Introduction
B2B marketing is more important than ever for long-term business growth. As companies navigate a digital world, B2B marketing needs to adapt to the challenges and opportunities of 2024.
Unlike B2C marketing or social media advertising, which is all about direct consumer engagement, B2B marketing is about building relationships and long-term partnerships with other businesses.
This means a deeper understanding of the target audience, more refined strategies, effective marketing and the integration of more technology to stay ahead.
This article will give you actionable insights into the best B2B marketing strategies for 2024. By looking at the latest trends, new approaches, and proven tactics, businesses can refine their marketing to achieve more in the business-to-business space.
Whether you want to improve your content marketing, leverage marketing automation or implement Account-Based Marketing (ABM), this guide will give you the knowledge to take your B2B marketing to the next level.
What is a B2B Marketing Strategy?
A B2B marketing strategy is a broad plan to help businesses market their products or services to other companies, not individual consumers. Unlike B2C (business-to-consumer) marketing, which focuses on appealing to the emotional needs and desires of individual customers, B2B marketing is all about logical decision-making and long-term relationships.
The goal is to build solid and lasting partnerships that drive mutual growth.
A B2B marketing strategy has several key components:
- Understanding the Target Audience: Knowing who your business customers are is vital. This means identifying your target companies’ specific pain points, needs and goals. By understanding these, you can tailor your messaging and offerings to the unique needs of your audience.
- Relationship Building: In B2B marketing, building and nurturing relationships is crucial. This goes beyond just closing a sale; it’s about building trust, demonstrating value over time, and becoming a trusted partner. Long-term partnerships lead to repeat business and referrals, which are gold in the B2B space.
- Content Marketing: Providing valuable content is another essential part of a B2B marketing strategy. Businesses need to educate and inform their potential customers through well-researched articles, whitepapers, case studies, and more. Content that addresses specific industry challenges and provides solutions helps establish authority and trust.
- Digital Presence and Technology: In the digital age, a strong online presence is non-negotiable. B2B businesses need to use digital marketing channels, from search engines to social media, to reach and engage with their target audience. Integrating technology like AI and marketing automation can streamline processes and improve marketing efficiency.
- Data-Driven Decision Making: Lastly, using data to drive decisions is critical. Analytics and data collection tools allow businesses to measure the effectiveness of their marketing, understand customer behaviour and adjust their approach to maximise ROI.
At the heart of B2B marketing is creating value and building relationships with other businesses. By understanding your target audience, providing relevant content, and using technology to amplify your marketing, you can develop a B2B marketing strategy that meets your goals and sets you up for long-term success.
B2B Marketing Examples: Case Studies & Success Stories
B2B marketing through storytelling and Account-Based Marketing (ABM) is a winning formula for engaging and converting high-value accounts into business buyers. Below are case studies of companies that have used these strategies to achieve significant business outcomes.
This section will look at real-life examples from the House of xGrowth and other general industry examples documented in the public domain. Let’s get into it.
1. OutSystems: Into the Financial Sector
Objective
OutSystems, a low-code software company, wanted to get into the financial sector in the Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) region, targeting Tier 2 banks and insurance companies.
The challenge was introducing their low-code solutions to an industry that is slow to change due to regulatory and security concerns.
Strategy and Execution
ABM Approach: This was OutSystems’ first ABM campaign in the ANZ region. They partnered with xGrowth to design and execute a targeted campaign. The strategy was to create personalised content that educated the target accounts about low-code and its benefits, specifically tailored to financial institutions’ needs and pain points.
Educational Content: The campaign included webinars, whitepapers and case studies that showed how low-code could accelerate digital transformation in the financial sector, addressing common concerns like security and compliance.
Results
Engagement: The campaign exceeded expectations with 24 meetings from the 100 target accounts.
Pipeline Growth: Within the first four weeks, the campaign generated a pipeline of $1.2 million, proving that a well-targeted ABM campaign can engage new prospects and drive business growth.
2. Dienst: Remote Work Solutions
Objective
Dienst, a remote work company, wanted to enter the Western and South Australia region. The goal was to acquire new accounts and grow existing ones.
Strategy and Execution
ABM and Relationship Building: The campaign focused on growing existing clients to increase their wallet share and targeting new prospects with personalised outreach.
Localised Messaging: Dienst used a localised approach that addressed the specific challenges and opportunities of remote work in those regions, ensuring that the content would resonate with the target audience.
Results
Market Entry: The ABM approach got Dienst into new markets.
Client Retention and Growth: The campaign acquired new clients and increased the number of existing ones, proving the power of targeted marketing.
3. Secure Code Warrior: Full ABM Rollout
Objective
Secure Code Warrior, a cybersecurity company, wanted a full ABM rollout to engage with key accounts across the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region.
Strategy and Execution
Cross-Departmental collaboration: xGrowth worked with Secure Code Warrior’s marketing, sales and customer success teams to roll out a single ABM strategy. This ensured all departments were aligned and messaging was consistent across all customer touchpoints.
Targeted Content: The ABM campaign delivered content to each target account, focusing on the cybersecurity challenges they faced and how Secure Code Warrior could solve them.
Results
Market Presence: The complete ABM strategy got Secure Code Warrior into the APAC market.
Engagement: The campaign engaged with crucial accounts, strengthening relationships and long-term partnerships.
4. Feedzai: Financial Sector Security
Objective
Feedzai, a fraud prevention company, wanted to acquire new clients in the financial sector across ANZ, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia and India.
Strategy and Execution
Targeted: The campaign targeted Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs), fraud specialists and security teams within Tier 1 financial institutions. It personalised outreach and content that spoke to the specific security needs of these organisations.
Brand Awareness: Feedzai used a mix of educational content and direct engagement to build brand awareness and trust with potential clients.
Results
High Penetration: The campaign reached 82% of the target accounts and got 15 high-value meetings.
Brand Positioning: Feedzai got strong brand penetration in the target markets, proving a targeted ABM can reach and influence decision makers in the financial sector.
5. Convoso: Multi-Tier ABM
Strategy and Execution
Multi-Tier ABM Program: Convoso ran a full ABM program for 12 months, which included Programmatic, Scale and Strategic ABM. This multi-tier approach allowed Convoso to engage with various accounts through broad outreach and highly personalised interactions.
Omnichannel: The campaign used an omnichannel approach, using digital ads, direct mail, and personalised content to reach and engage with target accounts.
Results
Full ABM Rollout: Convoso got into full ABM mode, engaging target accounts across all tiers.
Account Engagement: The structured ABM approach helped Convoso gain deeper insight into key accounts, positioning it as a trusted partner in the contact centre space.
6. Adobe’s “Click Baby Click” Campaign
Objective
Adobe wanted to educate on the importance of data analytics in digital marketing.
Strategy and Execution
Humour and Relatability: Adobe’s “Click Baby Click” campaign used humour to show a scenario in which a baby’s accidental taps on a tablet caused a massive spike in online orders. The humour highlighted the chaos without analytics and the importance of Adobe’s analytics tools.
Clear and Memorable Messaging: The campaign’s relatable scenario and clear messaging got the point across.
Results
Brand Awareness: The campaign got attention and reinforced the importance of data-driven decision-making and Adobe’s brand.
Positive Brand Association: The humour created a positive association with Adobe’s analytics tools, making the campaign memorable and impactful.
8. Zendesk’s Diversity and Inclusion Story
Objective
Zendesk wanted to showcase its commitment to diversity and inclusion and connect with its audience beyond its products.
Strategy and Execution
Values-Driven Narrative: Zendesk’s storytelling revolved around its commitment to diversity and inclusion, as highlighted in the “About Us” section of its website. It chose to address social issues that resonate with its audience rather than product-centric messaging.
Emotional Engagement: By showcasing their values, Zendesk created an emotional connection with their audience, loyalty, and trust.
Results
Deeper Audience Connection: The campaign helped Zendesk connect with their audience on a deeper emotional level, brand loyalty.
Positive Brand Image: By focusing on social values, Zendesk strengthened its brand image as a company that gets industry imbalances.
9. Lockheed Martin’s “Field Trip to Mars”
Objective
Lockheed Martin wanted to show off their technology and inspire future engineers through a campaign.
Strategy and Execution:
Virtual Reality Experience: Lockheed Martin’s “Field Trip to Mars” campaign involved a bus with VR displays that simulated a trip to Mars. The campaign targeted students, captured their reactions during the trip, and shared those in a short film.
Immersive Storytelling: The campaign used immersive storytelling to engage students and showcase Lockheed Martin’s technology in a fun and interactive way.
Results
Global Reach: The campaign won awards and reached a global audience, showing Lockheed Martin’s innovation and inspiring future engineers.
Long-Term Impact: By using the latest technology, Lockheed Martin not only showcased its capabilities but also aligned with its long-term goals of innovation and talent development.
B2B Marketing in 2024
The examples and case studies serve as a good launch pad to fly into this section.
Here, we will look at strategic elements that must be introduced in every company’s B2B marketing strategy in 2024. The examples shared above should have given you some sense of these strategic elements, but it’s time to consolidate them.
AI and Automation
AI and automation are now essential in B2B marketing rather than just optional. These technologies are changing how companies operate by enabling more targeted, more efficient and more insight into customer behaviour.
Predictive Analytics and AI-Driven Insights: AI is more than just automation; it’s intelligence. Predictive analytics powered by AI allows marketers to forecast trends, identify potential leads, and optimise their campaigns with a level of precision that was previously impossible. For example, AI can analyse vast amounts of data to predict which leads are most likely to convert so sales teams can focus on where it matters most.
Marketing Automation: Automation tools take care of repetitive tasks like email marketing, social media posting, and lead nurturing. By automating these tasks, your marketing team can focus on strategy and creativity and ensure your marketing is efficient and effective. Plus, AI-driven lead scoring can prioritise leads based on their likelihood to convert and supercharge your sales team.
Personalisation with Data
B2B buyers are looking for content and experiences directly relevant to them and their specific needs and challenges, so personalisation is the key to engagement and conversion.
Data-Driven Personalisation: By using data and AI insights, businesses can create highly personal experiences for individual buyers. This might mean email campaigns that address specific pain points or content that speaks directly to the challenges of different buyer personas.
Account-Based Marketing (ABM): ABM is gaining traction as a key strategy in B2B marketing. By focusing on high-value accounts and delivering highly personal campaigns, businesses can build stronger relationships with their most important customers. The key to ABM is collaboration across sales, marketing, and customer success teams to ensure a consistent approach across all touchpoints.
Engaging Audiences with Video and Interactive Content
As attention spans continue to shrink, video content is becoming increasingly important in capturing and holding attention. In 2024, it’s not just about producing videos—it’s about making them interactive and engaging.
Webinars and Live Streaming: Webinars have been a mainstay of B2B marketing for years, a way to share expertise and engage with audiences. Live streaming takes this to the next level by allowing businesses to interact with their audience, answer questions, and provide immediate value in a more personalised, truly live channel. This real-time engagement builds trust and credibility, making it easier to convert prospects into customers.
Interactive Content: Beyond video, interactive content like quizzes, calculators, and infographics can really boost user engagement. These formats ask for participation, making the content experience more dynamic and memorable. For B2B marketers, interactive content is particularly good at conveying complex information in an easy-to-understand and engaging way. Virtual and augmented reality are two more powerful tools for generating experiences that tempt customers and prospective buyers to engage in a meaningful fashion.
Reaching Wider with Omnichannel and Multichannel Strategies
Ensuring seamless and consistent customer and prospect interactions throughout the sales life cycle is crucial to maintaining a strong brand presence.
Omnichannel Marketing: An omnichannel strategy combines all customer touchpoints into one experience, so your messaging is consistent regardless of platform. Whether a prospect engages with your brand via email, on social media channels, or in person, the experience should be unified and aligned with your overall marketing goals. Consistency is critical to navigating the complex B2B sales cycle and maintaining a solid brand identity.
Platform-Specific Content: Different social media platforms serve different purposes in a B2B marketing strategy. LinkedIn is great for thought leadership content, and YouTube and TikTok are great for short, snappy videos that show your brand’s personality. Tailoring your content to the strengths of each platform means you can reach your audience in the best way possible.
Trust Through Influencer Marketing and Community
Trust is at the heart of B2B relationships. Businesses are using influencer marketing and community building to build and maintain that trust.
B2B Influencer Marketing: Working with industry thought leaders and micro-influencers can really boost your brand’s credibility and reach. Influencers have a loyal following that trusts their recommendations, making them powerful partners in your marketing.
Community Building: Creating and nurturing online communities around your brand can deepen customer relationships. These communities provide a platform for peer-to-peer support, customer feedback, and brand advocacy, which can strengthen customer loyalty and provide valuable insights for your business.
B2B Marketing Tactics vs B2B Marketing Strategies
Alright, we are now in tricky territory. So far, we have discussed examples and strategic elements that you need to incorporate into your overall B2B marketing strategies. A lot of times, our customers ask us how the above strategic elements are different from tactics. This section clarifies that.
What is a B2B Marketing Strategy: The Foundation
A B2B marketing strategy is the overall plan that outlines how your business will achieve its marketing goals. It’s the roadmap that guides your decisions and actions so everything you do is aligned.
This strategy is about the “what” and “why”—what you want to achieve (like increasing market share or thought leadership) and why these goals are important for your business’s growth.
For example if your goal is to be seen as a leader in your industry your strategy might be to create high quality, informative content that addresses the pain points of your target audience. This strategic focus would then guide all your marketing activity so every action contributes to your overall business goals.
The elements that we have discussed in the above sections should be incorporated when you are creating your business marketing strategy to meet a specific goal.
What are B2B Marketing Tactics: The Execution
B2B marketing tactics are the specific actions and tools you use to execute your strategy. They are the “how”—how you will achieve the strategic objectives outlined in your marketing strategy. Tactics are more short-term and detailed and focus on specific activities like launching an email campaign, hosting a webinar or running a LinkedIn ad campaign.
For example, if your strategy is to increase brand awareness among mid-sized tech companies, your tactics might be:
- Content Marketing: Writing blog posts and creating videos addressing tech companies’ challenges.
- Social Media Marketing: Sharing this content on LinkedIn and Threads to reach decision-makers in your target audience.
- Email Marketing involves sending targeted emails to prospects who have engaged with similar content and guiding them through the buyer’s journey.
While tactics are important for executing your strategy, they must also be flexible and responsive to changes in the market or customer behaviour. Review and adjust your tactics regularly based on performance data to ensure they are working.
How to Measure the Impact of B2B Marketing Strategies?
Now that you have your B2B marketing strategies and tactics in place, the next step is to ensure they are delivering the results you need. Measuring the effectiveness of your marketing isn’t just about tracking data; it’s about getting insights to refine and optimise your approach continually. Let’s look at how to measure the impact of your B2B marketing strategies and make data-driven decisions to drive your business forward.
Metrics to Track
This section lists the top 15 B2B metrics that you should be tracking. This is not an exhaustive list; if other metrics make more sense to your business, please feel free to track them in addition to the ones we have mentioned below.
Website Traffic
Tracking website traffic gives you insight into how well your digital marketing is driving potential customers to your site. By knowing where your traffic is coming from and what website visitors are doing on your site, you can refine your digital strategy to meet their needs.
Social Media Engagement
Likes, shares, comments, etc, on any social media platform.
Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs)
MQLs are leads that have shown enough interest in your product or service to be ready for a deeper sales conversation. They’re an early-stage indicator of lead quality and help sales teams focus on prospects most likely to convert.
Sales Qualified Leads (SQLs)
SQLs are leads that have been vetted further and are now ready for direct engagement by the sales team. These leads have moved beyond the marketing funnel and are ready to close. Tracking SQLs alongside MQLs will help you gauge how well your marketing and sales are aligned.
Conversion Rate
Conversion rate is the percentage of visitors or leads who take a desired action, such as signing up for a demo or buying your product. Track this at multiple stages in the funnel, like MQL to SQL or demo to sale.
Lead to Customer Conversion Rate
This metric shows how well your leads convert into paying customers. It’s key to understanding the efficiency of your sales process and where prospects drop off. This ties closely to demo-to-close rate, which tracks how many product demos turn into actual sales.
Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)
CAC is the total cost of acquiring a new customer, calculated by dividing the total marketing and sales spend by the number of new customers acquired. Keeping CAC in check is crucial for maintaining profitability and growing efficiently.
Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR)
For subscription-based businesses, MRR is a key metric that measures predictable monthly income. This can be broken down further into New MRR (revenue from new customers) and Expansion MRR (additional revenue from existing customers upgrading or adding more users). Track MRR to monitor the overall health of the business.
Customer Lifetime Value
CLV is the total revenue a customer generates throughout their relationship with your company. Increasing CLV should be a top priority for businesses looking to maximise long-term profitability. Metrics like Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) and retention rate are often used alongside CLV to track revenue growth and customer loyalty.
Average Revenue Per User (ARPU)
ARPU is the average revenue generated per user over a certain time frame. It’s a key metric to understand revenue trends and is closely tied to Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) and overall profitability.
Pipeline Velocity
Pipeline velocity measures how fast leads are moving through your sales funnel. A faster pipeline velocity means a more efficient sales process. This metric will show you where prospects are getting stuck and allow you to make data-driven decisions to speed up the sales cycle.
Onboarding Completion Rate
Onboarding completion rate measures the percentage of new customers who complete the onboarding process. This is critical to ensure customer engagement early on and reduce early churn, especially for SaaS businesses.
Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)
CSAT measures how satisfied your customers are with your product or service. A high CSAT score is often associated with lower churn rates and higher retention. Track this metric to make sure you’re meeting customer expectations.
Churn Rate
The churn rate is the percentage of customers who stop using your service within a certain time frame. It’s a critical metric for SaaS businesses and subscription models, where reducing churn means steady revenue growth.
Reputation, Relationships, Revenue (Three Rs of ABM)
In Account-Based Marketing (ABM), these are the metrics of success. They measure how your brand is perceived, the strength of your relationships with key accounts and the revenue from those efforts.
These are important metrics but can also be KPIs depending on your business goals and strategy. For example, if reducing churn or increasing the MRR is a priority, then those metrics can be KPIs that drive your marketing and sales. We’ll see an example of this in the next section.
Analytics Tools
To measure these metrics, you need to use robust analytics tools that give you detailed insights into your marketing:
- Google Analytics: A must-have for tracking website traffic, user behaviour and conversions. Google Analytics will show how visitors interact with your site and where you can improve.
- Marketing Automation Platforms: Tools like HubSpot, Marketo, and Pardot automate marketing and offer analytics that track across multiple channels.
- Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Systems: CRMs like Salesforce or Zoho CRM allow you to track the entire customer journey from lead generation to conversion. Integrating your CRM with your marketing tools will give you a seamless flow of data and a complete view of your marketing impact.
- Social Media Analytics: Each social platform has analytics tools—LinkedIn Analytics and Twitter Analytics, for example—that will give you insights into audience engagement and content performance.
While all of the above are typically available at every small, medium, and enterprise-level company, it’s important to ensure your Martech stack is optimised and that you have a way to have a single view of your data.
Using Your Data to Optimise
Now that you have the data, the next step is to analyse it and refine your strategies. Here’s how to use your insights to optimise your B2B marketing:
- Identify Patterns and Trends: Look for patterns in your data that will tell you what’s working and what’s not. For example, if certain types of content consistently get higher engagement, then produce more of that content.
- A/B Testing: Use A/B testing to test different versions of your marketing campaigns. This will tell you which elements—headlines, images, calls to action—resonate with your audience.
- Refine Targeting: If your data shows that certain audience segments are responding better to your marketing, refine your targeting to focus more on those segments. This will ensure that your marketing budget is being spent more efficiently.
- Adjust Budgets and Resources: Reallocate your budget and resources to the most effective channels and tactics based on your ROI calculations. This will ensure you’re getting the most out of your marketing spend.
- Continuous Improvement: Marketing isn’t static; it’s an ongoing process of testing, learning, and adapting. Review your metrics regularly, gather feedback, and make data-driven decisions to keep your marketing on track and aligned with your business goals.
By focusing on these metrics and refining your approach, you’ll ensure that your B2B marketing is not only effective but also adaptable to 2024 and beyond.
Conclusion
It’s clear that success in this fast-changing landscape requires innovative thinking, strategic planning, and continuous optimisation. By using AI and automation, personalisation, video and interactive content, and a cohesive omnichannel presence, your business will be ahead of the competition and connected to your audience.
Remember, these are not just theories. They are practical steps that have been tested across many industries. Integrating each tactic into your overall strategy and aligning it with your business goals and target audience is vital.
At xGrowth, we know B2B marketing. We are a B2B tech marketing agency. We’ve helped many brands navigate these challenges and achieve great results by developing bespoke go-to-market and cross-selling strategies for B2B that connect with their audience and deliver tangible outcomes.
Whether you want to implement advanced ABM, optimise your content marketing, or refine your data-driven decision-making, our team is here to help.
Get in touch with xGrowth and get your Go-To-Market Strategy sorted out today.
