Business-to-business (B2B) ecommerce is growing at a rapid rate, and businesses are scrambling to figure out how to adapt their sales and marketing strategies to accommodate. These organizations struggle translating their existing B2B marketing tactics to ecommerce. If this sounds familiar to you, you may be wondering where to start.
A good launching point when forming a B2B ecommerce marketing strategy is mapping out your customer journey and purchase path. How can you possibly advertise to your customer if you do not get to know them first? Understanding their pain points, preferences, and challenges is crucial in tailoring marketing efforts that resonate and provide value throughout the B2B e-commerce customer journey. From lead generation to retention, this blog will guide you through your customer journey so you can start advertising with a strategic digital marketing plan.
Mapping Your B2B Ecommerce Customer Journey
B2B ecommerce marketing most often takes into consideration a long customer journey and purchase path. Mapping out your customer journey allows you to put on your customer’s shoes and see things from their perspective. You will gain insights into how your customers currently act which will help you brainstorm how to encourage new customers to engage with your B2B ecommerce site.
Lead Generation
All businesses know that the key to growth is through sales. Sales from new customers are especially important. However, new customers do not always come easy. If that is the case, then how do you generate new B2B ecommerce leads?
First, you want to get to know your customer demographic. This is a good time to collaborate with your sales team because they know customers firsthand. Gather as much information as possible. Once you are more familiar with who your customer is, you will be better able to create an effective digital marketing strategy.
Common channels for lead generation are social media (such as LinkedIn), GDN, and paid search. At this phase you are focused on creating awareness around key pain points or interests you know your customers have. Researching and gaining customer data will help you figure out how to showcase your value.
A good ecommerce marketing tip is to use assets to your advantage. Downloads and webinars build initial relationships with prospects and set yourself up for nurturing opportunities as long as they create value for your customers.
Lead Nurturing
The lead nurturing phase builds upon the customer research you completed. Continue working with your sales team to identify your customers’ key questions, concerns, and aspirations. You can go as detailed as possible with this. Leave no stone unturned.
Just like your friendships, you want to nurture the relationship with your customer. Ultimately, you want new customers to follow through with a purchase and for existing customers to return. A good way to do this is by developing a series of ad communications that can educate the customer as to how you can provide value and assist them. Through effective content marketing strategies, you can encourage them to engage.
Conversion
Conversion is advertising that supports the prospect when they are ready to make a purchase. Opportunities to “convert” can include setting up an account, requesting a quote, or making an initial purchase. There are many ways to go about lead conversion, but the main thing you want to remember is you are more likely to convert a lead by creating value.
There are many different B2B ecommerce marketing strategies out there. Search marketing, for example, is important because you can be very specific in product related searches. Dynamic product remarketing ads can also bring people back to specific products that they are most interested in purchasing.
A good place to start is with content marketing. You do not have to spend much money (if any), and it can bring excellent results. Content marketing allows you to attract your potential customer through interesting images, informative infographics, and/or engaging copy. Content marketing is part of nearly every ad campaign.
Customer Retention and Loyalty
Once a customer makes a purchase, how do you ensure they will return? This can be a tricky task. First, you want to ensure they are happy with their product or service. As long as the customer is satisfied, you are on the right track.
The next step is tailored ads to your existing customers. This is where you can think about what makes the most sense to help them learn more about what they are most interested in. You can cross-promote or encourage repeat purchases based on previous purchase data. For example, you can collect all customers’ email addresses then launch an email marketing campaign.
Remember that a happy, engaged customer is more likely to be a repeat one.
Analytics
As always, it is important to make sure you have the right tracking in place to support appropriate KPIs at each part of the journey and B2B ecommerce advertising plan. From lead generation to loyalty and retention, analytics are a necessary part of the equation.
A clear analytics dashboard allows you to keep track of your ecommerce marketing progress. This will help you know what is working and what is not so you can tweak things. Essentially analytics allow you to continually improve and grow.
Analytics can track who comes to your ecommerce site and from where. They can also give insights into how customers interact with your website both positively and negatively. There are many analytics tools out there that provide invaluable information, such as heat mapping tools that allow you to see exactly where customers click and hover on the page.
B2B Ecommerce Solutions – Marketing Strategy from Industry Experts
As you consider your next steps in B2B ecommerce marketing, it is a good idea to speak with marketing professionals who can help you map out your customer journey. Having a marketing partner that stays on top of digital marketing trends—specifically with ecommerce websites—can make the difference between making that next big sale or not.
Enilon focuses on your unique needs with a customized approach. From digital transformation services to ecommerce marketing, our team of experts work with you every step of the way to not only meet but exceed your goals. We invite you to contact us to learn more about mapping out your customer journey to start generating leads today.
