How social media can build brand awareness and drive sales for B2B companies
It is no secret that for a company, having an effective social media strategy can massively contribute towards its success with the likes of Scentbird achieving a monthly retuning revenue of 75,000 dollars with a marketing budget of just ZERO.
But with many business to consumer companies tapping in to the phenomenon of social media and reaping the benefits. Business to business organisations seem to be falling behind in both the use and level of sophistication of social media (Bruhn et al, 2014).
One of the main issues seems to be that many B2B companies see social media as just ‘a cute promotional activity’ when in reality ‘social media is becoming a real competitive advantage for B2B companies that do it well’ (Marx, 2013).
A report by Buyersphere outlined the main information sources used by businesses when looking to purchase products/services for their company:
Source: https://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy/digital-strategy-development/why-b2b-companies-need-a-digital-marketing-strategy/
It found that 59% of companies surveyed said that at least one form of social media influences their buying decisions thus showing that this is definitely a marketing stream that should be tapped into by B2B organisations.
So exactly what forms of social media are more effective to drive sales for your B2B company?
The difference between B2C and B2B marketing varies greatly in terms of buyer behaviour and target market. Thus, different platforms of social media will be more effective in driving sales. For example, Miller found that 77% of B2C companies acquired customers from Facebook while this was only 43% for B2B companies (2012).
A report by Hubspot stated that B2B companies must place a higher emphasis on educational formats of social media such as blogs and webinars.
For a B2B company, having a well-established blog, regularly posting quality content will help to be seen as an expert in their space as well as help with their SEO efforts.
A survey undertaken by Smart Insights found that LinkedIn was the most effective form of social media for B2B companies to reach potential customers.
Source: https://www.smartinsights.com/b2b-digital-marketing/key-b2b-marketing-trends-2016/
For a B2B company’s sales team, a main challenge is that there are often multiple decision makers involved in buying decisions and these people will be in highly ranked positions within a company. Therefore it is important for your content to be seen easily by these individuals so what better place to share your expertise than on one of the largest business orientated social networking site?
So how do these social media sites really help to drive sales for your company?
Drives traffic
A report undertaken by Shareaholic found that social media is the number 1 driver of website referral traffic reportedly driving over a third of all traffic and with the ever rising popularity of social media, this looks to be an increasing trend (DeMers, 2018).
For a company, being present on social media can be used to generate inbound leads that ‘traditional cold calling fails to influence’ (Power, 2018). While having established social media profiles across multiple different channels will maximise traffic from potential customers who may not otherwise find your company.
Not only does social media help to direct people to your website, but through persistently talking about the same topic and gaining social media shares will improve your businesses search ranking (Copp, 2018).
Information anywhere at any time.
Apart from the obvious benefit of being able to reach your audience in real time by posting content instantly. Bickart & Schindler outlined the key benefits online information can have for a company: allowing potential customers to access relevant information to their needs anywhere, at their own pace and being able to refer back to it at any time (2001).
Thus, providing detailed information about your product or service and your industry via your website and social media profiles can help to reduce the sales cycle as leads acquired from posting this content will already have a detailed insight into what exactly your company specialises in and already sees this as a need for their business.
Regular content builds trust
Now the two points above sound great right?
But these are not achievable unless you are posting regular, high quality content across all social media channels.
A blog by Smart Insights says that by talking frequently and in detail about particular topics creates credibility and builds trust.
It is highly important to be seen as an expert in your field and by doing this ‘target customers buy into you through the expertise inherent in the material you share’ (Power, R. 2018).
Social media as a form of eCRM
The benefits of social media for your company does not just stop at helping to acquire new customers.
While acquiring customers is great for businesses. For most the ultimate goal is to retain these customers and build long term relationships.
This is where social media can come into play by acting as a source of eCRM (Chaffey, 2012).
Source: Chaffey, D (2012). E-business & E-Commerce Management, Pearson.
In 2013-2014 online interactions with brands grew 70% (Coehn, 2016). This figure is not only applicable to B2C companies. In fact, this is probably more important for B2B due to generally longer, more complex sales cycles and higher sales costs.
Social media gives a direct link to each individual customer and provides instant customer service via direct messaging and tweets. Allowing your company to instantly react and respond to problems can be extremely effective in providing great customer service levels and ultimately making your customer feel like they matter.
Additionally, having a help centre on your website’s blog containing FAQ’s can also give customers a source of instant support.
So
Now we have discussed just a few of the many benefits that social media can bring to your company then your sorted right?
Not quite…
While having a solid social media strategy is likely to bring benefits to a company. It should not be seen as the only marketing channel that a company should implement.
Social media is not a strategy in itself and should not be set up as such.
Integrating social media into a multi-channelled digital marketing strategy is key for companies wanting to reap the most reward from it.
Simple steps to start your social media takeover
- Create a blog and social media profiles across platforms
- Post regular engaging content.
- Share these posts via your social media profiles.
Want to know more? Here are some useful sources!
References
Bickart, B & Schindler, R. M (2001). Internet forums as influential sources of consumer information. Journal of interactive marketing. 15(3). 31-40.
Bruhn, M., Schnebelen, S. and Schäfer, D. (2014), “Antecedents and consequences of the quality of e-customer-to-customer interactions in B2B brand communities”, Industrial Marketing Management, Vol. 43 No. 1, pp. 164-176.
Chaffey, D (2012). E-business & E-Commerce Management, Pearson.
Coen, B. (2018). Using Social Media For Customer Relationship Management. [online] Social Media Today. Available at: https://www.socialmediatoday.com/social-business/using-social-media-customer-relationship-management [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].
Copp, E. (2018). 10 Benefits of Social Media for Business. [online] Hootsuite Social Media Management. Available at: https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-for-business/ [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].
DeMers, J. (2018). Forbes Welcome. [online] Forbes.com. Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysondemers/2015/02/03/social-media-now-drives-31-of-all-referral-traffic/#491c4db14315 [Accessed 1 Jan. 2018].
Marx, W. (2013), “Why B2B marketers still don’t get social media-and 7 steps for fixing that”, available at: www.fastcompany.com/3009993/bottom-line/why-b2b-marketers-still-dontget-social-media-and-7-steps-for-fixing-that (accessed 24 May 2013
Miller, M. (2012a), “The 2012 state of inbound marketing”, available at: www.slideshare.net/Hub Spot/the-2012-state-of-inbound-marketing (accessed 24 February 2012).
Power, R. (2018). Solving the B2B social media conundrum | Smart Insights. [online] Smart Insights. Available at: https://www.smartinsights.com/b2b-digital-marketing/b2b-social-media-marketing/solving-the-b2b-social-media-conundrum/ [Accessed 7 Jan. 2018].
Molly Brace • January 7, 2018