Promotion in the b2b market. Theoretical foundations for the formation of a complex for promoting services in the b2b market

Our main clients are B2B companies. Working with them is difficult, but very interesting. Often we are approached by clients who have already gone through several digital agencies, SEO offices and "specialists" in setting up advertising. Basically, these agencies specialize in the B2C segment, so when a B2B company comes to them, they work according to the standard scheme: website + SEO + contextual advertising.

Very soon, companies will realize that the work for which they pay a lot of money is inefficient. The traffic is non-targeted, leads do not turn into long-awaited customers, the sales funnel with crazy conversion, which was so beautifully described in the agency, does not work on their website. The only question that comes up is: WHY?

We decided to sort out the tangled tangle of complexities that hinder the implementation of effective Internet marketing. Here, in our opinion, are the main problems that a B2B company faces.

1. Lack of smart specialists

There are few professionals - both from the agencies and from the customers of the services. Often, marketers in B2B companies are young professionals who are engaged in advertising, printing business cards and ordering souvenirs, and organizing exhibitions. Few people know how to promote B2B companies and do industrial marketing at a high level.

There is a staff shortage in the Internet marketing market today, including a shortage of B2B Internet marketing specialists. It is much easier to promote an online store - I made changes on the site, corrected the advertisement and immediately saw the result of my work. When selling complex industrial equipment, a marketer can see the results of his work only after a few months. During this time, they can be fired, and the delayed effect often kills motivation.

2. Long term of the transaction

In the B2B segment, the decision-making process can be very long. From the initial contact of the client to the conclusion of the transaction, it can take from several months to several years. All this time it is necessary to communicate effectively with the client, without losing contact with him, to “warm up” his interest, to work with objections.

This imposes difficulties in measuring the effectiveness of marketing, which makes it difficult to make operational adjustments to tactical plans.

3. Complex segmentation of the target audience

It is very good if the company is engaged in the production of valves for oil pipelines or the implementation of information security systems for banks. In this case, there are almost no questions about who its target audience is and how to build communication with customers. What if the company has many segments? For example, we are manufacturers of siding, and we sell our goods only in bulk. In this case, it is necessary to work with end customers, and with dealers, and with architects who can include us in their project, and with construction organizations. Communication in this case will not be so simple.

4. Many decision makers

There are practically no impulsive and thoughtless actions when a decision is made by several people. Some are industry experts, others are responsible for finance, others for the project as a whole. And it is necessary to influence each representative of the company participating in decision-making, to convey the right words.

Let's take an example from one of our clients - a construction company. They were approached by the secretary of the head office of the network of medical clinics. Representatives of the construction company, at her request, sent a presentation, information about their projects, approximate prices. The secretary collected about 40 such kits from various organizations and passed the information to the deputy general director. The deputy director selected 10 companies and held preliminary negotiations. Only 2 construction companies reached the point of communication with the owner of the network of clinics. According to the results of the communication, our client won. He got the reconstruction of a four-story office building for a clinic. Each of the people in the chain of decision makers chose the company according to their own criteria.

5. Wrong goal setting

Unlike E-commerce, a B2B company on the Internet can have many different goals. For example: strengthening the brand, expanding the dealer network, launching a new product / service on the market, reducing customer service and retention costs, researching the target audience, etc. There are a lot of goals, and considering the Internet only as a sales channel is a short-sighted decision.

How does the dialogue usually take place between the service customer and the Internet marketing contractor?

“We would like to increase sales,” the customer says.
– Well, then you need to make sure that the site is in the first places in search engines (launch a contextual advertising campaign or display advertising or something else), – the performer answers.
- Is there any way to make it cheaper?
- Certainly. You buy 30 words in the TOP-10 Yandex search engine.
- Any guarantees? Will you return the money if you fail to bring the site to the first places?
Yes, yes, everything is for you.

So it turns out that they order some words in some positions, with some kind of guarantees. But even achieving this result does not guarantee an increase in sales.

6. Selling complex or specific goods or services

What if you need to sell complex equipment or consulting services, business automation? Yes, and it costs all millions of rubles, or even dollars? Contextual advertising and search promotion are clearly not enough, an information field should be built around the company, which will work to increase the confidence of potential customers. Content marketing is indispensable here. The site should correctly provide information about the work performed and show real examples. The Internet should include articles from the organization's experts, verifiable testimonials from real customers, and other types of content.

7. No direct sales

Many companies from the B2B sphere do not retail at all, but are only engaged in production, transferring all distribution functions to their dealers. How to be in this case? How to control the effectiveness of marketing activities and check how effective your dealers are and how they can deceive you? All this causes certain difficulties when working with the site, analytics and, in general, with Internet marketing.

8. Success depends only on live human communication

No matter how cool the e-marketing system is built in the company, no matter how many leads a day pour in, all the same, success in achieving a positive commercial result lies on the shoulders of sales managers. It is important to be able to quickly diagnose "holes" in this part of the system - to check the effectiveness of the work of managers in the CRM system to achieve their goals, to listen to how they receive telephone requests, how quickly they process requests from the site, etc.

9. Website as it should be for B2B

A website for a company operating in the corporate segment is different from a website for a retail company. Not all Internet marketers catch this difference and often strive to make either an analogue of an online store or a pretentious image site.

Based on the previously announced features, a site for a B2B company will not look like a site for B2C. Complex customer segmentation, complex documentation, complex communication of the company's advantages. The website is a direct consequence of the company's Internet marketing strategy. In Russia, a website is often made first, and then they think about how to make it realize the business goals.

10. Measuring the effectiveness of advertising

It is wrong to measure the effectiveness of online marketing for B2B companies only by the position of the site in search engines, the number of applications that came through the form on the site, even the number of calls from customers. Think again about the features of B2B companies, we list them again below:

Long chain of sales, long terms. Multichannel. No direct or phone sales, large number of decision makers. It is difficult to track where the client came from, what influenced the decision, how long he took to make the decision. Which advertising channel worked. Big uncertainty.

Taking into account these features, it is important to integrate web analytics systems with telephony, CRM and analyze each advertising channel already in the final financial result.

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So, we have listed the main difficulties of promoting B2B companies on the Internet. Perhaps you have something to add?

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The promotion complex is a set of various activities to bring information about the merits of the product to potential consumers and stimulate the desire to purchase it. The role of promotion is to communicate with individuals, groups of people and organizations through direct and indirect means in order to ensure sales of the organization's products. [kotler]

The structure of the promotion complex in the b2b market has a number of differences due to the peculiarities of the b2b market. For a more complete understanding of the specifics of the b2b market, consider these features.

The essence of the b2b market is that it does not work for the end consumer, but for companies in various fields and industries (public, private, commercial and non-commercial), as well as individuals who buy for business purposes.

This is one of the primary differences that marketing faces in the b2b buying decision process. In the b2c (business to customer) market, personal emotions play a significant role. The reason for the purchase may be a beautiful box, a pleasant memory associated with the product or commitment to a particular brand.

The situation in the b2b market is completely different. Here the buyer is a company consisting of competent people, professionals who are distinguished by collective, purposeful activity, the result of which is the amount of profit received.

All participants in the industrial market, unlike buyers of the b2c market, are equally active in choosing counter-partners. They analyze and evaluate potential suppliers, spend significant resources on making a decision on a deal, sign agreements and contracts, etc. Here we can note the “model of industrial purchases” developed by N. Rackham, based on the work of 2 hemispheres. Rackham says it's important not so much to develop a promotional concept as it is to understand the purchasing decision process of an industrial buyer. According to the model, the right hemisphere is responsible for purchasing decisions from buyers in both markets. However, once the industrial consumer has made a purchasing decision, that decision must be justified to the buying group, which requires a return to the analysis in the left hemisphere. Thus, in the b2b market, rational motives are the basis for making a purchase.

The process of making a purchase decision in the b2c and b2b markets according to the model of N. Rackham

Thus, promotion in the b-2-b market is often less spectacular than in the b-2-c market, but this does not mean that it is less effective. However, one should not forget that the persons involved in making a purchase decision are ordinary people who are not devoid of emotions and a sense of humor.

The second difference is that the purchase decision is made by a group of people with different social status. It can be both the owner and the hired worker. The motives for buying from them, although mostly rational, are still different. For the owner, this is primarily an economic benefit for the business; for an employee, personal gain, recognition and confirmation of his status can play a role.

Therefore, if in b2c companies usually the same message is promoted through different communication channels, they try to surround it with the same information message from different sides; then in the b2b sector it is necessary to convey different messages to different decision makers (due to the group nature of industrial buying).

The third difference is a higher level of buyer risk. The buyer-businessman risks much more than the buyer-man in the street. Huge sums are circulating in business, and the enterprise risks not only the money that is given for a complex product, but also future profits, and even its existence as a business structure.

The fourth difference is a smaller number of buyers. The business seller, as opposed to the consumer goods merchant, usually deals with a limited number of buyers. Since there are few consumers, very often you have to focus not on some average consumer, as in b2c marketing, but on one specific buyer. Accordingly, the entire marketing mix should be developed for each of these consumers separately: promotion in the b-2-b sphere turns out to be more personalized, and therefore more interpersonal. [L. Ivanov "Industrial Marketing"]

The fifth difference is in its way derived from the previous ones and consists in the need to establish closer cooperation between the seller and the buyer. The buyer of industrial goods and services, like no one else, wants to have long-term, permanent and trusting partnerships with their suppliers. He is not interested in "new taste". The main selection criterion is convenient, constant and understandable terms of delivery and, most importantly, trust in the supplier. [Dmitrieva Irina Magazine Advertiser №1 2004]

All these features have a significant impact on the formation of the promotion complex. Since the deal is logical in nature, reliable economic indicators and analytical data based on them can be strong arguments in favor of a deal between partners. In his book Selling the Invisible, G. Beckwith, using the example of two firms, proves that buyers need evidence: facts and figures. I choose between two manufacturers, the buyer will give preference to the manufacturer who appeals with numbers, and does not unfoundedly promote the merits of his enterprise. [Beckwith G. Selling the Unseen: A Guide to Modern Service Marketing / Harry Beckwith; Per. from English. - 5th ed. - M.: Alpina Publishers, 2009. - 224 p.]

Another important point in b2b marketing, which is especially important to pay attention to is such a classic persuasion factor as a unique selling proposition - USP. For b2b marketing, it is extremely important that the USP concept is carefully thought out, prepared and communicated to the consumer. If the buyer, when choosing a company, does not see a clear answer to the questions: “Why should I contact this particular company? How is it better than the rest of the companies on the market? ”, He will simply move on to analyzing the proposals of another company.

However, since in this course work we are talking about the promotion of such specific products as services, we cannot ignore the main characteristics of services that also affect the choice of means of promotion.

First, let's define the concept of "service":

According to F. Kotler, a “service” is any event or benefit that one party can offer to another and which leads to the satisfaction of a need, but does not lead to the possession of anything.

Tykotsky wrote that a “service” is a product of labor, identical in nature to material goods.

According to GOST, a “service” is, first of all, the result of the interaction between the contractor and the consumer.

From this follow the main characteristics of the service:

• · Intangibility. Services are intangible: they cannot be seen, tasted, heard or smelled until they are purchased. The buyer is forced to simply take the word of the seller.
• · Perishability. Services may not be stored for further sale or use. The reason many physicians charge fees for non-attendance patients is that the value of the service existed at the time of the patient's non-attendance. With a stable demand for services, their fragility does not cause serious problems, but if the demand is subject to fluctuations, then service providers face certain difficulties.
• · Inseparable from the source. Services are provided and consumed simultaneously, i.e. can only be provided upon receipt of an order. A service is inseparable from its source, be it a person or a machine, while a product exists in material form regardless of the presence or absence of its source.
• · Quality inconsistency. The quality of services can vary significantly, depending on when, by whom and under what conditions they were provided. In the process of providing a service, the human factor plays an important role: often the quality depends not only on the professionalism and experience of the performer, but also on his physical condition and mood at the time of the service. Service buyers are often aware of this variation in quality and seek advice from other buyers when choosing a service provider.
• · No owner/owner. The consumer of the service, as a rule, uses it for a limited amount of time. . Unlike tangible goods, services are not owned by anyone. In most cases, the provided service cannot be used for too long a period of time. Ultimately, it either becomes obsolete or becomes irrelevant. Any performance, football match, vacation at sea on a package tour ends sooner or later.

Thus, the impossibility of using accurate, rational parameters of the service causes a problem in the development of promotional materials. The complex of service promotion should focus not only on stimulating demand, but also on making services more tangible and letting the consumer evaluate their quality. Customers in both markets experience anxiety when faced with services, due to the inability to see the result before purchasing the service. In this case, you should operate with the company's image, its reputation, customer reviews, etc. A well-established trademark in the eyes of customers is a certain guarantee of the quality of the services provided.

Thus, when forming a promotion complex, it must be remembered that the b2b service sector does not work for the end consumer, but for companies operating in a particular area, so the decision on the need for a particular service is extremely rarely taken alone. As a rule, a large group of people is involved in this, so the marketer needs to take into account the interests of the organization, people with the authority to make decisions, and competing companies. In the business market, one of the main goals of any enterprise is to show how the service will help corporate clients increase revenue or reduce costs. Of great importance here is PR, the company's reputation as a reliable supplier, but personal sales play an even more important role.

1.2 Features of using b2b market promotion tools

Despite the complexity of promoting the service sector in the b2b market, you can increase sales if you use a variety of activities for this, each of which is designed to solve its own problems. To promote the company on the market, it is necessary to carry out brand management, image advertising that increases the company's recognition in the market, use personal sales, remote sales. The company's participation in various exhibitions, specialized events, forums, and seminars also ensures a high effect.

Let's take a closer look at the tools of the promotion complex. The means of promotion used in industrial marketing are the same as in marketing to consumers. According to Golubkov E.P. The promotion package includes:

• personal (personal) sales - verbal presentation of goods during a conversation with one or more potential buyers in order to make a sale;
• · PR (public relations) - non-personal sales promotion for a product, service, social movement through the dissemination of commercially important information about them in the media;
• sales promotion - a variety of short-term incentives aimed at encouraging the purchase or sale of a product or service;
• · advertising - any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods and services on behalf of a known sponsor.

Lester Wunderman introduced the concept of "direct marketing" in 1967 while working with brands such as American Express and Columbia Records.

Direct marketing is marketing based on the direct impact on customers through various means of communication and communication in order to sell goods and services and maintain a customer base. Direct marketing is based on the fact that the client contacts the representative of goods and services.

However, do not forget that the effectiveness of these funds directly depends on the type of market. So in the consumer market, as a rule, the main efforts and means of promotion are spent on advertising and only then on promotion, personal selling and PR. Another situation in the industrial market. Here, thanks to the presence of a large number of specialized professional publications, and especially thanks to the development of the Internet, customers are well informed about the product or service, its main characteristics and additional features. Again, if the buyer does not feel the need for an industrial product, it is almost impossible to convince him to purchase the product. Under these conditions, the role of the image (reputation) of the company, information about it in the publications of the specialized press and, in particular, reviews of other corporate clients, increases. It is no secret that many firms, before making a large purchase of durable goods, conduct a kind of industrial intelligence (the so-called monitoring of suppliers). That is why the main focus is on branding, PR and personal selling, and only then advertising and sales promotion.

Table 1 presents data on the perception of information from the proposed communication sources, based on the analysis of promotion channels and the convertibility of potential customers coming from these sources to the company's profit.

Figure 1. The share of promotion channels in the formation of an integrated marketing communications strategy in the b2b market

Increasing customer loyalty in the B2B area should be carried out through direct marketing activities, as well as a system of discounts and optimization of conditions. Moreover, the content of mailings should not be exclusively informational and commercial in nature. Congratulatory letters have a more effective impact on the formation of a positive opinion about the outsourcing company.

Thus, it should be concluded that the promotion of B2B services is a set of measures aimed at creating a positive image of the company, which plays a key role when deciding on the choice of a subcontractor. Personal sales in the chain of promotion channels are the most effective and close the circle of marketing activities, as they are in the nature of the final steps to work with a potential client. When choosing any marketing activity, one should be guided by the strategic direction of the company's development. All promotion channels must be coordinated and be links in the chain of a single strategy for the formation of integrated marketing communications.

In order for the B2B service sector to be presented in the business community at a truly worthy level, it is necessary to use integrated marketing and advertising campaigns that combine both traditional methods and Internet technologies.

Promotion of services in the b2b segment has its own characteristics that must be taken into account when developing a promotion plan, namely:

· Inaccessibility of the audience that makes decisions (heads of enterprises, top management, heads of departments);

The complexity of organizing and conducting research of a different nature;

Long chain of decision-making, in which more than one link is involved;

· Limited exposure to traditional and mass advertising media - there are industry and highly specialized sources;

· “Connections” play a big role, as well as the overall reputation of the company in the industry market.

Promotion of b2b services is different from the promotion of conventional consumer services and goods. The difference between marketing strategies is determined, first of all, by the composition of the target audience. Consider some features of the promotion of services and goods in the b2b sector.

· The need to focus on a narrow circle of consumers. This feature has its pros and cons. A rather narrow circle of consumers of specialized services and goods allows you to run promotion companies at a much lower cost. When addressing a mass audience in the b2b sector, one cannot hope for a few sales, since the number of customers in this sector is initially small, so companies must reach, preferably, 100% of the target audience, while encouraging a significant number of those covered to make a decision.

· Appearance of informational materials. In the first place in all information materials about the company in the b2b sector is the content, whether it be traditional handouts or electronic ones - accuracy, reliability, completeness of information, ease of use. But it is also worth paying attention to the stylish, but at the same time strict design.

Company marketing concept

To stimulate sales of services and goods in the b2b sector market, it is necessary to constantly introduce new and improve already used promotion tools. Internet promotion was chosen as the optimal method of promotion, taking into account the specifics of the project. At the moment, Buteykis & Partners has a functioning website, which, however, requires significant optimization.

The purpose of the promotion: increase the number of customers.

· Raise awareness of potential customers about the company;

· Increase brand awareness;

· Strengthen the level of trust in the company.

Stages of the promotion concept implementation:

1) Select the target audience of the project and determine promotion channels;

2) Conduct an analysis of the demand for services;

4) Optimize the official website of the project;

5) Prepare PR materials for Internet promotion.

The target audience. Buteykis & Partners operates in the b2b sector. The main target audience are representatives of the business environment, heads of enterprises and projects conducting their business in Moscow. With the expansion of the project, it is possible to increase the coverage of clientele in other regions.

promotion channels. The Internet was chosen as the main promotion channel. More specifically, it is:

* Search engine optimization (SEO) - promotion of the site in the top search results;

* PR materials for the official site and thematic sites.

» Anna Feoktistova wrote a column for the site about the promotion in media, social networks and blogs of a complex technological product - billing for telecom operators. Feoktistova reviewed both Russian and foreign resources, and noted the strengths and weaknesses of different types of content marketing.

Latera Marketing Director Anna Feoktistova

We at Latera have been developing billing for Hydra telecom operators for many years, and recently launched a new project - the Hydra OMS order management system. These are completely different products, but there is something that they have in common - their complexity in the eyes of the average Internet user.

Promoting such projects is more difficult and interesting than the next “food constructor” or “Uber for something”. Today we will talk about what methods of content promotion in Russian and English languages ​​we tried, and what results we managed to achieve.

The sales cycle for such a complex product is months, sometimes years. For example, even ordering a demo version of the system most often does not happen from the first visit: 80% of “demos” are ordered either from a direct visit to the site, or from organic search engine results for targeted queries like “billing hydra”. In such a situation, it is almost impossible to track the conversion from any specific actions in the field of marketing. But some general observations can be made.

Our company has existed for almost ten years, but for many years we have not carried out targeted work on promotion. We had a blog on the site and an email newsletter, which was signed by several thousand people. The materials were prepared by the managers and technical specialists of the company, so all this was of an irregular nature.

To fix this, we decided to take advantage of the capabilities of the Rockin "Robin media hub and attracted its specialists as experts in creating thematic content for B2B companies.

The project has been going on for almost a year now. Here's what we've tried so far.

Promotion in RuNet

From the very beginning, our main promotional efforts have been focused on the home market of RuNet. Here we have worked with several channels and tools for creating and distributing content. Below are all the steps we have taken and a description of the results of the work.

Step 1. Blog on Habrahabr

Perhaps the most obvious way to promote technical products in Runet is Habrahabr and, to a lesser extent, its younger brother Geektimes. The monthly audience of this resource historically consists of technology enthusiasts and IT professionals and exceeds many notable business media combined. A variety of companies maintain their blogs there - from global giants like Google or Intel to unknown young projects.

Thanks to the “collective intelligence” rating system for publications, even small startups can get good audience coverage and outperform multinational corporations in the overall ranking.

On the other hand, Habrahabr has always been a difficult resource to work with. More than a dozen projects can tell stories about how readers mercilessly criticized and downvoted materials that everyone inside the company liked. Therefore, it was necessary to develop an approach that would allow us to talk about our billing and not incur the disfavor of the audience.

To do this, we decided to use the format of explanatory texts, in which we “attacked” the main doubts that arise among potential customers who are thinking about buying our product. For example, many of these companies are not sure that it is worth spending money on a product created by someone else if you can create your own solution. In practice, with "self-written" software, there are almost always a variety of problems that are not obvious at first glance. We talked about them in our material, which caused a real storm of discussion (and was almost downvoted).

We honestly talked about what technical difficulties we face and how we deal with them. Everyone is interested to read how the combination of several rare circumstances led to a massive failure, the consequences of which we were able to overcome. In addition, such stories help potential customers see that we are able to work in a stressful situation and do not try to gloss over problems.

In addition to technical materials, so that the audience does not get bored, we published entertaining and simply useful articles translated or adapted from English - readers also liked them and some of them collected tens of thousands of views.

In addition to solving the problem of “keep the user while we write a complex technical article”, such materials could be used to express their attitude towards technology. For example, this is how we explained our choice of the MongoDB DBMS for the Hydra standalone RADIUS server.

Result: we published the first article on Habrahabr at the end of August last year, since then we have posted 25 publications. They have been viewed over 300,000 times. Some of these materials have served as the basis for columns in specialized media. Several clients came to us from Habrakhabr, including large ones.

Restrictions: good technical content cannot be cheap - it is impossible to create it without the involvement of qualified engineers, and they still have to do the main work sometime. Putting the creation of such texts on stream is not an easy task, but in addition to this, the blog should have its own editorial policy, which would imply the publication of articles of various types that solve different business problems. In addition, a blog on Habrahabr is a paid service, the cost of which can scare many away (this is 60 thousand rubles for three months in prices as of August 1).

Conclusion: this promotion channel should be used if the company is ready to produce high-quality technical content. “Ready” is not just “we have smart engineers and interesting projects”, but also there are people who can be trusted to collect texture and turn it into a final text. If you have someone inside the company who writes interestingly, this will help you act faster.

Step 2. Working with online media

In parallel with the blog, we were engaged in targeted work with online media, which theoretically could be read by representatives of our target audience - managers and employees of telecom operators.

Here we decided to act in two directions - to work with thematic resources that write a lot about telecom, and to publish more general "business" texts in business publications. So we were able to convey to the audience outside of Habrahabr our strengths in terms of developing, implementing and supporting a complex telecom product that solves real problems well. We also managed to explain why this is needed at all, and express our opinion on important topics - for example, organizing work within the company and building interaction with customers.

The media group of the first type included the resources of Nag.ru (a well-known site in the telecom industry) and Roem.ru, and the second - "The Secret of the Firm", "General Director", the site, Rusbase and others.

Over several months of work, we published a couple of dozens of texts in the media that talked about what to look for when choosing billing, what metrics to use to evaluate business performance using a subscription model, why you don’t need complex products on your own and what will happen to the Russian Internet after the adoption of the Yarovaya package.

Result: Our media articles received a good response - in some cases they collected more than a hundred comments. In our opinion, such placements have helped to increase the notorious "brand awareness" of our company outside the established telecom community, and within it - to gain new supporters and, as a result, customers.

If we compare the “exhaust” from working with the media with blogging on Habrahabr, then the blog brought us more customers. In the case of the media, attendance turned out to be much lower, and we received any significant traffic only from the industry-specific Nag.ru. At the same time, publications in the media have a positive effect on the “visibility” of the product in search engines - links to articles pop up in Google for queries like “billing hydra”. And even though this is often not the first page, but the second, third or fourth, when it comes to choosing an enterprise product for hundreds of thousands and millions of rubles, customers are ready to look through.

Restrictions: it turned out to be difficult to work with the media - often our materials were rejected without a special explanation of the reasons (“another speaker writes on this topic” - as an option), sometimes they directly said that it was better to “act through the commercial department”, in some cases they completely ignored . The situation is similar to that described in this article - it takes perseverance and fortitude in order not to give up in case of failures.

Conclusion: in the field of b2b media, this is a good content marketing channel that can bring real sales. However, like Habrahabr, you need to “know how to cook” it, and even in this case, no one gives any guarantees of success. You can't just take and get on the pages of RBC, Forbes or CNews (more precisely, you can, but it's very, very expensive). On the other hand, good results can be achieved through targeted work with carefully selected thematic online publications. We are following exactly this path.

Step 3. Blog on the site and Facebook

We have had a blog on our site for a long time - it was originally filled by the company's managers in their free time. Really interesting texts were published there, some of which caused lively discussions among the "telecom operators" - in thematic mailing lists, chats in Telegram, and so on.

The only problem here was that the director had something to do besides the blog - so the articles appeared when there was free time (which is almost never) and the corresponding mood. Thanks to the experience gained in independent content creation, we were able to clearly articulate our vision of content marketing and quickly convey our wishes to the contractor.

You can buy everything online - from matches to an island in the ocean. But is it worth it to go into online sales to b2b companies? How realistic is it to sell metal products or CNC machines through the site?

The difference between b2b and b2c markets

How to sell a car? Watching who.

A human client needs to sit in the car. See what's under the hood. Consult with your wife. Hear about the favorable price and quality of service.

It is important for the buyer-organization to find out about the terms of leasing and the cost of depreciation. Understand the nuances of the contract and the conditions for further cooperation. They probably won't even look at the car.

The difference between b2b and b2c markets is enormous. And in the speed of decision-making, and in the amount of the transaction, and in the role of emotions. The decision to choose a tractor is made rationally and for a long time. About buying pizza - quickly and emotionally. If you arrange a battle between a marketer working with everyday goods and a marketer promoting financial consulting, it will stretch over several days. We have collected in a table some of the differences related to sales via the Internet.

The specifics of the markets are obvious, but when it comes to the Internet, questions arise. How to understand that this person wants to buy a milling machine? Can a pizza consumer be our target audience with the characteristics of “top manager, 30-50 years old, working in production”? How do business users behave online? Therefore, sometimes Internet promotion in the business market is used intuitively. And the tools that show results in the b2c market do not work.

The main mistakes in Internet marketing in the b2b market

Wrong goal setting

The success of trading in consumer goods is in reducing transaction costs. An online store pays off by saving on renting a trading floor and paying sellers. In the network, it is important to reduce the cost of attracting an application.

It would be a mistake to set such a goal when selling b2b goods or services through the site. The salesperson's role in dealing with business customers goes beyond invoicing. When selling complex goods and services, it is necessary to demonstrate competence in the professional field. The client needs to be convinced that the product solves precisely his professional tasks. Therefore, the goal on the b2b site may be to get a warm contact (after downloading the price list or demo version) and access to direct communication.

Why is it important to set the right goal? In b2b, there can be 3 applications per month, but each one is a million. Therefore, if you get carried away by reducing the costs of attracting an application, you can lose 3 million. Of course, you need to understand the maximum allowable cost of an action on your site.

Overlay offline segmentation on online users

The basis for offline segmentation can be the volume of consumption of goods, industry, frequency of calls, etc. The buyer of the machine can be a person of a certain age and position. You go to the top manager of the plant with one commercial offer, and send another one to the "IP manager".

It is not always possible to track socio-demographic characteristics online. The volume of consumption of goods on request is also not understandable - the manager of a construction corporation and the “IP” will enter the same request “milling machine” or “accounting program”. Therefore, it is better to segment online users based on additional criteria, at the intersection of online and offline characteristics.

Why is it important to segment? To show each audience the offer they need, increasing traffic conversion and thereby increasing the cost effectiveness of online marketing.

Measure the result with b2c market metrics

It is hardly enough to measure only the volume of traffic or conversion to applications. On the b2b market, the sale is long, multi-stage, which means that the result must be measured accordingly.

Set up deep analytics, build a long funnel and track results taking into account the characteristics of the purchase. Without losing a client after a phone call.

For example, in the b2c market, one of the performance indicators is ROI (the ratio of the amount of profit to the amount of investment). For b2b, this metric will not be indicative - it is difficult to take into account all the costs for six months that went into making the deal go through. Much more valuable for understanding the effectiveness will be the conversion rate from calls to deals.

Why is it important to choose the right metrics? To understand which channels, in which period, brought you more targeted visitors. And invest in effective ones.

How to "set up" the Internet marketing system in a b2b company

Surely you are working on promoting goods / services on the Internet. You know which channels are effective. But sometimes it's good to "clean up" and check how well everything works. And can the scores be improved? By the way, one of the first rules of a systematic approach to Internet marketing is to regularly revise indicators and adjust, based on the data received, not only tactics, but also a promotion strategy.

Let's go over the main points that are good to track regularly.

Adequacy of the goals of promotion on the Internet

the company's global business goals;

product features;

Selected tools.

The global goals for a b2b company on the Internet are likely to be focused in the area of ​​information, positioning and building trust. Online sales will be the second level goal.

At the level of product goals, the adequacy of the way your product is consumed is important. For example, when choosing rolled metal, a consumer monitors the Internet and sends requests to several companies for a mini-tender. This means that the target for rolled metal may be getting into the first selection list. What is needed for this? A simple and understandable application form with the ability to attach a tender request, a quick response to the request and getting contacts for further communication.

An example of an application that allows you to quickly get into a mini-tender:

Goals and metrics in the context of tools are determined depending on the life stage of the site development. For example, at the initial stage of the promotion, there is no data on the quality of traffic sources. It is difficult to predict which channel will bring quality visitors. Therefore, goals can be set in terms of traffic volumes. After the analytical period, it is advisable to review the goals.

If you already know the average cost of an application, you can move on to more complex metrics. For example, a leasing company may set a goal to “ensure the nth number of applications without exceeding a certain percentage in the total amount of executed leasing agreements”.

Segmentation by online criteria

There can be many types of segmentation in the network, for example:

• by the stage of the customer's life cycle (potential, current, departed);
• by type of consumption (through tenders, wholesale, works with companies from the state register, etc.);
• by type of requests (multi-component low-frequency, branded, general);
• by behavior on the network or on the site (for example, those who viewed a certain set of pages and downloaded the price list);
• by interests (pizza, economics, design);
• by client CID (user attribute based on the browser used).

Segmentation, which takes into account your knowledge of offline customers with an attempt to model their behavior on the network, gives the greatest effect.

Unfortunately, the volume of applications from a site in the b2b market is usually small, so it takes time to accumulate statistics on the quality of the segments (which segments give higher quality applications). However, it is important to determine the value of each segment (what is the volume of customers and the average check) and estimate the volume of demand (for example, by the frequency of requests).

In the future, segmentation will not only allow you to effectively work with each segment. But to complete the most important task is to expand exactly the segment that brings the greatest profit, find an audience with similar characteristics on the network and show it your offer. It is the search for new customers and reaching new audiences that is the most difficult and demanded task for b2b.

All applications are "qualified"

Often a potential client is "lost" at the stage of a phone call. The goal of Internet promotion has been formally achieved - the client was taken to a personal conversation, an appointment was made. What happens to him afterwards is often unknown.

However, how to evaluate the effectiveness of working with the Internet if we do not know what quality of the audience we bring to the sales department? An order for rolled metal can be for 20,000 or 20,000,000 rubles. Who do we need more?