Member Article

A B2B marketer's to-do list for 2023

There are always new developments in B2B marketing.

Marketers now have access to wider circles of influence, and new technologies which allow them to reach their target audience in new and creative ways.

There is a temptation to try everything you see, in an attempt to develop your latest marketing plan. But, having an overly comprehensive marketing plan might lead to overspending on things that aren’t really relevant to your business.

Here are some of the strategies the marketing experts at More Than Words think are worth a try for your B2B brand in 2023.

1. Engage B2B marketing experts

Innovative B2B marketing specialists are needed to get the best results from the average B2B buyer.

If your B2B company has a low lead-to-customer rate, it is a sign that you are hiring non-specialists, and giving them too many responsibilities.

For the best possible results from your marketing efforts, you must hire marketing specialists who have experience in their particular niche.

For example, if you are selling a product to a large corporate customer, it would be wise to hire a specialist in B2B marketing with experience in selling to large companies, rather than someone who has only worked in B2C marketing, or with SMEs.

The good news is that companies are no longer limited to their own talent, so it’s not necessary to spend a fortune hiring and training staff just to carry out marketing tasks.

Rather than hiring several individual industry specialists, you can simply partner with one outsourced B2B marketing team

2. Offer access to gated content

A gated content marketing strategy takes time to create, but ultimately benefits both the company and website visitors alike.

The content can be in the form of an eBook, blog post, tutorial, video, or white paper that provides valuable, necessary information to prospects.

Typically, gated content requires the site visitor to provide their contact information, such as their full name and email address. These emails can then be added to your CRM system or email marketing software for follow-up.

People will sign up for gated content marketing if it is consistent with the needs and interests that brought each prospect to your website in the first place.

3. Email Marketing

While email has been criticised as being too traditional by some, it remains the most important B2B marketing channel across most industries.

In fact, B2B email marketing has one of the highest click-through rates (CTR) among all marketing channels.

CTR is calculated by dividing the amount of clicks that an advertisement gets by how many times it is displayed. For instance, if an email with a link to a landing page gets 100 clicks and is sent to 1000 people, the CTR would be 10%.

Clicks ÷ impressions = CTR.

Regular email newsletters are integral to B2B marketing plans, even today.

There are four types of emails:

1. lead nurturing,
2. promotional,
3. informative, and
4. instructional.

Having a clear understanding of your buyers’ journey, and where prospects are within it, will allow you to send them the right email at the right time.

4. Automating nurturing campaigns

In order to manage leads generated by gated content and email newsletters, you need to have a nurturing email content strategy in place.

A nurturing campaign helps to keep a prospect engaged with your business even if they are not ready to buy right away.

Regular emails with valuable content, offers, and information about your products and services will ensure that your company stays top of mind with a potential customer without annoying them.

This can be done more quickly through marketing automation.

Automated emails are sent based on a predetermined criteria, such as when a B2B customer subscribes to your newsletter, they can be set up to receive a welcome email giving them a discount code or a special offer.

In addition to saving you time, automation helps you ensure that no lead gets lost by engaging and retaining them throughout the sales cycle.

5. Compromise between advertising and offering value

Any B2B business needs to strike the perfect balance between providing valuable content, increasing brand awareness and promoting their products and services.

A great B2B marketing strategy is important, but products or services need to match.

Similarly, no matter how great your products/services are, you have to promote them and let your target audience know about them. B2B consumers don’t want to be inundated with advertisements if they don’t know your brand is trustworthy.

To build trust with potential buyers, focus on creating high-quality content that provides value and demonstrates your expertise in the industry.

With More Than Words’ marketing databases, you can find the direct contact information of millions of UK businesses, schools, and public sector organisations.

Direct marketing, despite the recent focus on digital marketing strategy and social media marketing, is still an effective way to generate a B2B sale.

Database marketing gives you the power to control how, why, and who receives your promotional messages.

A direct marketing campaign is also much more measurable and trackable than Google ads, digital marketing or social media campaigns.

Ask us how our marketers can help your company follow up on existing customers and new decision makers based on the engagement generated from each campaign.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by More Than Words Marketing .