A Short Guide to Smart B2B Marketing Launches

The good news about B2B marketing is its ultimate practical nature. To misquote Chaucer, “Value will out.” In the majority of cases, business-to-business purchasing is driven by practical considerations including but not limited to:

-Clear and understandable value your offering brings to the buyer

-Timing, as B2B purchases are typically made only when needed (sometimes later!)

-Reputation, because business purchasing decision-makers are often risk averse

-The right price, because the bottom line matters and competition, both direct and indirect, can be fierce; but remember, the lowest price on the market may connote “cheap” so play your cards right

-Problem-solving and pain reduction, because business is nearly always tough and your offering should make it easier

The other good news about B2B marketing launches is that, if you do your homework, you can pretty nicely identify and target your prospective buyers.

-Decide if you have one or multiple vertical markets to reach (schools, hospitals and hotels or just one of these)?

-Determine who is likely to make and to influence the buying decision.

-Research the way these people, as a group or singly, like to get their information (websites, trade shows, social media, video, print or online media, word-of-mouth, search engines, inbound marketing)?

-Remember that delivering your message via multiple methods and media will generally give you stronger results than the Monomaniac Approach of one form of outreach forever.

Once you’ve done some homework and you have your B2B product or offering ready to go, leverage your knowledge and tell your story.

-If your offering is “news” (and a new product or service of value typically is news), treat it as such, with media outreach, video how-tos, social media, trade show exhibition, eblasts, advertising, and lots more.

-Follow up with ongoing “drip” marketing, telling stories, creating case studies, continuing to advertise, and offering advice of value.

-Remember that when you are sick and tired of deluging the market with the same old messages, your prospects may just be beginning to notice them.

-Do you have a high-value offering and key prospects? Consider conversion marketing, in which you reach out to these same people multiple times, in a range of different ways.

-Can you become the expert in the solution you are offering? We may be getting tired of hearing the term “thought leadership,” but it still matters. Offering counsel, expertise and value through presentations at trade shows or conferences, writing white papers, blogging, and publishing articles makes your expertise, and if properly done, your offering top-of-mind.

-Learn as you go. You may later realize that the benefit you ranked as third in importance when you launched turns out to be #1. Revise and leverage. You may find out that schools really want the product you thought was ideal for hospitals. You may discover that your best customers buy one or two right away, and that the biggest prospects take two years to get you a purchase order. Smart B2B marketers are ready and able to adapt to realities and changes in plans.

-Repeat. Keep improving your offering, your messaging, your targeting, and your sales. Once you have the hang of this, you’ll want to keep at it.

What a career!

It's the dog days of summer, but there will be no lolling about here.

van Schouwen Associates has a career opportunity available... for the right person. We want a strategic communications professional to join our writing and PR team. WELL, you may say, that should be an easy position to fill.

Nope. In fact, looking for the right person to fill this job opening gives the existing vSA team a new appreciation for what we do every day. And it gives me a new appreciation for the team we have. The job opportunity requires a person who can:

-Face undaunted the task of QUICKLY learning to communicate intelligently about client specialties that may range from geothermal engineering to patented building supplies, aerospace quality management to investment planning for the wealthy.

-Write like Ernest Hemingway about said topics.

-Edit like... oh, I don't know, A.M. Rosenthal?... about said topics.

-For media relations initiatives, pitch to diverse, extremely busy editors, employing a keen understanding of what each editor, each venue and each readership needs right now.

-Switch between topics, disciplines and client needs at a moment's notice. And again. And...

-Genuinely enjoy working with clients who are smart, busy, facing pressures and deadlines of their own, and who trust vSA to create and implement strategic marketing programs that perform... programs that perform extremely well, no matter what the climate.

-Come up with great program ideas and innovations for clients.

-Work social media in B2B, financial services and other wilderness expanses.

-Work with the rest of us.*

Are you the one? Do you know the one? Be in touch...

*We're fun. Naturally.