Tips & Tricks for B2B Social Media Marketing

May 12, 2021 | Marketing

Social media isn’t just for B2C businesses – it can also be a great tool for B2B businesses as well. However, a B2B company should have very different goals in order to reach their target customers. Many B2Bs have found social media to be very effective in not only helping them to generate leads, but in many cases have found that these leads spend more money on average. Need more reasons that your B2B should consider using social media? Here are our top four.

Your Competitors Probably Already Are

If your competition is active on social media, that means they are connecting with a key segment of customers that you are missing out on. Social audiences are often the most vocal – and persuasive – customer groups. Reaching them can mean getting your brand into the conversation, and raising brand recognition.

Your Customers Use Social Media to Look for Services

Social media has only increased customer expectations for both B2C and B2B. People go online to share reviews, give feedback, voice their opinions, and to ask questions. Utilizing B2B gives you the opportunity to follow and get involved in conversations about your brand, and even conversations about your industry in general.

You May be Missing Out on Leads & Sales Opportunities

Generating leads and sales from social media isn’t just for B2C companies. Social media can also be critical in nurturing leads for B2Bs. A survey from IDC found that 75% of B2B buyers and 84% of executives use social media to help them make purchasing decisions – and 76% are receptive to social engagement about a product or service they are interested in.

You Can Use Social Insights to Increase Customer Satisfaction

Social insights help you to learn what your customers are saying about your brand in online discussions. Customer reviews, feedback, and comments can help you to develop strategies to address exactly what your customers want and need. This will only help your business in becoming a more competitive player in your industry.

How to Create Your B2B Social Media Strategy

No matter how large or small your B2B is, there is value in having a social media strategy. Designing a clear strategy with defined goals is going to be your key to success. Your strategy should:

Should Align With Your Business Objectives

All social media strategies should be started with two questions: What are the company’s business objectives, and how will social media help us achieve them? Are you trying to increase customer engagement, improve customer service, or something else entirely? No matter what your goals are, they need to be specific, measurable, relevant, timely, and attainable.

Identify Opportunities to Meet Your Goals

In order to identify your opportunities, you should do some research into your competitor’s social media presence. Write down their strengths and weaknesses in order to identify an opportunity for you to stand out.

Learn About Your Buyers

As a B2B, your audience is obviously the buyers within the companies who would benefit from your product or service. In order to appeal to these buyers, you need to learn more about who they are, what they do, and what problems you can help solve for them.

Focus on The Right Social Platforms

Not all social media platforms are going to help your B2B social campaign. You want to be posting where your target customers are, and if you don’t know that off the top of your head, dig into social audience demographics. According to Hootsuite polls, LinkedIn is by far the best platform for B2B posting, with Facebook coming in second.

Have a Plan for How to Measure Your Results

Running a campaign without tracking its results is like throwing money away. Instead, you need to decide which metrics and data you will monitor in order to determine what is working, and what is simply draining your budget. Establish KPIs, then set benchmarks and achievable goals.

5 B2B Social Media Marketing Best Practices

Speak to Your Audience

Don’t try to just speak to a general audience – use language and acronyms that are common in your industry. That doesn’t mean you should try to sound too technical; try to keep it conversational so that it is both relevant and enjoyable for people to read. Your goal is to communicate clearly in order to connect with your audience.

Create Separate Channels to Keep Things Simple

Trying to launch a new product or service, but end up spending a lot of your time addressing customer service concerns? Create multiple channels so that each can serve a distinct and appropriate purpose. This can help you ensure that your social media campaigns are delivered on time, and that your existing customers are still getting the service that they expect.

Personalize Your Messaging

Social media allows marketers to create very targeted campaigns. Take advantage of this by tailoring your content to speak to people based on where they are, what they do, where they are in their career, and more.

Provide Valuable Content

Social media isn’t just about self-promotion; it’s also about showing potential customers that you are up-to-date on industry changes or advancements. Identify your customer’s pain points, learn about their business needs, and about their customer’s needs. Take advantage of market research, personal expertise, and other resources to post blogs, white papers, videos, and more to share on your social pages. This will help build trust by showing that you are an authority in your industry.

Utilize Social Media Ads

Social media ads provide almost limitless options for targeting in order to narrow down who sees an ad. This means that you can be hyper-specific in order to only reach the more relevant audience. You can also use retargeting ads, which allows you to show your ads to people who visited your website but did not convert. Creating a value proposition ad to show these visitors increases the chances of them returning to become paying customers.

If you’re a B2B interested in learning more about how you can add social media marketing to your digital campaigns, we are here to help. Gulf Coast Web has 25 years of experience in managing all types of digital design and marketing campaigns – even for companies outside of our immediate area. Our staff consists of highly-trained digital design advertising professionals who are both passionate about their jobs and excel at what they do. Contact us today to book a consultation with our team. We look forward to outlining exactly how we can help you grow your business with our digital media agency services.