In the competitive world of B2B giants, it can be difficult for startup or mid-size eCommerce companies to develop the right B2B marketing strategies to remain competitive. In this blog post, we are going to share some efficient marketing strategies for the business-to-business market that really work.
These are the best business-to-business marketing strategies:
- Conduct thorough research on your prospects and clients
In-depth research can bring lots of valuable information to the surface, and you can then use this information for your B2B marketing. Better knowledge of your prospects and clients will empower you to deliver better customer experience.
Besides, you will find out what helps your company succeed and develop a better understanding of services that you should offer. When it comes to your prospects and clients, there is no such thing as useless data. Remember that, and collect as much as you can whenever you can to feed it back in to your ecommerce optimization strategy.
- Create realistic marketing personas
Many B2C businesses create so-called “personas” when developing their marketing strategy. A marketing persona is a portrait of an average person that belongs to the company’s target audience, with as much details as possible, including the name, age, gender, interests, family, purchasing preferences and behavior.
This tactic is also suitable for B2B marketing strategies, where your persona can be a business owner. This will help you save time by narrowing down your target audience and thus ensuring that your marketing message reaches the right recipients. It also helps with important aspects of your site that you might not be thinking about. If you know your target, you can write product content that addresses their pain points. You can choose a B2B eCommerce platform that integrates with systems your target customer already uses.
It goes deeper than just deciding who you’re selling to. It can inform the entire marketing strategy of your business.
- Keep your promises
Unfortunately, some sellers tend to use aggressive marketing tactics. They invest a lot into marketing, but their disappointed clients get hardly anything in the end. As a result, there is no ROI, the seller gets no profit and can ruin their reputation by promising things they know they can’t deliver.
This refers both to the business-to-consumer and business-to-business marketing strategies. So, to earn trust from your audience, and do not barrage them with unrealistic promises. Instead, just tell the truth and lay out clear expectations for your prospects about which problems your product can solve.
Never use loud words and phrases that are not supported by facts, such as “the best,” “award-winning,” or “number one.” Instead, keep your marketing collateral simple, clear, and trustful.
- Align your ads with landing pages
Landing pages should be a primary target of all marketing strategies for the business-to-business market. When a prospect clicks your ad, they should be taken to the dedicated, branded landing page with cohesive design and content.
If the content and design of the ad and landing page are completely different, the prospect is more likely to just leave the page altogether, and never be converted to a customer. As a result, you may be receiving lots of traffic to your landing page, but this traffic won’t be converting leads.
- Make your website appealing to visitors
This is arguably the most important marketing strategy for eCommerce. A user-friendly website with sleek design and informative content will prolong the visits of your prospects and move them along the conversion funnel.
A responsive website with a mobile version will add even more points to your B2B marketing plans. Of course, it should also be user-friendly for your staff, so making sure you have a reliable system for product data management is key. Remember, service is part of user experience and you need to make sure your team keeps things streamlined internally.
- Encourage feedback
Feedback from customers is a powerful tool and an integral part of B2B web marketing. One of the best ways to gather feedback is to include surveys as part of your B2B marketing ideas.
This will help you understand your audience, improve your services and earn a shiny reputation, because customers love when their suggestions and feature requests are brought to life.
- Interconnect your sales channels
If you sell your products via a physical store, dedicated online store, and mobile app, you can go further and add more channels, such as social media or email marketing.
You can also use the and integrate all of these channels with each other. This B2B internet marketing strategy will ensure a smooth, integrated customer experience across all of the channels available.
- Run A/B tests
A/B testing refers to testing two different B2B marketing tactics at the same time. Such tests are an important part of the best B2B marketing campaigns. To achieve better results, you should run them side by side and at the same time.
This will allow you to find out which business-to-business digital marketing campaign works better and detect possible errors.
- Run SEO campaigns
Search engine optimization is one of the best B2B marketing strategies. On-site SEO uses targeted keyword phrases that typically focus on your services and expertise.
The purpose of on-site SEO is to rank for searched terms on search engines, making it easier for your prospects to find you. Off-site SEO involves external links to your website, for example, guest posts on trusted websites. As a result, your website will earn more credibility with search engines.
- Extend your sales funnel
In B2B eCommerce strategy, the “prospect – lead – customer” journey of a user is much longer than in B2C. Shortening the funnel for faster sales like in B2C approach will not work in this case, because B2B is targeted at long term, productive relationships with customers.
Therefore, you can extend your sales funnel by creating educational content for prospects, conduct webinars, and use social media to build brand awareness.
- Find your brand advocates
Encourage your customers to share their positive experiences with your brand on social networks or review sites and reward them for this.
When people see that you appreciate such advocacy, they will be more likely to think of you in the future. By the way, your employees can also become brand advocates.
- Participate in trade shows and expos
Trade shows and exhibitions can be a great way to network with potential customers, however this really depends on your product. You have to make sure the event you’re attending has an immediate connection to your product, so you’re getting some ROI for your efforts.
- Use the referrals system
Having your existing customers refer your services to other businesses is one of the most helpful B2B marketing tips you’ll hear. The businesses that you are working with can directly refer their clients to your business. All you have to do is create an incentive for them to do so. This is a win-win strategy for both parties in a B2B relationship.
What eCommerce Marketing Strategies Do You Use?
We hope that this information will help you create the best strategy for your business, but we want to know what’s already working for you. Please feel free to use the comments section to share your favorite B2B marketing strategies for eCommerce.