B2B-Roadmap_square_logo

The B2B Digital Marketing Strategy Roadmap To Maximize ROI

Digital Marketing Tricks

Understanding Digital Marketing Strategies

Digital transformation has overtaken the world in the past five years, changing the way we think, learn, inform, and buy. This change not only affects B2C businesses but it is making waves for those in B2B as well. Today’s wildly successful B2B brands have welcomed digital transformation into their marketing strategies and can be seen reaping the benefits. A stellar example comes in the form of HupSpot’s LinkedIn sonspored ads campaign that were meant to attract small to medium sized businesses. The results showed 400% more leads within their target audience. Other big B2B brands such as Shopify, Upwork and Dropbox are also leveraging the power of digital marketing to enhance their lead generation tactics.

Source: LinkedIn

While B2B marketing has always been challenging, today’s landscape gives birth to a whole new set of fast paced challenges that many B2B brands are struggling to catch up with. Technology has allowed B2B buyers to have unlimited access to information through multiple mobile devices at any time. This changes the buyer journey and opening up new channels of communication.

Navigating through this ever changing landscape can be a challenge – even for the best of brands. That is why we have compiled the ultimate roadmap to build a B2B digital marketing strategy that is fit to succeed in the modern B2B landscape. This B2B Digital Marketing Strategy roadmap that will maximize ROI and lead your B2B brand to maximise ROI.

If you would like to find out more on how to build a digital marketing strategy, head over to one of our article on digital marketing strategy.

Understanding Digital Marketing Strategies

The modern B2B buyer is much like a B2C consumer as their buying decisions are largely motivated by customer experience rather than the price. This requires B2B brands to take an experiential approach that leads the target audience through a digital journey to lifelong loyalty.

Despite these similarities, there are still some key differences. Read our the key differences between B2B and B2C Digital Marketing article to find out more.

The Roadmap Process Explained

Our B2B marketing strategy roadmap targets the five essential components of a successful digital marketing campaign. This includes website, SEO, social media marketing, content marketing and online advertisements. Read on to find out the importance of each one.

1.  A High Performance Website

Your website is much like a first impression for potential clients, making it the most valuable marketing asset. According to research, 80% of people examine websites in order to check out new service providers. These numbers are bound to rise as more millennials and Gen-Z buyers enter the market.

MarketingGuru’s Website

An effective website needs to have the right design, informative and relevant content that captures attention. Here are some main points to keep in mind while optimizing a website for lead generation and sales:

  • Ensure Fast Response Times: Eternally loading websites can be a huge turnoff. According to surveys, 40% users leave a website that takes more than 3 seconds to load.
  • Security Comes First: Unsecured sites are a big red flag for users and research suggests that 85% customers are averse to browsing an unsecured site. Avoid this by purchasing as SSL certificate for your website.
  • Make It Mobile Friendly:  In a world where 70% of all online traffic comes from mobile, a smooth mobile experience speaks for itself. Furthermore, 50% B2B queries originate from smartphones as buyers are more likely to choose vendors who have a mobile-friendly website experience.
  • Give Actionable Information: Your website is more than a long winded introduction to your services. It is a 24 hour sales opportunity which require actionable information like clear CTAs, contact forms, past projects, testimonials and affiliations to guide the buyer in the right direction.
  • Professional Design: Poor design and navigation capabilities repel buyers. Websites need to be pleasing to look at and easy to navigate. 
  • Get Your Message Across: 46% buyers abandon a website because it is not clear what the company does. Sometimes your message can get lost in the web design. Provide relevant content that highlights your core services so buyers don’t feel confused.

2.  SEO

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a growing field of interest that can generate leads and sales by really pushing your content and website forward. If you are unfamilar about SEO, head on to digest our 9 point simple SEO guide first. There are two primary components of SEO:

On-Site SEO helps search engines find your website through keyword phrases to produce relevant search results. These ensure that if B2B buyers are looking for your type of services, search engines can redirect them to your website or content.

Offsite SEO provides backlinks to your website in the form of outside engagement or guest appearances on other websites. Backlinks can increase your credibility and establish authority in the field while bringing in networking opportunities.

By networking, getting featured on other websites and generating more traffic, you can establish yourself as a credible source to get higher rankings on search engine results. SEO can be integrated into your content strategy to bring more visitors and put your company in the limelight.

3.  Content Marketing

Content marketing is a multi-dimensional area which consists of blogs, press releases, videos, social media content, articles, ebooks and much more. B2B buyers are increasingly relying on digital content to make their buying decisions easier. 75% B2B buyers think that content has a direct impact on their buying decisions.

Here are some content marketing areas that businesses are focusing on to get the best results.

  • Blog Posts: Blogs are a fantastic way to get your message across while providing helpful information and establishing your expertise. Buyers can gain insight on your work as they read relevant blogs that empathize with their problems and identify how to solve them. Blogs which connect to the buyers’ struggles and present it in an engaging manner are highly popular among B2B buyers.
  • Social Media Posts: Social media is an effective way to not only get customers but build an audience. Building an audience ensures that there are people who follow you for the content and remain loyal to keep coming back for you.
  • Infographics: Most people appreciate visual imagery as it can condense complicated information into an attractive visual. Infographics are the ideal way to present information and capture attention
  • E-books: E-books are also a content marketing strategy that is surprisingly effective when they include actionable information such as checklists, guides and tips that impart wisdom.

4.  Online Ads

Online ads may be the first thing that puts your company in the direct line of sight. Online ads can be in the form of text, imagery or videos displayed on frequently visited platforms such as Facebook, YouTube and other websites. These online ads have now become highly sophisticated to allow for targeted advertising that reaches the most relevant customers. Apart from contextual advertising, online ads target consumers even when they are distracted so they can recall your company without ever clicking or focusing on the actual ad.

Google advertising is a popular form of online advertising. The benefits of Google pay-per-click advertising should not be underestimated.

5.  Social Media Marketing

Social media has emerged as the ultimate tool for B2B marketing that can help in lead generation, branding, establishing authority and building an audience. Social media allows you to deliver a constant stream of targeted content that keeps your company relevant and entertains a loyal audience.

Here are some common types of social media posts that are most popular for businesses:

  • Blogs
  • Digital Seminars (webinars) or events
  • Attractive statistics and facts
  • Industry related news
  • Informative one minute videos

While a multi-channel approach is usually preferred, picking your social media platforms wisely can help you build a strategy for your type of business. All social media channels may not suit your brand but LinkedIn is a must for all B2B services. In fact, 80% of B2B leads originate from LinkedIn. So if you are a B2B business, having an active presence on LinkedIn is essential.

A Final Note

The digital world is an opportunity to start anew and target an even larger audience than ever before. As the world moves towards digital, sticking with the old approaches means risking your B2B business. Embrace the digital wave with a marketing strategy of your own through effective SEO, PPC and social media marketing that can take your B2B business to the next level.

Digital marketing strategies are all about innovation, so don’t be afraid to step out of the comfort zone and enhance the B2B buyer’s experience to maximize ROI and gain loyal customers. Use digital platforms to market your B2B agendas, learn from businesses and create new communication channels to help your business achieve greater heights.

Are you trying to build a B2B digital marketing strategy that works? MarketingGuru provide SEO, PPC and social media marketing services that can give your B2B business the desired competitive edge. Speak to one of our gurus today!

Read More...

Strategy_square_logo

How To Build A Digital Marketing Strategy For Your Business?

Digital Marketing Tricks

Let’s face it. In today technological advanced world, every business has at least a website and some form of social media presence. What is more important is having an effective strategy to integrate all your digital assets.

What Is A Digital Marketing Strategy?

Whenever digital marketing is mentioned, SEO or PPC advertising are often among the first few jargon that comes to mind. For those who are not aware, they are acronyms for Search Engine Optimization and Pay-Per-Click advertising. However, many seldom mention and discus about establishing a digital marketing strategy.

“The series of actions that help you achieve your company goals through carefully selected online marketing channels. These channels include paid, earned, and owned media, and can all support a common campaign around a particular line of business.”

Digital Marketing Strategy
HubSpot Blog

 

According to HubSpot, digital marketing strategy “the series of actions that help you achieve your company goals through carefully selected online marketing channels. These channels include paid, earned, and owned media, and can all support a common campaign around a particular line of business”.

That’s a huge bunch of words. In short, it is simply how you are going to achieve your objectives by leveraging on your digital assets such as your website or social media accounts.

Why Your Business Needs A Digital Marketing Strategy?

Having mentioned that most business owns a website and a couple of social media accounts means that your competitors are also able to level the playing field. Hence, the only way to stay competitive is to have an effective digital marketing strategy to achieve your objectives.

Some may argue that there are other forms of marketing and digital marketing is just one of them. That may be true, but digital advertising spending is set to overtake traditional in the United States. This underscore the importance of not only having a credible brand image but also the strategy.

The trend in many small and mid-market companies is to outsource various areas of web development, marketing and graphic design to agencies. This fact makes it more important to understand your own strategy. A digital marketing strategy not only convey a unified message to your audience but also helps to establish a reliable brand image.

How To Develop Your Own Digital Marketing Strategy?

For those not in the marketing industry, it may seem like an uphill battle to craft a digital marketing strategy. Don’t let the word ‘strategy’ scare you off. The steps outline in this article can be applied for both large and small companies.

Step 1: Identify your objective and goals

This step should be obvious since nailing down your objectives and goals will help you determine how your digital marketing objective contribute to your overall business objectives. For example, if the business objective is to increase revenue by 50%, your digital marketing goal would possibly be to increase leads from your website by at least 50%. By having a quantitative goal, it helps to determine the best tactics to be successful.

Step 2: Analyze your past campaigns

Chances are that your business has done a digital campaign previously. By identifying the past mistakes and results, it can provide useful insights and help focus the marketing resources.  Based on the insights, you may need to revisit step 1 and change your goal.

For instance, after analyzing your leads from your digital assets, you discover that most came from Facebook. Hence, you may want to focus on a KPI regarding Facebook such as increasing Facebook followers by 30%.

Step 3: Identify your target audience persona

Every business will not be profitable without their customers. Hence, it is of utmost importance for a business to know their key customer groups and their profile. This includes identifying their demographic and psychographics attributes. A simple way to build your audience persona is to take a look at your Google Analytics’ Audience Reports and identify the key characteristics such as age, sex, career, etc.

Step 4: Identify your means

At this junction, it is important to identify three aspect: budget, digital channels and your team. It is important to determine if you have the required budget need to achieve your goals. This could be done by using historical data of your past campaigns to create a forecast of the results. Most importantly, you should also allocate your budget to each channel you intend to use.

This is also the best time to do an audit of your digital channels. You may want to focus more on a certain channel or even explore new channels you haven’t explored in the past. You may also want to evaluate if A/B testing should be implemented for certain channels. If KPI has not been set for each individual channel, it may also be a good time to do so.

The last aspect is your own team. You should assess and evaluate if your team possess the capacity and expertise to execute your digital marketing initiative. This is also the time to determine if you should hire more team members or to outsource certain elements to an agency.

Step 5: Develop, execute and review the plan

After all the research and evaluation, it is time to put everything into the plan. Certain elements may have to be achieved first before others can begin, just like your website has to be completed before beginning SEO and thereafter, social media marketing. This may require a certain degree of expertise and coordination and should be best left to a professional agency if your team is small or does not possess the required capabilities.

Don’t be surprised if your plan is not executed successfully because not all assumptions will be correct. The key in this step is to regularly review the performance and tweak the necessary elements as needed. At regular intervals, ideally on an annual basis, scrutinize the performance and do a complete review. If necessary, don’t be afraid to go back to Step 1 and repeat the process.

A Final Note

Digital marketing may seem easy. After all, most millennials are already savvy with social media and you probably use Google as the starting point when looking for products. However, crafting a digital strategy and reviewing it regularly may not be that easy since most marketers also have other tasks. This is when consulting a full-service agency really helps. You may even consider outsourcing your marketing department and focus on your strengths to develop your business. If your business has not started or is in the process of developing your digital marketing strategy, contact MarketingGuru to find out how we can help you today.

Read More...