In order to become successful, every B2B company needs a solid source of prospects, as it’s next to impossible to promote your services and products effectively without a generous supply of sales leads. While the B2B marketing space used to operate quite differently than B2C companies when it came to marketing, today the marketing strategies are very similar. After all, B2B buyers are people, too. People with the same fears, apprehensions, goals, and dreams as B2C consumers. With that in mind, here are a few hacks that can amplify your B2B sales.
Get Visual
Video is quickly becoming one of the most efficient means of reaching a target audience. High-quality, well-produced, information-rich video provides your prospective customers everything they need to know to evaluate your product or service, and is a great way to differentiate your company and brand from the competition. They can serve as “how-to” or demonstration videos to highlight how your product or service works and how it benefits the buyer’s goals.
One of the best perks of investing in video is that video increases your SEO, making it more likely to rank higher in search results, meaning a prospective B2B buyer is more likely to purchase from your company than a competitor.
Invest in Marketing Automation
Marketing automation gives your team the ability to measure ROI, as well as helping to monitor responses and link them to a specific marketing campaign. Automation also helps to monitor overall spending, engage with customers and prospective customers, and it can be used at any stage of the buyer journey.
While marketing automation may take some planning and budget consideration, once it’s up and running, it could be a game-changer. Since it’s projected that within the next decade most marketing will be handled by automation or artificial intelligence (AI), there’s no better time to get the jump on your competitors than now.
Sell Properly
Do you know the difference between cross-selling and upselling? Many marketers have no clue. But, knowing the difference automatically gives you an advantage over your competitors. Here’s the basics:
- Cross-selling is suggesting that your customer purchase another specific product with the primary product. For example, if selling lumber, cross-selling a variety of nails, screws, or stain, or recommending a conditioner from the same brand when a customer buys shampoo. Cross-selling promotes items that enhance or work in conjunction with the primary purchase.
- Upselling is encouraging the purchase of extra items that result in a larger purchase. The promotion could be related items, such as suggesting ink or paper when a customer purchases a printer, or recommending special filters or battery packs when a camera is purchased. The promotion can also involve unrelated items, such as an offer to purchase more items to receive free shipping, or offers of “buy one, get one half off”.
Knowing when to upsell, when to cross-sell, and when not to do either is crucial. One of the quickest ways to lose customer confidence is to jeopardize your appearance of transparency and honesty for the sake of trying to get a customer to spend more.
Welcome Feedback
Whether it’s a good story or a bad one, your customers will be sharing their experiences with your products and services and their impression of your company and brand with family and friends in person and through social media. It’s critical that you pay attention to their feedback at the earliest possible opportunity. Properly used, how you respond to customer feedback can be the difference in whether a customer is converted, retained, or lost.
Listen to learn better. Regularly request customer feedback through surveys, and ensure that there are communication lines through your business and online always available to address customer concerns and complaints. Respond promptly and positively to any online review or criticism and always offer to make the situation right for the customer. Responding well to serious complaints can turn a negative review into a positive for readers who see you addressing concerns. Learn from your mistakes. If multiple customers repeatedly complain about the same thing, it’s not them, it’s you. Fix the issue.
