For decades, manufacturers have been staying within the circles of their existing relationships. Typically, these manufacturers developed products, trained their sales staff, and then sent those staff members out to directly connect with potential customers in their offices, at trade shows, and other such places.
While this type of sales-only relationship with business partners worked well in the past, the present scenario has dramatically changed. Today, in this highly competitive landscape, even manufacturers are not off the hook for marketing.
B2B marketing for manufacturers has become an indispensable tool to stand out. With 94% of B2B buyers conducting extensive online research on various B2B manufacturing companies, it has become crucial to leverage different digital platforms. Robust B2B marketing strategies can help you reach out to informed customers who are looking for a solution. Besides, it also helps to build a rapport with the audience and establish brand credibility.
Here, we will look at the top 5 B2B marketing strategies for manufacturers that can help them stand out and grow their business.
5 B2B Marketing Strategies for Manufacturers
1. Publishing High-Quality Content
Publishing high-quality, informative, and relevant content is a crucial marketing strategy. As a manufacturer, you need to inform the prospective audience about your products/ services and add value to them. And this is only possible if you consistently publish content on your website.
Moving on, broadcasting quality content has the following benefits:
- Boosts SEO for manufacturers, enabling them to show up when their prospective clients search online
- Positions you as a trusted leader in the industry and increases your brand credibility
- Helps to push people further down the sales funnel. For instance, someone who is in the awareness stage may get the required information that pushes them to the consideration stage.
Make sure to offer content in different formats, including blogs, videos, whitepapers, case studies, infographics, etc. This will help you satisfy the needs of all types of customers.
2. Driving Awareness with Email Marketing
Email marketing is one of the most effective and cost-friendly strategies to drive awareness among your potential customers. Email marketing newsletters, packed with valuable information about your product/service, industry news, announcements, etc., let you capture interested leads and gradually nurture them. Simply showing up in the inbox of your potential customers will keep you fresh in their minds.
Email is also excellent for marketing automation. You can develop drip marketing campaigns to propel a sequence of emails to prospective clients whenever they take an action on your site. For instance, if a person fills out a form on your website, marketing automation can be leveraged to follow up with personalized and related emails. This is an effective way to exploit the worth of every single contact that your B2B marketing strategy generates.
3. Investing in B2B Advertising
Securing the top ranks on SERPs via SEO is a long and drawn-out process. It requires a long-term commitment to content, patience, and also a little bit of luck. And for this reason, investing in B2B advertising options such as Google and PPC ads becomes indispensable for effective manufacturing marketing.
These ads present a great way to target potential customers. The distinguishing factor between organic vs. paid search is that the latter lets you jump the line and appear right at the top of SERPs without having to dedicated time to SEO. But to ensure the effectiveness of your paid marketing campaigns, you need to provide relevant ads. You can conduct extensive research on your target audience to identify the keywords your prospects are using to search online.
4. Testing Different Elements of Website
It does not matter how awesome and useful your website content is if the site offers a poor user experience. If you cannot deliver a smooth and seamless site experience, your potential users will certainly doubt your ability to provide quality products or services.
So, once your site is ready, make sure to test all the elements. For instance, ensure that:
- All buttons, links, and other features on your website work as planned. Try them out on multiple devices and in different browsers.
- The pages load quickly. A slow-loading page is one of the greatest reasons for a high bounce rate.
- The website is mobile-friendly. As per guidelines by Google, websites that are not responsive on mobiles may get buried or even delisted from the search engine results. Additionally, in this mobile-first world, having a mobile-friendly website is crucial to boost engagement.
5. Integrating Social Media
Today, social media channels such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc. have become powerful platforms for B2B marketing. These channels have evolved from being supporting channels of information to being primary sources for increasing brand awareness and customer loyalty.
Nowadays, a vast majority of business purchase professionals leverage social media to gather reviews and cultural cues that help them decide if your manufacturing company is a good fit. As per a survey, almost 60% of buyers check out service providers on social media to understand more about the company. So make sure that your manufacturing company invests in social media marketing to reach out to a wider audience.
Conclusion
To grow and expand your manufacturing business, you need a strong B2B marketing strategy built around your buyer’s needs, intents, and habits. At StratMg, we have years of experience with B2B marketing. Our expert marketing professionals with proven track records can help you tap into the emerging trends in B2B marketing and build credibility and authority for your business.
