marketers to think of strategies with the end in mind. The B2B selling process is more complex and the potential consumers buying cycle can be long and drawn out. As a result, B2B marketers are presented with unique challenges and need to continually build relationships with their consumers.
Establishing a relationship with the potential consumer is key, but understanding that there are different people with their own requirements is the real ticket to success.
While its true that there may be different people in the buying cycle who search using the same key phrases, the intention of each may be different. Each will have their own set of pre-determined keywords that they will use to search for. As a result the importance of revisiting keyword baskets is crucial. The end result of course is obtaining qualified traffic and thus qualified leads.
Here are some other challenges faced by B2B marketers:
• Longer, more Complex Selling Cycles
• Undetermined KPIs
• Need for "traffic filtering" to ensure qualified traffic is turned into qualified leads
• Understanding the Consumer's Buying Cycle
• Measuring success at various intervals of the selling cycle
• Ignoring secondary conversions and missing out on opportunities to intercept qualified traffic
• Tracking leads through sales
• Developing effective on-site conversions that lead to the bigger off-site conversions (ie. the sale).
B2B marketers need to be proactive in tackling these challenges.
WIDGET MARKETING: CAN WIDGETS BENEFIT B2B SITES?
There has been a lot of “buzz” about widgets and widget marketing recently as creative online marketers have discovered the use of widgets. Widgets are simply pieces of embeddable code that can be found on one site, and embedded in another that can be used to promote your own site or blog. Widgets have become popular with users of online communities as a result the business of marketing via widgets is a great way for site owners (including B2B sites)to promote their content and business.
Widget marketing is starting to catch on in the online marketing world. Today there was a great post by Nick Wilson over at Search Engine Land on link baiting for 2007. According to Nick, a major component of link baiting in 2007 will be “widget baiting”.
How Can Widgets Help B2B Sites?
Simply put, widgets are all about providing your users with the tools to promote your B2B business or any business/online property for that matter. For B2B marketers, widgets offer the potential to be a means of acquiring new customers at a minimal cost, promotion of your site’s presence out to the rest of the Web, and can provide a traffic source to help build your external link inventory.
Widgets are a great way for promoting your site and your content. For B2B sites, which are looking to create streaming media channels (combining audio, video, photos, text, and RSS feeds etc) and broadcast them live across their site’s pages or blog, widgets can help accomplish this. Sites like splashcast specialize in just that.
Top 10 Favorite Widget Sites for B2B Search Marketing
1. My Blog Log
2. Mashable.com
3. Widgetoko
4. Snipperoo
5. Reuters Widget
6. Widgipedia
7. Spring Widgets
8. Word Press Widgets
9. Poll Daddy
10. Business Week Widget
B2B MARKETING IN 2007 – EVANGELIZING YOUR CONSUMERS
Given the understanding that most B2B organizations offer high end products or services, we know that the time that it takes to qualify a lead, nurture the relationship and convert the lead into a sale can take months or even years. The thing is, there is one more step involved in this marketing process for B2B marketers to consider and that is to make your customer an evangelist for your organization.If you have done your job and provided a service/product that your consumer truly appreciates, and the consumer is sincerely pleased about the entire experience, the chance of making this consumer an evangelist for your company is great.
Consumer evangelism is simply the process of taking a customer who is thrilled about your product/service and their experience and getting them to become outspoken "evangelists" or glorified promoters for your company. These “greatly satisfied” consumers can become a powerful tool for marketing and growing your business in addition to other leads that you have.
Its all the customer who makes the market. Its not what we want we produce and customer takes. but its what the customer wants and it is he who chooses the vendor, who has offered the service he wanted. If we the selected ones, we are lucky, and cashing on this in the form of evangelizing may not be wrong. Its the advantage that has come your way. Use it.
The fact that they selected your organization means that they understand how your solution works and that it will work for them.Keep in mind that your solution has to provide an extraordinary experience for this to happen.
Having loyal customers is one thing, converting them into influential and enthusiastic evangelists for your organization is another. Loyal customer are not necessarily promoting you to others, consumer evangelists do. Consumer evangelism should be practiced by any B2B organizations that want to grow their company and make a real difference in their industry. It’s been reported that “organizations that focus on building word of mouth (WOMM) into full-fledged evangelism grow faster, are more profitable and have big-picture ideas that somehow change the world.” If this sounds too good to be true, it’s not.
• Consumer Evangelists purchase and believe in your product or service
• Consumer Evangelists passionately recommend you to friends, family and colleagues
• Consumer Evangelists provide unsolicited feedback or praise
• Consumer Evangelists forgive dips in service and quality
• Consumer Evangelists are not bought they “extol” your virtues freely
• Consumer Evangelists feel part of something bigger than themselves
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