Wondering if organic social media is worth the time and expense when you only sell B2B? Here’s why you still need social media and the benefits it offers.
B2B marketing requires careful strategy and is very unique compared to B2C marketing. But that doesn’t mean that the channels and marketing opportunities you engage are completely different.
How you market to another business differs more in how many touchpoints it takes to earn a sale, the duration of your sales funnel and how involved your sales team needs to be throughout the process. But at its foundation, much of the strategy remains the same in that you need to meet new customers through providing value.
Organic social media content is a great way to do that. Some B2B businesses think that social media is only for meeting customers and not other businesses. But that isn’t the case. Let us explain why.
Organic social media is worth the time and effort for B2B companies. Here’s an overview of the value social media can offer your customers.
Yes, you’re selling your product or service to another business and not a consumer. But the decision-makers at those businesses are also consumers. So the decision-makers go out to social media to do research for their business purchases just like they do for their personal purchases.
You have to be there when they go looking. HubSpot found that 84 percent of B2B marketers use social media to reach their audience. Your prospects expect to find information about you on social media. And if they don’t, it might make them question how active your business is and whether you can serve their needs.
Even if a customer never reaches out to you via social media, they like knowing they can. It builds transparency, openness and trust. But to do that, you need to have a real presence on the social media platforms where you have profiles.
You can’t just open a bunch of accounts and let them sit there. This will make you appear like you’re ignoring your customers and their needs. Instead, you want to post frequently, respond to comments and be there for your customers.
When a prospect sees that, it tells them that they’ve found a trustworthy company. Give your customers and prospects a platform for interacting with you to facilitate two-way communication.
Social media helps B2B businesses focus on building valuable content and testing out what resonates with customers. You’ll get insights into types of content and messages that mean something to your customers.
Posts on social media are not all about selling. They should be all about providing value to your customers. Customers followed you on social media to get valuable content, not to be sold to. They want to know how to maximize their investment in your products or services, see how other customers are using the product, and get ideas for how to grow their business.
When developing content, think like your customers. And use social media as a gauge to see how well you’re doing listening to your customers. If your posts see little engagement, it’s time to make some changes in your marketing strategy.
When building an online strategy, you need to realize that everything works together. Your social media content supports SEO efforts. Search engines, such as Google, like seeing that companies have regularly updated profiles and focus on building valuable content on their websites.
If a prospect searches for you by name, your social media profiles will likely show on top search results. Once they land on those profiles, they should see up-to-date content from you or they’ll likely bounce and continue their research on your competitors’ profiles.
If you want the ability to run ads on social media, you’ll need to have active profiles. Social media platforms only require that you have a page or profile to run an ad. But if you run ads from dormant pages, chances are prospects will scroll your profile and leave because you don’t look like an active and reliable company.
Bringing in leads from social media ads requires organic social content to support those efforts. And once you develop new followers from ads, you’ll need some way of staying in touch with them and showcasing your value. That’s another area where organic content comes into play.
Now that you know the value social media can provide B2B businesses, here’s how you should be using social media to engage prospects and retain customers.
You’ll never know whether organic social media is doing what you want it to unless you set SMART goals. Make sure you have some way of measuring your success.
Social media is great for learning more about your competitors and their strategies. Keep tabs on campaigns your competitors are running and see where they are succeeding. That’s not to say you should duplicate what they are doing, but you should look for opportunities.
If you’re developing blog content – which you should be doing – social media is a great way to get it in front of customers and prospects. While curating content from other sources is a great use of social media, don’t forget to share the content you’re developing as well.
Social media is a great place to brag. You’ll want to add awards and accomplishments to your website, but you have a bit more space to elaborate or remind customers on social media. You can also bring attention to top employees, involvement in your community and other feel-good aspects of your business.
Give customers a place to go to find support for your products and services. Invite customers to join the conversation or share their needs with you on your social media pages. That way, you have an opportunity to fix any challenges the customer is facing and start valuable conversations with them.
Social media is outstanding for testing out messages. See what resonates best with your customers. Test different images of your products to see which one generates the largest amount of sales and then lead with that on your website. You’ll find many great testing opportunities using social media if you start to look closely.
The most important aspect of social media is that it allows you to converse openly with your customers. You shouldn’t just be broadcasting messages. And if you are, you aren’t doing things right.
Engaging with B2B customers on social media doesn’t just happen. You need a clear strategy to do things effectively. New Light Digital knows how to build that strategy and integrate it with your full digital marketing strategy to make every resource count.
Ready to learn more? Schedule a free consultation with our team and we’ll explain how our social media plans stand out.
Learn more about B2B social media marketing from some of the top questions and answers companies just like you ask.
Yes, a B2B business needs social media because that way you can run campaigns to bring in leads and build valuable relationships with your customers. Failing to use social media means you’re missing out on valuable opportunities.
Organic social media is worth it whether you advertise to customers or other businesses. That’s because it helps build visibility into what you do and can humanize your brand by allowing you to show a bit more of your personality.
B2B social media helps promote sales and build relationships with customers. You can position your products and demonstrate your value in your social media posts.
Further reading:
Learn what social media metrics you should be following to measure your success. Here’s why these metrics matter and how you can use them.
LinkedIn advertising is a powerful tool for reaching B2B decision-makers. Learn how to harness the power of these ads and get the most of it.
Building a social media presence is crucial for new businesses. Follow these 12 steps to create smart, optimized profiles and content.
