In the digital age, both the search for solutions to companies' problems and the acquisition of new business partners in the B2B sector are increasingly taking place on the Internet. Therefore, good B2B online marketing is an important element for a successful corporate strategy.
Online Marketing in B2B
The term online marketing generally describes all activities in the field of marketing that are carried out via the Internet. This is a broad field through which numerous business transactions are carried out.
It would be disastrous for a modern company to do so without its own online strategy, since business customers in particular search for:
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solutions to problems
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the development of new ways to sell products
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the acquisition of new customers for their own business model
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partners for the company's own supply chain
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opportunities to expand their business into new markets
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ways to increase turnover and profit.
In the digital age, B2B online marketing is becoming increasingly important.
With the help of online marketing activities, the right strategy can help you succeed:
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The acquisition of qualified leads for the sales team
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Increasing the awareness of the company
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Placement of brands and products for the desired target group
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Customer loyalty through permanent presence on the web
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Increasing traffic on the company's own website
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Improvement of the ranking in search engines
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Expansion of the presence in social media channels
In order to achieve these goals, it is crucial for your company to set up the right strategy for its own B2B online marketing.
Only if it is possible to identify the adequate target customers and keep them engaged, it will be possible to close a successful deal for the sales team at the end of the customer journey.
Digital Strategy for B2B Companies
There is not one path to the right strategy for B2B online marketing in your business.
The first step is the will to want to build a presence online for your business. To achieve this, all departments need to work together.
The key to success is that all employees in marketing and sales know your online marketing strategy and are actively involved.
This is the only way to acquire new customers or to successfully market targeted products and services online.
The goal of your strategy for B2B online marketing is to set a clear perspective and thereby provide clear courses of action. In addition, your campaign must generate added value for your leads and your business.
In this context, it is important to:
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Establish a suitable online presence
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Precisely define and sharply delimit target groups
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Define the customer journey and make it attractive
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Identify touchpoints of the interested parties
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Pick up customers at the touchpoints and provide them with information
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Distribute high-quality content
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Create customer loyalty
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Use social media channels
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Improve search engine ranking
You determine the focus of individual factors in your own B2B online marketing strategy. It is a good idea to always involve the marketing and sales staff in the details of the strategy.
A well thought-out online marketing concept
It is not the best idea for a company to simply act wildly on the internet and place expensive ads everywhere, or place product information randomly on the net.
Since products in the B2B segment are significantly more complex and often require additional information and long decision-making processes, the right strategy in B2B online marketing is of great importance.
It is crucial to know your target group and to distribute the right content and decision support via the appropriate channels.
If you know your desired customers, the first step has already been taken. Now it is the task of the marketing staff to develop a targeted strategy for the campaign on the Internet.
Here are some tips as an example, which stand for a successful B2B online marketing:
What is inbound marketing?
In the digital age, B2B decision makers' email inboxes are often cluttered with advertising. At the same time, advertising is annoying with every click on the internet when an employee is looking for solutions to a problem.
Many people are getting better at tuning out the constant advertising messages on websites and no longer reacting to them. As a result, classic advertising is becoming less and less important.
Professional B2B online marketing aims to discover potential customers differently. Inbound marketing is about reaching the desired target audience by adding value to the lead instead of bombarding them with unwanted product information.
It's about picking up the target customer by addressing their needs and providing valuable information and assistance for their issue. This builds trust with the ideal customer because it adds value to them, while also generating interest and attention.
In the customer journey of a lead, ad-free inbound marketing should be used relatively early on as a building block of your B2B online marketing strategy.
This way, you convey the feeling of being a partner at eye level to your ideal customer.
What is content marketing?
Content marketing is about creating valuable content that adds value to your ideal customers. This makes successful content marketing an essential component of your online marketing strategy.
Good content can provide solutions to the needs and wants of your potential customers. It enables marketing and sales staff to pick up your target customers relatively early in the customer journey.
At the same time, another goal of good content marketing is to attract attention in relevant search engines. Among other things, your content is used there to assess the attractiveness of your website and to improve its ranking.
When it comes to content marketing, it's crucial to tell compelling stories that your ideal customers can relate to.
Below are some examples of successful storytelling:
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Providing strategies for solving problems
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Conveying information
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Spreading industry experience
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Trigger thought processes
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Stimulate changes in behavior
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Motivation to act
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Broaden the horizon of the target customer
Decision makers from B2B companies respond well to expert text, supporting images and visuals, and informative video content.
Content Marketing Strategy for B2B Companies
In B2B online marketing, distributing valuable content to your ideal customers is one of the most important building blocks.
It's not enough to create high-quality content and then haphazardly send it out to all known customers in one package. Rather, it's essential to figure out at what point the content will be targeted.
The second aspect is that valuable content in online marketing must be aimed at the desired customer and not serve to spread one's own brand awareness to the world.
A well-thought-out content marketing strategy includes this approach:
If your messages don't reach potential customers at the right time, valuable content tends to go unread. That's why it's critical to know each customer's customer journey and exactly where they currently are.
When marketing online, you should always be ready with the appropriate content for your target customer at the appropriate touchpoint.
Building topic worlds
In the past, the ranking of websites on the leading search engine was primarily determined by relevant keywords. If you wanted to occupy a topic area in the field of online marketing, it was important that as many keywords as possible appeared on your website and were scattered in the right combination.
Today, this is no longer sufficient because Google can assign even complex queries of customers to individual terms and topic worlds via artificial intelligence.
Meanwhile, Google no longer evaluates a website stubbornly according to individual well-used keywords.
The new trend for your website is:
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Authority
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Popularity
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Relevance
With Pillar Pages as a critical building block of B2B online marketing, you create theme worlds on your website that are permanently filled with current and exciting content on corresponding sub-pages.
This way, you offer your readers orientation and at the same time demonstrate your expertise as a recognised expert.
It is best if you create several Pillar Pages about different specialist topics from your business. Google will definitely rate your B2B online marketing strategy positively.
The importance of a corporate blog
The corporate blog on the company's own website is a central element for well-structured online marketing.
A company blog increases the perception of your company and ensures customer loyalty with good contributions and offers a contact point for curious prospective customers.
This also makes your corporate blog great for generating leads for your B2B business by adding conversion elements to blog posts.
For example, you most advantageously report on:
As a guide for your corporate blog in online marketing, these five factors are suitable:
It's important that your content is written in an interesting and engaging way, with graphic elements to break it up.
Pay attention to the principle that information comes before advertising.
Additionally, as part of B2B online marketing, it's a good idea to link your corporate blog to social media channels.
Improve Google ranking
Both the search for new business partners and the solution of problems in the B2B segment increasingly take place on the Internet in the digital age. For this reason, a strong Google ranking is essential for B2B online marketing.
Anyone who does not appear on the first page of Google is almost lost in the jungle of the Internet. However, maintaining one's own Google ranking is not an individual task, but requires permanent attention.
The more visible your website is on the major search engine, the greater the chance that potential buyers will be able to find your company.
With these five tips you will succeed in bringing your website to the front in Google:
Thanks to artificial intelligence, the search engine can now recognize which websites offer added value for users and takes this into account when ranking.
Building online sales for B2B
For your online marketing to be successful, it is crucial to develop the right strategy and then efficiently put the planned actions into practice.
Every business has its plan to create an online presence. In addition to creating good content, choosing the right channels for your messages is also a prerequisite for future success.
In this context, social selling is just as important as building a well-thought-out ad strategy.
The employees in sales and marketing are the first point of contact in your company for these tasks. Here it is indispensable to involve all parties in your online marketing strategy.
B2B online marketing is a crucial factor for future business success.
Conclusion
With the right online marketing strategy for your B2B company, you will not only succeed in expanding your reach online, but also in gaining valuable leads and converting them into paying customers in the longer term.
Accordingly, you will continue to be perceived as an expert and pioneer in your industry and be present where your customers are also increasingly moving: on the Internet.
