The average B2B buyer consumes at least five pieces of content before talking to a salesperson and generally engages with marketing content at least six months before making a purchase. Increasingly, with marketing resources (and reviews) so easy to access, prospects are taking it upon themselves to undertake the purchasing legwork before talking with a sales representative. Consequently, much of the decision-making process is out of a brands’ hands and the ability to impact the buyer journey is substantially decreasing.
How can marketing help progress opportunities to get buyers ready to talk to sellers? How can content, or the way it is disseminated, become more compelling and shorten the timespan between customer research and sales conversation and conversion? It’s no secret that automation is enabling brands to share content and frame how prospects approach an upcoming purchase. Your aim should be to extract maximum value from automated lead nurturing to drive deeper engagement and a quicker sales cycle.
While most customers aren’t ready to buy on first seeing a product (love at first sight doesn’t exist in B2B marketing), buyers still tend to lean towards companies they know and trust so that when they are ready to buy a product, they have no doubts as to the vendor/manufacturer supplying it. B2B relationship fatigue is unlikely as loyalty is usually strong. A study by Marketing Sherpa found that 85% of buyers said they like to receive monthly emails from companies they do business with. The rationale is that during the decision-gathering and decision-making phases, it’s helpful to have brand reminders that enable us to look take a deeper look at the products and companies under consideration.
This funnel will not be news to any of you. It’s the usual process, but it is one that marketers can have an impact on.
The positive element of the buyer being in the driving seat is that they are savvy, clued up and decisive when they finally become ready to buy. The modern buyer is confident in their research and, generally, wastes little time in finalising the purchase. However, lead nurturing is a vital cog in the B2B buying process as regular, targeted, and informative points of contact can tip the balance in your favour. Savvy buyers are motivated by quality, value, and substance, which makes them more likely to purchase when you provide them with carefully curated, personalised offerings that meet their requirements.
Lead Nurturing Campaign Basics
Keep it regular: send targeted, carefully curated emails once or twice a month. Don’t pester people, it will backfire on you!
Segment: ensure all content is personalised and relevant
Mix it up with multi-touch marketing: employing MTM to share your content on various different types of media and via various means you’ll act in a customer-centric way.
Automate: careful timing of content distribution can make a big difference to clicks, opens and actions
Clever use of compelling and continuous communications develops strong customer relationships. Combine this with well-planned lead nurturing strategies increases engagement and builds pipeline.
Every relationship starts with trust. Nurturing allows brands to develop that trust and, consequently, enjoy better conversions and customer relationships on a long-term basis. Multi-touch marketing is your key to successful nurturing. MTM allows you to target your audience with consistent, layered brand messaging across a range of platforms and touch points. Automating such customisable multi-touch campaigns gives a customer-centric approach and clever use of compelling and continuous communications develops strong customer relationships. MTM also gives your audience the ability to access your content on their terms. Furthermore, it enables you to nurture prospects based on preferences and previous behaviours, delivering personalised, relevant messaging.
Maximise the exposure of your campaign messaging
ONBOARD: Build the right target audience through accurate segmentation to achieve personalisation and prevent over-messaging.
ENGAGE: Use a blend of awareness and engagement communications to maximise campaign messaging.
NURTURE: Nurture your prospects with personalised, targeted follow-up emails. Be customer centric.
MEASURE: Real-time, automated analysis and monitoring allows you to adapt and react to campaign trends and interactions.
CPB UK is one of the most successful telemarketing agencies in the UK with the richest IT contact data. Our sole focus is using this data, combined with expert multi-touch marketing techniques, to build your sales pipeline. Don’t give up on summer marketing, work with CPB to develop a nurturing multi-touch marketing strategy that will make hitting targets a breeze.
