Long gone are the days of traditional advertising.
These days, it is all about content marketing, not just for business-to-consumer organisations, but for business-to-business marketing ones as well.
The marketing industry is in constant flux, so it is critical that businesses stay abreast of the changing trends so that they can work to stay ahead of their competitors.
In this post we’ll discuss the changes and what they mean for your business.
The Changing Market
As people become more and more dependent on the internet when searching for information, it becomes increasingly important for businesses to maintain an online presence.
This is no longer limited to merely having a website. Blogs and social media accounts are crucial components of this presence as well.
It is not enough to simply have these things either. Businesses must be actively involved in maintaining them and in using them to communicate with customers.
It is not just consumers who are using the internet to evaluate businesses. B2B organisations use the internet to research and vet other businesses that they are interested in working with.
In order to remain successful in this area, your business must take great care in cultivating its online presence, as this is now the primary way in which other businesses will find yours.
Inbound vs. Outbound Marketing
To understand modern marketing methods, it is important to note the distinction between the way marketing was done in the past and the way it is done now.
Past marketing efforts focused more on outbound marketing, while the current trend is more towards inbound.
Outbound Marketing
The outbound method involves a business creating promotional messaging and delivering it to customers through a variety of media forms. This includes traditional TV, radio, and print advertising. Exhibiting at tradeshows, cold calling, and emailing are also considered outbound marketing.
Basically, outbound marketing is any activity that involves a business pushing its marketing messages out to its customers.
Inbound Marketing
On the contrary, inbound marketing involves the customer seeking out the business themselves.
Typically, this involves creating informational materials designed to attract the interest of customers so that they will initiate an enquiry to the business for more information.
Inbound marketing includes a company’s blog, social media accounts, ebooks, white papers and the like.
When customers go online to search for information, they will be directed to the organisation’s website to retrieve the information. The ultimate goal of this is that the customer will find value in the company’s offerings and seek out more information or make a purchase.
Inbound marketing is often referred to as content marketing because the business produces informative content to attract customers rather than crafting advertising materials.
What This Means for B2B Marketers
B2B marketers need to be aware of these changes to the marketing industry so that they do not get left behind as their competitors continue to adopt the newer methods.
Today’s customers are increasingly discerning and have often trained themselves to tune out traditional advertising methods.
Even though many businesses spend the bulk of their marketing dollars on outbound marketing efforts, these methods are far less successful in generating leads and attracting new customers than inbound marketing has become.
How to Get Started
Inbound and content marketing methods offer a variety of opportunities for B2B organisations to connect with potential clients.
With so many options to choose from, it can be difficult to determine where to start.
Here, we’ll break down some of the most popular methods and offer some tips and guidelines to help you get started with each method.
Blogging
By far the most popular method of inbound marketing, blogging is a great tool to effectively establish your business as an authority in your industry.
In crafting your posts, don’t simply publish posts just for the sake of publishing something. The information that you put on your blog needs to be well thought out and planned to have the strongest effect.
Before you begin, really take the time to think about the types of customers you want to attract. Put yourself in the shoes of your target market and think about what information would be desirable to that market.
Think about problems that they might have and use your posts to propose ways to fix them. If you start to notice common questions amongst your current and prospective clients, write posts that answer those questions.
Try to resist the urge to overtly promote your business within your posts.
While a brief call to action at the end of the post is perfectly acceptable, and quite common, keep this to a minimum.
The goal is to provide additional value for your readers so that they will be inspired to seek out your business’s services on their own.
If your blog becomes overrun with self-promotion, your readers will likely tune out in the same way they do with traditional advertising.
Social Media
As with blogging, try not to use your social media outlets solely for advertising purposes. If your business is running a special promotion or some other unique event, by all means, post about it.
However, you need to give your followers more. Share links to interesting articles related to your industry, post unique facts about your business or ask your followers questions.
Encourage your followers to leave their comments and to share your posts with their own followers if they like.
Keep in mind that social media is meant to be just that: social. Don’t spend all of your time on social media creating your own posts. You need to engage with your customers as well.
Aim to respond to your customers’ enquiries and comments as quickly as possible to show them that you value their business.
Ebooks and White Papers
Particularly for B2B organisations, white papers and ebooks give you the opportunity to share your knowledge and expertise on a topic in more detail than you could in a blog post.
This is a great way to further establish your role as an expert in your industry.
The writing style in these formats can also be much more formal and technical that with blogging, so don’t be afraid to get deep into the subject matter.
Use ebooks and white papers as incentives to get prospective customers to sign up for your email list. This way, you’ll be able to obtain contact information from customers who might not otherwise offer it to your business.
Then, you’ll be able to nurture the relationship to hopefully turn that prospect into a paying customer for your organisation.
Embracing Technology
Technology across a variety of industries is developing and progressing at an alarming rate, and the marketing industry is no different.
It is in the best interests of your business to embrace technology to bolster your marketing efforts.
Evaluating Your Customers and Your Competition
Just as your customers and competitors use the internet to conduct research on your organisation, so too can you in researching them.
The internet is filled with a wealth of information that you can use to better understand your target market, their needs and wants, and their purchase behaviours.
Be sure to research your competitors as well to determine what distinguishes your business from theirs.
This will help guide you in deciding what to post on your blog and social media channels to set your business apart.
Real-Time Tracking
Advances in technology have made it possible for you to track the success of your marketing efforts in real time.
This way, you can evaluate exactly what is working and what isn’t so that you can make changes as quickly as possible.
You can see how your customers are arriving at your website, which pages they are viewing, and how long they are staying. These unique insights can help shape your future marketing efforts as you learn more about your customers and their behaviours.
Marketing Automation
Automation is one of the greatest tools modern marketers have at their disposal. Blog and social posts can be prewritten and scheduled to publish at the times that are optimal for customer viewing.
Rather than having to stay on top of these efforts throughout the day, your marketing team will be freed up to focus on creating the content.
Automation can be used for your outbound marketing efforts as well, like with email responses and other brand communications.
Keep On Learning
Now that you have mastered the basics of business-to-business inbound and content marketing, keep seeking out and learning fresh information.
This industry is constantly evolving to reflect current customer tastes and preferences, so it is never safe to assume that what works today will continue to work in the future.