B2B Marketing Synchronizing Traditional & Current Marketing
There is no denying that that the realm of business has been reshaped with the introduction of new technologies and marketing techniques. These developments have opened new outlets for savvy marketers to capitalize on, offering new avenues to increase sales and brand recognition.
These marketing alternatives have not been embraced with open arms by all however. Specifically in B2B businesses, resistance to these new practices is prevalent. Many business leaders and senior management in these industries are wary of modern marketing approaches, due to the uncertainty of measuring an ROI. With such wariness, these companies will inevitably fall behind their competition who are successful in implementing these approaches.
B2B businesses do not have to disregard traditional marketing tactics entirely. Rather, B2B businesses must synchronize traditional and modern marketing tactics to formulate comprehensive marketing strategies.
The current outlook of many businesses
Corporate executives, as stated previously, are not all convinced in the benefits of modern marketing approaches. One study in particular demonstrated this low level of confidence in social media campaigns; it indicated that a shocking 43% of B2B firms admit that their chief executives “never consider” their social media reputation when making business decisions. In many of these cases, executives assert that they still haven’t come up with a definitive way to equate social media analytics with bottom-line business results.
Why this outlook must change
In the modern world of business, successful B2B marketing requires a different, multi-dimensional approach. Demand and lead generation alone are not enough. In lieu of this, it is a necessity to construct a business strategy that utilizes both customer retention and new prospects to drive value and revenue growth. And there is no greater resource to draw in new prospects than social media and mobile marketing. Modern strategies must be market-focused, not just product-focused, and they must be coordinated with other core business functions.
Benefits of modern marketing approaches
There are a lot of issues in the B2B realm, but one of the most significant is building brand awareness. The use for social media is a plain and simple remedy to remedy this. Social media activity can generate exposure and increased traffic, leading to greater brand recognition.
Another benefit of increased use of modern marketing tactics is the morale-boosting effects for one’s own employees. 82% of employees say that they trust a company more when the CEO and other members of executive leadership communicate through social media- this can include messages as influencers on Twitter to the public at-large.
Modern marketing approaches can also provide greater marketplace insight. The use of analytics, especially the ability to modify marketing efforts based on the data collected, may be the most important element of a successful B2B inbound marketing strategy.
How can you reliably measure outbound marketing initiatives? There is no consensus to the lack of measurability with regard to outbound tactics as of yet. However, there are indeed ways to better understand the ROI of outbound campaigns. For instance, marketers can attach custom URLs to direct mailers, print ads, and other advertising initiatives. This will not solve all of the analytical shortcomings of an outbound campaign, but this method can serve as a reduction to its unknown effectiveness.
Another popular tactic is the utilization of hashtags. Campaigns can create a unique hashtag for a particular action and promote it throughout all the collateral created for that campaign. Through the use of hashtags, your company will be able to better track levels of prospect engagement.
No marketing effort should stand alone, whether traditional or modern. Instead, the best of both marketing approaches should be blended to promote everything you promote the overall goals of your B2B’s integrated marketing strategy.
