the freedom to choose which exact keyword/s to use, where your ad will show up, and how much you’re willing to spend on it. You may also exclude certain keywords, target specific locations, and more!
Event Marketing
The Bizzabo Blog defines B2B Event Marketing as an offline marketing channel where real-life experiences are leveraged to facilitate in-person interactions that result in actualised business goals like customer retention, increased event revenue, sales acceleration, and investor relations.
This image from Marketing Charts is based on a survey of 424 exhibitors who had participated in a B2B exhibition within 2 years prior to the survey. Televerde also revealed that B2B salespeople believe industry events are the most useful activity undertaken by marketers in their organisations.
Affiliates and Partnerships
A recent research from Innovative Enterprise suggests that the affiliate marketing industry will soar to nearly $7 billion in the next four years – with 90% of marketers indicating that affiliate programs were either important or very important to their advertising strategies.
Image Source: Big Commerce
According to a study conducted by the National Retail Federation, 81% of brands are using Affiliate marketing as part of their customer acquisition methods. It works by extending the responsibilities of product marketing across parties, allowing them to leverage the abilities of a variety of individuals for a more effective marketing strategy while providing contributors a share of their profit.
Remarketing
Blue Corona defines Remarketing as the practice of serving ads across the internet to people who have already visited your website. It allows your company to seem like they’re ‘following’ people around the internet by serving ads on the websites and platforms that they use most.
On average, only 2% of your website visitors convert. Remarketing goes after that other 98%. This chart by Wordstream shows exactly how conversion rates increase as more users see ads under remarketing campaigns.
For example, Google Display Network reaches 90% of Internet users worldwide – 65% of whom they reach every single day. With GDN, more than a trillion impressions are served to over 1 billion users every month.
Marketing Automation
Marketing Automation refers to the processes and practices that a company can adopt to improve the efficiency of their marketing based on several online channels. In 2015, 80% of marketing automation users reported generating more leads – with 77% seeing an increased number of conversions.
VentureBeat reports that brands typically see a 20-50% increase in revenue after adopting Marketing Automation. You can make your approach as intricate and data-driven as possible with this tool in tow.
Testimonial Videos
Image Source: Boast.io
Before people make a purchase, they look for product reviews. For services, they look for client testimonials. Reviews and testimonials are a powerful, unbiased tool for establishing trust and making a positive impression on your page visitors and potential buyers/clients.
Here are 4 of the best testimonial statistics curated by Boast, a leader in professional video testimonial production:
- 65% of your audience is inclined to visual learning.
- Website visitors are 64% more likely to follow through with a conversion after watching a video.
- 63% of online shoppers will purchase a product if it has reviews and ratings.
- 90% of online shoppers confirm that their buying decisions are influenced by online reviews.
According to Boast, video testimonials are a huge factor when it comes to buying decisions, and if you aren’t utilising a video testimonial service to capture and show your customers’ praises, then you are missing out on a huge opportunity to have your current customers help you sell your products/services to even more prospects.
Image Source: Marketing Insider Group
B2B marketers are also starting to think more strategically with their video content because it allows them to fit more video into the same budget. Hubspot’s The State of Video Marketing in 2018 Report revealed that 81% of businesses use video for their inbound marketing strategy, compared to 63% in 2017.
