Content Marketing in B2B: Good Content – Good Leads

Companies in B2B continuously produce valuable content: whitepapers, contact forms, case studies, blog posts, webinars, and more. However, content marketing in B2B is rarely used consistently for lead generation.

Content marketing remains trendy. Instead of shouting aggressive advertising messages, companies prefer genuine knowledge sharing about products and services. Especially in B2B marketing, products and services are becoming more differentiated and thus require more explanation. With many genuine USPs, the devil is inevitably in the details. Therefore, in content marketing, there are fundamentally two approaches to communicate with potential customers and ideally generate a lead: Push and Pull. In a Pull, the interested visitor actively seeks out information provided on the company's site. Push refers to companies actively distributing their information — at the right time and in the right place. The following strategies may be helpful in this regard.

1. INFORMATION INSTEAD OF EMOTION: THE DIFFERENCE TO B2C

The difference between B2B and B2C lies primarily in the target audience: While it is assumed that private customers in the B2C sector make most of their purchasing decisions based on emotions, the opposite is true for business customers in the B2B sector: Decisions are made based on facts and rational, economic arguments.

Thus, B2B marketing is not about entertainment, but about a professional presentation of information, facts, statistics, and studies. The challenge for companies is to first find the right story for their products and services and then tell it in a way that is engaging, exciting, or humorous, but definitely convincing.

2. FIRST IMPRESSIONS COUNT: OPTIMIZE LANDING PAGES

As part of an appropriate content marketing strategy, companies must specifically optimize their respective landing pages based on the search needs of interested visitors. Websites are more than just a company's business card: The first impression, visual design, technical atmosphere, user-friendliness, didactic structure, and not least the "user experience" during the registration process are — according to neuromarketing research — decisive factors for lead generation.

But content also matters: Those who structure their content well, organize it meaningfully, make it informative, and visually appealing benefit not only from a better SEO ranking on Google but (possibly) also from convinced business partners.

3. LET OTHERS TALK ABOUT YOU: NETWORKING WITH TRADE PUBLISHERS

Trade publishers offer exclusive opportunities for paid content placement, for example via advertorials: These are paid content published in the name of a company. Additionally, some trade magazines offer the possibility to publish your own articles — provided they meet journalistic quality standards (objectivity, factuality, etc.).

The author is usually the CEO of the company or a marketing manager. The biggest advantages of long-term media partnerships are the wide reach and efficient target audience engagement. And whether advertorial or article: Publishing houses will become more aware of your company and, sooner or later, so will other businesses.

4. CASH PAYS OFF: USING PPC CHANNELS

Pay-per-click channels, i.e., running campaigns via Google AdWords, YouTube, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter & co., can be utilized with manageable effort in a relatively short time and can be intensified, reduced, or ended with flexible budgets monthly, weekly, daily, or even hourly.

Through billing (CPC: Cost-per-Click), you only pay for actual visitors to your landing page. Prices can vary greatly depending on the keyword and reach seemingly exaggerated peaks. However, if valuable leads are generated through the ads, the costs are justifiable and bearable from an overall economic perspective.

5. BREAKING DOWN BARRIERS: NO DIVISION BETWEEN MARKETING AND SALES

How to turn an anonymous website visitor into a known customer? This usually happens with the help of an opt-in, i.e., a registration often associated with the prospect signing up for a newsletter or similar. But only when such a potential lead actually shows a willingness to purchase is contact made with sales. In classic content marketing, certain content is only accessible after filling out a contact or opt-in form.

However, a contact form is not a suitable vehicle for generating opt-ins. Those who want to take it a step further should link interesting content with the opportunity to generate legally valid opt-ins. For this, marketing and sales must work closely together, or as the publisher of the Content Marketing Study TBN Public Relations GmbH 2013 put it: "The awareness of working with content, focusing on dialogue, and leaving traditional paths is quite pronounced in B2B marketing. But the traditional division between marketing and sales prevents the great potential of lead generation from being fully utilized."

6. DISCOVERING NEW HORIZONS: THE VALUE OF SEMINARS AND WEBINARS

In many B2B industries, seminars and webinars are becoming increasingly important for lead generation. Clearly, the effort is high, but seminars and especially webinars often receive an astonishing response. Particularly webinars that "share" genuine knowledge from within the company and reach many people through the right distribution channels usually quickly amortize the high costs.

It is important that seminars and webinars offer concrete solutions for specific problems. It is advisable to mention in-house services relatively late and link to additional content on the landing pages. Real added value in the seminar or webinar helps in the long run to win new customers and build closer relationships.

7. ACQUIRING EXTERNAL PARTNERS: DON'T DO EVERYTHING YOURSELF

Companies should not try to create all content themselves. On one hand, there is already a plethora of content created by bloggers, technology experts, business professionals, consultants, and partners that may be relevant. On the other hand, it is not guaranteed that there is sufficient expertise within the marketing department, which tends to play a coordinating rather than an executing role.

Why? Good contacts with trade magazines, long-standing experience in the areas of SEO, Adwords, social media, PPC, etc. — all these things embody a kind of "expert knowledge" often only found in specialized agencies. Involving external content marketing partners is thus not only more promising but also saves a lot of time and money in the long run.