Consider 2017 as your marketing marathon: You’re about 20 miles in, so it’s time to take a deep breath, narrow your focus, and make a final surge in the last five! What are some B2B marketing tactics you can and should employ to power through in the fourth quarter to make 2017 a win?
Content marketing: Let the quality shine through
With 2018 in sight, many company leaders are already planning budgets and making purchase decisions for the coming year. Now is the time to really shine with quality content marketing that informs, educates, and benefits your audience members — without overtly selling. This helps you make an emotional impact and gain prospects’ interest so you can position yourself as a thought leader and remain top of mind.
Producing quality content is key to doing just that. With so many B2B companies employing some form of content marketing, just producing content isn’t enough. Stand out with quality content that resonates with your audience throughout the prospect-to-customer journey. This means you can’t just create content that’s important to those in your organization. Rather, you’ve got to craft customer-centric content that speaks to the heart of what matters to those in your audience.
An added bonus of quality content: Your own audience members can become powerful marketing tools, working on your behalf as they like, share, and comment, increasing you and your content’s visibility.
Social selling
Social media channels — especially LinkedIn — present massive opportunities for B2B marketers to use their quality content to create communities and forge relationships with prospects worldwide. Those who are investing in LinkedIn social selling by starting and growing relationships with prospects already have the upper hand in building their networks. It’s time to join these early adopters and employ social selling tactics if you haven’t already. Not only can B2B marketers share information via social selling but they can also easily gain a competitive edge when they instigate two-way dialogue and actively engage with prospects and customers. By offering advice and discussing others’ content contributions on the platform, social selling also offers B2B marketers opportunities to grow their relationships with and retain current clients.
As 2018 approaches, use social media platforms to engage with followers and ask them what they need as they plan for 2018. Use the information they provide you to advance your social selling efforts. Why? LinkedIn is the most effective social media platform for those in the B2B realm as “66% of users report that they see good results from the site and 94% of B2B marketers use it as a marketing tactic.”
Influencer marketing: Employ the third-party effect
But LinkedIn opportunities don’t stop at social selling. Influencer marketing is a buzz term pervasive among savvy marketers. So, what exactly is it? Influencer marketing focuses on letting an outside expert or key leader in your industry or niche drive your company’s brand or message to the masses. The influencer’s known expertise and values should already align with and reflect those of your company. And, since your audience is already on LinkedIn, it’s also a great platform for your influencer marketing efforts.
As 2017 draws to a close, now is the time to do your research to better understand your influencer marketing opportunities, target potential influencers, and lay the groundwork. A powerful influencer marketing campaign can help you thrive in your fourth quarter — and the year ahead.
There is no lack of opportunities for B2B marketers to seize as they close out 2017. The challenge is to narrow your focus and employ a handful of tactics effectively. Using quality content marketing and social media engagement while establishing roots for an influencer campaign can unite your efforts, making 2017 a decisive win for savvy B2B marketers.
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