Is marketing automation suitable for B2B businesses (that’s businesses that sell to other businesses)?
Short answer: Absolutely!
B2B marketing automation can be very powerful, particularly for objectives like growing contact lists, converting leads and increasing their sales.
“But how?” I hear you ask…
Well, here are three ways you can use marketing automation in your B2B business.
B2B Marketing Automation for Nurturing Leads
You can activate automations from the early moments of contact. Often, this begins with a ‘Welcome’ email.
To nurture leads effectively, follow up the ‘Welcome’ email with a series of nurturing emails. The email series should guide prospects along to a point where they’re ready to buy. And you won’t have to do a thing…
Well, almost.
There will be things to map out and set up. But once done, all you’ll need to do is track and optimise the campaigns. The work needed to send each email can all be handled by the automation software you use.
In the early stages of the series, it’s best practice to stay clear of direct sales messages. Instead, focus on explaining who you are, your story and why you are the best at what you do.
There’s no written rule about the duration of a successful nurturing email series. That depends on your industry and the level of commitment required by the buyer. And commitments come in the form of not just money but time and effort, too.
You can also use marketing automation to re-engage leads that have gone cold. Through automated email marketing, you can use client insights to create targeted campaigns.
For example, you might choose to target contacts that you know haven’t opened an email for 6 months. Try re-engaging them with one of these subject lines:
“John, we miss you”
…or “Janet, please come back to us” for the more desperate approach.
Increasing Conversions in Your Sales Pipeline
So now we’ve covered nurturing leads, how can we use automation to optimise conversion rate?
The ability to be more targeted is a key benefit of marketing automation for B2B businesses. The time of overloading clients with irrelevant messages is over. And one popular way of targeting is through automated live chat software.
Through live chat, you can pop up at the exact time clients are browsing your website. It’s the perfect time to interrupt their browsing session and move the buying process along.
You may want to ask if you can answer any questions about their experience, the same way shop assistants sometimes do in clothing shops. Done correctly, this will help you decrease website bounce rates and increase conversions. Remember to tailor your message to the knowledge you have available. You can craft a message based on the page they’re on, how they’ve found you or the amount of time they’ve been on the page.
You can also create marketing automations based on user behaviour. For example, you can target contacts that you know have engaged with a certain area of your business. This might be insight gathered from a monthly newsletter you send out. And because you know what their areas of interest are, you can tailor the message you deliver to them
You can use marketing automation to nudge almost-ready purchasers across the finish line. One way would be by sharing some social-proof-boosting client testimonials. You could do this in an automated email nurturing campaign. And you can tailor the content to your audience.
Imagine you’re a digital marketing agency and your contact is in the automotive industry. For greater success, you could tailor the testimonials to an existing automotive client. This may prove more successful than a testimonial from an unrelated industry.
B2B Marketing Automation for Client Support
Delivering a positive client experience is key.
And we can use marketing automation to enhance this experience and keep it consistent.
Too often, B2B marketing objectives focus only on boosting sales. But there are other key areas you can focus on too, such as building up your client reviews on review websites.
Gathering client feedback has always been a great way of improving the way you do things. And you can automate your review invites to land in inboxes at specific moments.
The time at which you invite clients to leave a review will differ from business to business. So give your clients enough time to start using and enjoying your products or services!
Another great way of engaging clients is through new product or service updates. Again, you can be super targeted with these campaigns. If a client is already using a similar product or service, they could be the ideal audience to target.
And you can do it all in an automated way!
Want to find out more?
So, you’re now equipped with some tactics you can use right now. If you’d like a more in-depth view of what marketing automation can do for your B2B business, please get in touch.