How To Improve B2B Marketing: Ideas For Your Next Strategy
1. Use Promotional Products
B2B, or business to business, marketing involves selling one company’s products or services to another company. One of the best ways for clients to recall you and to kickstart new or repeat business is through your promotional products.
There are several different ways you can use promotional items to your advantage. For example, you can send them to prospects — those you are eyeing to book an appointment or close a sale with. Plan your strategy well so you’ll have an opportunity to reach out to your audience faster and get instant results with Streamoz.
They can also serve as complimentary gifts to your clients. Promotional products are one of the most common B2B marketing strategies. They are widely used, and that is why even clients often expect to receive them.
Promotional items have proven to be effective marketing and brand awareness materials. Maximize their potential by choosing items that are useful and relevant to your target market. Don’t forget to make sure your company’s identifying features have prime visibility so the product can do the promoting for you!
2. Involve Yourself With Your Local Chamber of Commerce
A great way to build your network as a business owner is by joining your local chamber of commerce. Here, you’ll be able to interact with other business owners and involve yourself in the local business community.
Being an active member of your local chamber of commerce will allow you to expand your network of partners and clients. In turn, more people will become aware of your company. This gives you great opportunities to grow your business.
Chamber of commerce members look out for each other’s interests. That’s why they strive to be on top of business trends, issues, and happenings. They also help leverage each other’s businesses, so you can count on them for your company event promotions.
3. Join Trade Shows and Exhibits
Your B2B marketing won’t be complete without joining trade shows and exhibits. These are events organized by industry associations or a group of companies. They invite different companies within their specific industry to come together and exhibit the products and services they offer.
This is the perfect time to meet with potential investors, clients, and competitors. You can show off your technical know-how to gain new business or get investors for your company. You’ll also be able to observe how well your competitors are doing.
Trade shows and exhibits provide a lot of opportunities for your business, so they should be part of your strategic B2B marketing plan.
4. Give Product Samples
If you want to launch a new product or break into a new market, providing product samples is a good B2B marketing strategy. You can send them along with your salesperson to your target companies. If your prospect agrees to try it, your salesperson can guide them through it.
The purpose of giving away sample units is to allow your customer to try the product first before they make a purchase decision. This is especially important to companies who purchase within a strict budget — they want to get their money’s worth.
The quality of your product sample and your customer’s product experience will have a huge impact on their purchase decision. It could make or break the deal, so it’s important to ensure that your sample units are in excellent condition.
5. Offer Reduced Prices
Offering reduced prices for your products and services often happens when you join reverse auctions. Here, you bid to get buyers, so you compete with other suppliers to bid for the lowest price possible. You have to reduce your prices to match your competitors’ bids. The supplier who bids the lowest wins the new business.
You can also offer reduced prices as part of your promotional B2B marketing. Consumers are not the only ones who enjoy sale events, as companies can also take advantage of them. You can offer discounted products and services on special events such as holidays and your company anniversary.
6. Allow Trade-ins
As with consumer trade-in programs, you can also offer companies a discount on new product models when they turn in the old models they have. Create a trade-in program for your B2B market wherein they can surrender their old, damaged, or broken products in exchange for a price discount.
Trade-in programs are most valuable to companies looking to replace and offload their current products. This is a great give-and-take B2B marketing strategy you can use for your own business.
7. Establish Strategic Partnerships
Establishing strategic partnerships with other businesses that share your values and market can bring in good benefits. The great thing about this is it’s mutually beneficial. Find other businesses that you can team up with on activities and deals to enjoy the following co-branding benefits:
- Improved company affiliation portfolio
- Shared expenses
- Wider market base
- New leads
- New partnership opportunities
One of the ways of how you can choose a partner for your B2B marketing is to see which companies you have worked with before. If you’re looking for new partners, find ones that are relevant to your own business. The partnership has to make sense for it to work, so having common values and market are among the most important factors to consider.
8. Encourage Referrals
Capitalize on the power of word of mouth by encouraging referrals. Satisfied customers become your advocates, and they can encourage others to do business with you.
Develop an easy and rewarding customer referral program for your current clients so they can help you gain new business. Through referral programs, you can gauge customer satisfaction as well. It also opens opportunities for you to thank your loyal customers and reward them for their patronage.
9. Maximize Your Social Media Pages
These days, almost everyone has access to social media. These platforms are a great way to connect with your audience on a more personal level. You can also reach a large audience through your organic and sponsored social media posts.
Post regular content in your social media pages to increase your online presence. Through your content, you can aim to inform, sell, create buzz, or simply connect with your market. Manage your online community well, as they are a reflection of how well you treat your customers both online and offline.
10. Start Your Email Marketing
Despite the popularity of social media as a marketing platform, email marketing is still relevant. All you need is an email list and a good marketing message to leverage this medium for your B2B marketing.
Email marketing is not costly and it can reach a wide target audience. Coupled with a good campaign strategy, it can bring in value for your business. Here are some ways how you can benefit from an email marketing campaign:
- Achieve top-of-mind awareness when you send regular newsletters or company announcements
- Drive user traffic to your website or online store when you make special offers
- Generate leads in exchange for access to relevant marketing assets
- Gain new business through regular product and service updates
Make your email marketing count! On-point messaging, creative eye-catching visuals, and relevant offers are the way to go so you can maximize this strategy.
11. Leverage Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
When people want solutions to their problems, one of their first instincts is to look it up online. Most people, though, don’t go past the first page of the search results to find answers. What if they were looking for the product or service you’re offering, but your content ranks beyond the first page?
This is where search engine optimization comes in handy. Once you master SEO, you can use this for your B2B marketing by improving the content you publish. This way, you can take advantage of organic search traffic, instead of paying to stay within the first search results page.
SEO can yield higher traffic to your content, whether for your website, social media pages, or blog posts. They can also provide you with good traffic quality, as you’ll have potential clients come to you through the search results.
12. Work On Your Own Blog
If you want to provide useful and relevant content to your target market, start your own blog! Through this, you’ll be able to promote your products and services, as well as provide valuable insights and tips. Aside from social media and email marketing, this is a great way to connect with your target market online.
Blog posts can add value to potential customers, especially if you are able to provide solutions to their pain points. Publish quality content and you will stand out from the competition because of the added value you provide.
13. Publish Press Releases
Another effective way to gain coverage and increase your company’s visibility is through press releases. Write a press release that interests your target audience and appeals to editors. Use these guide questions when crafting your press release:
- Is it newsworthy?
- Is it timely?
- What will hook people to read it?
- Is it relevant?
- How will it benefit your target audience?
Through press releases, you can increase awareness for your business. Later on, this can also translate to sales.
B2B Marketing Plan
Before executing any of these B2B marketing ideas, you need to create a marketing plan first. This includes your marketing goals, clear strategies on how you can achieve them, your timeline, and your budget. Make sure all the information your business customers may need are ready and available for them to access.
Analytics is also essential in executing a B2B marketing plan. Track the performance of your marketing activities to know which ones are effective and bring in returns.
You don’t need to overcomplicate B2B marketing. The key thing is to know what your goals are. Take inspiration from these marketing ideas when you plan for your next strategy and achieve the results you want!
As a business owner, what kind of marketing strategy will you most likely respond to? Let us know in the comments section below!
