In January, Forbes called 2013 the ‘year of the customer’, and when it comes to B2B sales, this statement could not be more true. The customer, not the seller, now controls B2B buying cycles. This means that your marketing strategy and content must be based on a full understanding of who your customer is and structured around meeting the customer on their own terms.
In order to meet the customer where they’re at, you need to have a clear understanding of where he or she is in the buying cycle for your product or service. Knowing the stage of the buying cycle the prospect is at tells you what marketing content is appropriate to move them to further down the pipe. Giving someone the wrong content at the wrong time will confuse or annoy your prospect, neither of which is an effective sales strategy.
Just as you would not serve crème brulee as a breakfast dish, you should not give a prospect a video of a complex software demo after their first interaction with your company. You need to provide your prospect with a full menu of content options and let their behaviors inform you of what they would like to be served. Using a marketing automation solution, you can watch prospects interact with different “menu options” and gauge if they are in the mood for breakfast or lunch.
Following this metaphor, here are the different stages of the buying cycle for B2B customers along with what type of marketing content is appropriate for each stage.
Stage #1: Breakfast
Prospect expresses interest.
Content types: basic info about value proposition, “welcome” emails, educational blogs, best practices articles, introductory videos
Stage #2: Lunch
Prospect is engaging.
Content types: Invitations to webinars/webcasts, demo videos, segmented content based on specific page views
Stage #3: Dinner
Prospect is ready to make a decision.
Content types: case studies, software demonstrations, service/product options, feature comparisons, white papers, testimonials, pricing
Stage #4: Dessert
Prospect becomes an ongoing customer.
Content types: new product/service info, review/testimonial requests, newsletters, requests for customer data updates
These four stages (or meals) of the buying cycle comprise the majority of the B2B marketing process. However, the problem remains: what if the prospect isn’t hungry?
In cases where the prospect is showing no interest in digesting your content, you need to prove to them how great it tastes. Maybe your prospect is hungry, but you haven’t offered them anything appealing yet. These prospects need to be nurtured with content like surveys to better assess their specific business needs. Prospects that aren’t hungry also need to be given incentives to engage in your content; offering a promotion of some kind may be able to initiate reengagement (e.g. “Today Only: FREE Samples!”).
In summary, we have gone over the various stages of the B2B customer buying cycle and explained what marketing content each stage necessitates. If you have any questions or would like to know more about B2B buying cycles or content marketing, please contact us.
