Businesses who are trying to attract the attention of fellow businesses to make a profit often feel like they have a whole different ball game when it comes to marketing. After all, you are trying to advertise to whole companies instead of just the wallet-heavy individual consumer.
Companies tend to be more discerning in their choices, and their accountants try their hardest to cut spending as much as possible, making it hard to get your foot in the door to show off the benefits of your products of services.
Business to business, or B2B, marketing may look different from the outside, but actually it isn’t all that different from regular old business to customer, or B2C, marketing. If you’re just starting to develop your B2B marketing strategy or if you feel that your old strategy needs a jumpstart to make it more effective, learn the most fundamental rules of B2B marketing to increase your profits like never before.
More Eyes Means More Leads
Just like with regular marketing, the more people you get to look at your advertisements, the more likely you’ll find the person who wants to learn more. Big volume marketing, like billboards or car stickers, gets your message to thousands of people every day, and one of them is bound to be a company executive or department head with an office problem remedied by your product or service. Invest in advertising that sees a lot of traffic — or that will allow a lot of traffic to see it.
Quality and Quantity Make a Sale
Though the quantity of your ads is certainly powerful in generating buzz about your product or service, because business are pickier about what they invest in, you need to make sure your marketing strategy is qualitative as well. Make sure you explain exactly what your product or service can do for a company — maybe it organizes client information more efficiently or provides must-needed specialized technical support — in an eye-catching and attractive way.
Leads Are Sales Waiting to Happen
If you find your marketing starts to really pay off, you might have an influx of leads the likes of which you’ve never seen. It might feel like you don’t have enough hours in the day to follow up on potential leads, but you must remember that these potential clients could provide your biggest sales yet. You need a large portion of your potential leads to convert if you want your company to succeed, so you must make sure you or your sales team is devoting enough time to following up on the leads you receive.
Feedback Is Your Best Friend
This is a good strategy for any marketing department. Just because your company is staying afloat doesn’t mean it’s performing to your clients’ highest expectations. Get as much feedback as you can from your current clients to make sure your products and services are functioning as well as they should. Make sure you ask not only about your clients’ satisfaction with your product or service but also about their treatment. You may be able to smooth out some step in your sales process to convert more leads in the future.
