How to Sell to Sellers: B2B Marketing Tips

Prefer reports and analyses over emotional messages, act indirectly through end customers, don’t neglect the offline and remember that it’s a marathon, not a sprint: rules of thumb for marketing to businesses

A sale, even if it’s particularly difficult and competitive, is ultimately a simple story: Party A offers a product, some kind of merchandise or services, and Party B decides to go for it. But what happens when our customer is not the one-time buyer, but rather the seller? How do you market the product to someone who is supposed to market to others? Here the process is complex and usually longer, and requires different skills. Especially in the digital world.

“B2B Marketing is a different opera,” says Ravit Goffman, owner of the advertising agency “Goffman Creative”. “When we market to businesses, and not to private customers, we are talking about a long purchasing process with an emphasis on the awareness stage. The sale itself is only the last stage. A different strategy is derived from this: less emotional and more rational – based on data, professional analyses, benchmarks and presentations. We will emphasize less the product value and more the work that will be streamlined, the time that will be saved and the profits that will grow in the long term. Less messages like: We are the most popular/cheapest, and more: You can trust us”.

Royit mentions that unlike B2C marketing, working with businesses is often long-term and includes characteristics of relationships. Employment is usually on a permanent retainer, not in one-time payments, and the client will expect to receive regular reports on the results. In the decision-making process, it is likely that several factors will be involved – from purchasing and finance, through the professional levels and sometimes up to the CEO.

So how do you build B2B Marketing correctly? Here are some tips from Ravit, who has been involved in effective launch and marketing moves for a wide range of businesses and private clients alike:

Content is king

Continuous exposure of relevant decision-makers to quality, accurate, and well-planned content creates continuity and constructive communication over time. To this end, it is important to combine sponsored and organic exposures, ensure proper SEO, and optimally segment target audiences.

Every business and its audience

Businesses can be approached directly or indirectly, through their consumer audience. In the world of interior design, for example, it is worth “talking” to the designers themselves and even their clients, so that they prefer a specific supplier of doors or sinks. In aesthetic-medical equipment, we will consider preparing content targeted to patients, so that they can verify that their aesthetic institute is indeed using a brand they know and appreciate.

Surprise, Surprise

Since this is a long-term relationship, which is built in stages, it is very important to diversify the messages, platforms and forms of delivery of the message. Even if the client is satisfied with the results, he expects us to be updated, to refresh the work, to innovate and renew.

Building Reputation

Marketing for businesses is a long-distance race. True, reputation is an elusive concept that may be built slowly, but it has a decisive impact on product preference and “memorability.” Focused exposure to relevant content, regularly and consistently, while emphasizing the various needs and the solutions we offer them – this is the right way to create a good reputation, which will also permeate and pass on “word of mouth”.

Niche sites

There is great importance in locating relevant niche sites and advertising focused on them, for example: PORT2PORT in the field of logistics.

This also includes specific groups on social networks, and of course effective use of LinkedIn to reach relevant professional segments.

A Hard World

Even if the bulk of resources are directed to digital, especially in B2B, complementary offline efforts must not be neglected. Conferences, meetings, brochures, holiday greetings and printed professional material will connect customers to us and provide them with added, authentic value in the ongoing service we provide them.

“In the B2B world, perseverance, patience and a slightly different mindset in marketing are required,” concludes Ravit. “Here, unlike promoting a deal with a private client, we mainly try to convey expertise, stability and experience. Because the product, it is important to remember, is actually us.”