B2B Marketing Strategies for 2022 and beyo
Nithin Kumar Peratla, PMP, PSPO II
Driving Business Value Through AI & ML Products at Cognizant | IIM Bangalore | IIT Madras | PMP | Agile | Cloud | Digital Transformation | Management Consulting | Change Management | Strategy
Marketing is a science that requires the marketer to be on toes every second in and out of work. I term it an ever-evolving gamut of skills and technologies required to ensure the business generates targeted traffic and leads. As an astonishing fact, 60% of digital marketing professionals accept this as one of the biggest challenges in their profession.
Out of my interest and research in digital marketing trends, I have come across an excellent article from Mr. Sujan Patel about 15 key B2B marketing strategies that can help a business stay connected with its customers regularly. I will summarise the gist of the article for the ease of my connections and followers.
For B2B businesses, targeting a specific set of accounts should be a key target – say, a group of senior buyers at a company whose business you want. It is not always required that the marketing campaigns in the B2B segment go viral all the time as the business is not targeting lakhs of customers like B2C but is looking at a select set of businesses as customers. ABM makes salespeople's lives much easier because you're creating content and campaigns that are specifically targeted to the prospects you're chasing.
80% of your revenue comes from 20% of your customers.
Livechat is often incorrectly termed as dealing with customer complaints only. But, researchers say that 92% of customers say they're satisfied with their live chat experiences, a higher proportion than any other communications channel.
In the era of WhatsApp messaging, it's hardly surprising that customers love live chat more than direct interaction. After all, it's the fastest and most comfortable way for them to get a response to their queries.
According to McKinsey, it's the primary factor behind 20 to 50% of all purchasing decisions. And it is not surprising because happy customers are loyal customers and are repeat customers.
Businesses can build a referral program to showcase their products' confidence and as a nudge to refer their products.
We all know how effective content marketing can be. According to some estimates, it delivers three times more leads than outbound marketing and costs 62% less. But not all content is created equal. Precisely, long-form content delivers much better results than short-form content. Longer posts are nine times more effective at generating leads.
An average buyer views 5 or more articles from the winning vendor before purchase
Email Marketing is often termed dead, but it is not. But, with the advent of marketing automation tools such as Mail Chimp, Sendinblue, it can become a potent weapon for marketing professionals who can customize their emails depending on the target segment. Targeted emails can be pleasing to potential customers if they receive them at the right time of their requirement.
Again, thought leadership – in other words, offering expert opinion on issues relevant to your field – is nothing new. But as a marketing technique, it's more effective than ever.?Thought leadership is a viable approach for any number of business types and marketing strategies, but it's mighty for reaching the power brokers within target businesses.
According to LinkedIn and Edelman,
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58% of decision-makers consume between one and four hours of thought leadership content every week
Unless you've been buried beneath a fallen overhead projector for the past decade, you should be well aware of the benefits of paid media, whether via search or social.
Notably, organic – or non-paid – activity is becoming increasingly ineffective. Organic search click-through rates are continuing to decline, while organic impressions on Facebook and LinkedIn have dropped by as much as 90% in recent years.
The message here is clear:
You just can’t afford not to be running paid activity in 2022.
And there's another critical component to paid media strategies – retargeting. Brands are already using it for various reasons, from customer acquisition to raising brand awareness.
The benefits of retargeting are clear.
Retargeted customers are three times more likely to click on an ad, while 26% of customers will return to a website after being retargeted.
It might seem like an old-school tactic, but event marketing will be just as relevant in 2021 as it ever has been before.
In an ever-more-digital world, the advantages of building personal, face-to-face connections have never been more significant. So it's hardly surprising that a majority of marketers believe event marketing is the single-most effective channel, according to one source:
52% of business leaders believe event marketing delivers greater ROI than any other channel or tactic
According to Harvard Business Review Analytic Services, the?most popular types of hosted event?are:
The B2B industry is undergoing a significant change. As organizations are moving away from in-person sales strategies, they should look forward to leveraging technology and data as a new way forward.
The B2B sales strategies should always focus on using personalization, data, and systemization to enhance the sales process at every step.
The result is clear:
Creating more brand awareness, education, and value than anyone else.
When you can do that and maintain discipline while executing on the sales fundamentals, you can grow your revenue faster than you think.
What are you hoping to achieve with your marketing efforts in 2022?
Happy New Year, 2022!
And how do you plan to do it? Let me know in the comments below: