For a modern B2B company, a well-functioning online sales department is an important building block for the success of the company. It is not enough to create a website. Instead, you should also know the levers to gain more traffic and leads for your business.
What does online sales mean?
The term online sales includes all activities in the field of digital media that a B2B company can use. In this context, the first goal of the company is to build the largest possible online presence. For example:
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Draw attention to the company
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Strengthen the awareness of your own company and expand the reach
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Receive inquiries for the company's products and services
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Generate prospective customers who will later become customers of the company
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Promote sales of the company's own products
In the digital age, it is vital for any business to have a comprehensive presence online.
Potential customers search the web specifically for information that is helpful in solving their own problems.
If these solutions are found, the product purchase phase, which in the B2B segment is often accompanied by a longer decision-making phase, begins seamlessly. Here, it is crucial that you know the needs of your ideal customers to stay in business.
The goal is to understand your leads and be ready with information and valuable content that is helpful to the target customer, at every touchpoint in the customer journey.
This only works when the marketing and sales people in your company work together. Together, they can solve the customer's problems and connect with sales at the appropriate time.
Does your B2B company need online sales?
The answer to this question is an undoubted YES!
In the past, sales in the B2B segment has strongly been driven by face-to-face interaction, such as:
This behavior has changed due to current restrictions on personal contacts and the elimination of numerous trade fairs and exhibitions. At the same time, customer needs have changed.
Decision-makers in the B2B sector who are looking for solutions to problems first obtain information online.
If solutions are found there, the direct contact is also immediately made digitally.
For this reason, it is crucial for your company to set up a contemporary online sales department on all digital channels, if possible. It is not sufficient to place a website for your company on the Internet and to list a number of products there.
For successful online sales, it is helpful to know the set screws online, so that your website can also be found and subsequently increase new customers and sales of the company's products via increased traffic. But how does this work?
Search engine optimized website
Make your website visitor-friendly for your leads while also ensuring that Google finds your website exciting and rewards that with a top ranking.
Keep the following important facts for your web presence in mind:
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Your content must be current and aligned the needs of potential customers
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Describe current and relevant topics in your corporate blog
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Implement the appropriate keywords to be found by prospects and customers
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Increase the focus of your content on information rather than on product advertising
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Facilitate the handling for your visitors by an active user guidance
Your optimized website is an important building block for online sales and ensures additional business success.
Social Selling
The presence of social networks is also becoming increasingly important in the B2B segment.
It is not very successful for an employee in the marketing team to get on the phone and call off a list of potential customers. In some cases, cold calling also involves legal concerns.
For this reason, it is more convenienct for your online sales team to engage with good digital content on social networks such as:
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Facebook
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Instagram
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LinkedIn
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XING
and build your own community of interested readers there.
The approach you should take is to regularly feature topical and interesting posts from your business that add value to potential customers, on social media.
In doing so, it is a good idea if you provide your articles with lead magnets that prompt the reader to contact your online sales department. This behavior allows you to start a dialogue with prospects and connect with your ideal customers.
Source: Preview of a LinkedIn post with the Pedalix software
Ad Strategy
In order to increase sales in your online sales in the short term, you should think about using a targeted ad strategy. In this context, it is important to have good content on your website that adds value to your visitors at the same time.
The investment of specific Google or even social ads can possibly become costly for your online sales. Hence, this strategy is only recommended for selected focus topics.
Here, you must succeed in reaching your desired customers directly, so that a timely referral for a consultation appointment to the sales department takes place.
Conclusion
There are several ways to optimize the clout of your own website for online sales. Through search engine optimization, social selling and the purchase of the right ads, it is possible to generate additional traffic on the company's own website and significantly increase the reach.
As a result, companies in the B2B segment increase their online sales and the acquisition of additional customers, leading to a successful business in the future.
