Understanding your niche is the first step to owning your Business-to-Business (B2B) content marketing strategy. Today’s market is constantly changing, and it can be difficult to gain footing, even if your business is already established. Because of this, you have to be ready to adapt your content marketing strategy to succeed in various circumstances.
Strategies that may have worked in the past simply aren’t enough anymore. In fact, it a common mistake to think that constantly creating content about your industry is enough to gain traction. Yes, creating fresh, positive content is important. But that’s not enough to rise to the top of search engine rankings. If you’re ready to update your content marketing strategy to start seeing results, check out our top 4 surefire ways to get on the right track for your B2B content marketing.
How to improve your B2B content marketing:
What is B2B content marketing?
Before we get to the good stuff, it is first essential to establish what effective B2B content marketing looks like. All too often, business owners will lump Business-to-Business strategies and Business-to-Customer strategies into the same bucket. This is not a good idea, as it can hurt your chances of seeing results. It’s far better to develop a B2B-specific strategy (and a separate B2C strategy if that’s applicable for your business).
This is because B2B content marketing is focused more on expanding your audience composed of other businesses. In order to tailor your message to this audience specifically, you may want to prioritize relationships as there is an expected long-term transaction. Your target audience may also have a more complicated sales process as the buying decision on the part of a business is a more significant one. It involves a lot of people and the purchasing decision can affect operations.
Keeping all of this in mind, your content marketing needs to be tweaked to effectively encourage more businesses to spend money on your product or services.
4 surefire ways to improve your B2B content marketing
Build trust
Simply put, companies are looking for solutions to their problems. One way you can build trust is to offer the solutions they are looking for. This not only builds your credibility, but is also a great way to get your name out there, especially if you are just starting out. One way you can do this is by offering to collaborate with other more established businesses. By using this strategy, you are able to easily expand your audience while slowly building your authority in the industry.
Your content, no matter how good it is, will not be helpful if your readers don’t find you credible enough to click on your link. Of course, it helps to always create relevant content that will be of use to your audience. Once your audience starts to trust the information you publish, they will eventually consider purchasing your products or services as a further means to solve their problems.
You can publish helpful content on:
- Your website
- Your blog
- Someone else’s blog (as a guest post)
- Press releases
- Social media
- E-books
- White papers
- Brand ambassador platforms
Offer value
Businesses will only spend money on your business if they believe that it can bring them even more money. Make your company stand out from the competition by establishing your brand as something that offers value. This is how they will remember you.
Successful companies cite hosting webinars and organizing in-person events as effective tactics. In these events, the live discussion allows companies to ask questions that help their own businesses. By answering them, you are able to place yourself as an authority in the industry and that will highlight your products or services even more. By providing valuable information, you won’t need to hard-sell your service when the time comes. Your know-how will speak for itself.
Needless to say, these activities go hand-in-hand with your content, which you can direct webinar and event attendees to visit and read as well. Giving out free materials (like e-books) after the event is also a good way to leave the impression that you can continue to offer value for their money.
Create engaging content
Content marketing draws strength from providing valuable information that businesses use to solve problems. By providing this information, you can increase brand loyalty and drive sales as well as leads to your business. It is then even more crucial to make your content appealing, especially since you are competing for attention in a crowded internet landscape.
Creating engaging content means spicing it up. Don’t just put up blocks of text that will bore your readers. You have to be mindful that catching their attention leads to them choosing you for their business.
Make use of the following elements that can make skimming your content easier and will give your audience something to remember:
- Pictures
- Infographics
- Charts
- Videos
Create videos that make your content even more unique. In these videos, you can do tutorials, Q&A’s, demos, and how-to guides. After hearing your knowledge-packed 5-minute crash course, your audience will develop a positive image of your brand that can help push them to take your call of action. Simply put, focus on how you can help them and this will slowly snowball to sales.
Learn to strategize
Buyers are usually discouraged when they feel like you are forcing them to buy your product. Thus, don’t make the mistake of just promoting your product outright. Learn to strategize. Tell a story to connect with the professionals reading your content. It might be difficult to do this if you are not familiar with your audience and the day-to-day business problems they are facing. Consequently, you need to do market research.
When you are able to create customer profiles, you can personalize your landing pages to fit what businesses are looking for. An example of personalizing content is making use of customized pop-up offers for different kinds of content for your audience segments. By personalizing, you can also stay laser-focused on the type of content you should be writing.
Another strategy is to learn from the mistakes of your competitors. For example, if their content doesn’t talk about their own company’s insights, you can capitalize on that. Readers love original content and would be more likely follow the steps you curated based on your experience. Of course, you could also draw from their strengths. If they invite guests/experts for interviews in their blogs and they get a lot of engagement, you can try the same strategy, since it’s been proven to be effective in your niche.
Final thoughts
After you’ve read all of these tips, you might start staring at your content calendar, wondering how to incorporate them. (Bonus tip: If you don’t already have one, you need to start a content calendar). B2B Content Marketing can easily get overwhelming, especially with the trial and error process and constant tweaking needed to remain competitive. If you need a guide to quickly move the process along, there are digital marketing agencies that can help you get leads and drive sales without a hitch.
B2B Content Marketing FAQs
What is B2B content marketing?
B2B content marketing is focused more on expanding your audience composed of other businesses. In order to tailor your message to this audience specifically, you may want to prioritize relationships as there is an expected long-term transaction.
How can I improve my B2B content marketing?
Build trust. Offer value. Create engaging content. Learn to strategize.
What are the best places to publish content?
You can publish helpful content on your website, your blog, someone else’s blog (as a guest post), press releases, social media, E-books, white papers, and brand ambassador platforms.
