B2B marketing is becoming increasingly important. In the meantime, some trends and techniques have established themselves, which will become important in 2018 and beyond and already are.
Let's take a look together at the modern marketing techniques 2018.
The trends in B2B marketing for 2018 and beyond
Even though parts of 2018 have already passed, further trends are nevertheless emerging, which in the B2B marketing will still be valid beyond the year.
This is reflected, among other things, in the fact that more and more companies are relying on these marketing techniques and implementing them in their internal processes.
The 7 main marketing techniques in B2B marketing 2018 are:
- Focus on the Buyers Persona
- Influencers to build trust
- Personal contacts and personal presence with the customer
- Effective design of the Customer Journey
- Interdisciplinary teams for success
- Using Big Data effectively
- Content Marketing Remains trump
Focus on the people behind the companies
Many companies and the people working in them make the mistake of seeing their partners in B2B marketing as companies. This mistake makes it very difficult to establish and use the various contact options that are common in normal B2C marketing.
Many of these measures can be transferred in a targeted manner and, above all, without difficulty if the focus is placed more on the individual persons and decision-makers in the targeted companies.
The Buyers Persona must therefore come into focus. This is partly time-consuming, as this must first be determined, but can then have a lasting influence on B2B marketing.
The main thing now is to convince the key people of your own advantages and your own product or company.
The tools for this are more than familiar from B2C marketing and can be transferred without difficulty. A targeted build-up of trust and a targeted strengthening of one's own brand can influence the decisions of this group of people sustainably and to the advantage of one's own company.
Building trust through influencers
Trust into the Brand and the Products also play an important role in B2B marketing. Just as with end customers, this trust can be built up specifically through influencers.
However, the selection is more suitable Influencer in B2B marketing is significantly more demanding, since as a rule these Influencer in business must have a corresponding acquaintance and standing.
As a rule, this also means that such influencers are significantly more expensive and for this reason must be used in a very targeted manner.
It is therefore important to target influencers who underline the professionalism of the company and who are believed in the quality of the advertised product on the basis of their judgment.
The search for a suitable Brand ambassador can be crucial for successful B2B marketing, but it can also tie up a lot of resources.
Personal presence strengthens brand awareness
Even though sales in many industries are increasingly shifting to the online world, personal contacts and personal identifications still play an important role in the B2B segment.
For this reason, you should not shy away from personal contact for successful B2B marketing, but rather seek it out.
Become part of the important Trade fairs and Meeting active in your industry and ensure that your relevant employees are present.
At first, this may only make a small difference and hardly pay off.
But the more often you show presence and thus the better known the Faces of your employees for your B2B contacts, the more drive such a business relationship develops on a personal level.
Through the personal and human component, you create trust in your own product and your own company and can take B2B marketing to a whole new level.
After all, personal contacts have become rare in the online world and are nevertheless particularly valued by decision-makers in companies.
The customer journey in the focus of attention
If we have already dealt with the buyer persona at the beginning, it is important in B2B marketing to convince them of the advantages of one's own company and to induce them to make a purchase decision.
The differences between B2C and B2B marketing are rather marginal here.
It is important to accompany the buyer persona on its way to a purchase decision during the customer journey and to influence the customer at all touchpoints if possible. Important contact points include:
- The search results on Google
- Online and offline - advertisements
- Blog articles and content
- Newsletter
- Social media channels
- Fairs and events
Ideally, the customer is convinced and targeted at every touchpoint of the customer journey.
However, this is much more difficult in B2B marketing, as customers often react differently and need to be animated differently than in B2C marketing.
For this reason, it is important to focus on some touchpoints of the Customer Journey and to strengthen them especially for B2B marketing.
Interdisciplinary teams for marketing success
In B2B marketing, it depends not least on the successful approach to the customer and business partner.
However, many people in marketing are too caught up in their own world and there is often a lot of mistrust placed on them because of their vocabulary and tasks.
For this reason, it is important that in B2B marketing, the language of the customer is met at their decision-making level.
Interdisciplinary teams for B2B marketing offer the possibility of more Flexibility and Adaptability in marketing and to meet the wishes and needs of customers even more effectively.
Here, all subdivisions of the company can be called upon to provide targeted impetus and set accents.
The use of Big Data is becoming increasingly important
Big Data is more than just a buzzword.
Particularly in the B2B segment, the available data about the Customers and its Business relations an important role.
As a company, it is important not only to collect this data, but also to use it in a targeted and efficient To be edited and then at use.
This not only requires the appropriate programs, but also the workflow of the company's own employees must be adapted to the use of the data.
Thus, the processed data can be used in B2B marketing to develop targeted persuasion strategies or to adapt one's own products and their presentation to the preferences of a potential business partner.
Content marketing as a pillar in B2B marketing
Content Marketing means above all convincing the customer with sound expertise and satisfying his hunger for information.
Especially in B2B business, the purchasing process is often characterized by a long phase of information gathering.
At the same time, most companies now obtain information online about potential Suppliers and their Products.
So the better one's presence on the web and the more control one has over the various data, the more effectively companies can position and present themselves in B2B marketing.
