How Is Marketing Different In B2B Compared To B2C?

Forming a new business is all about marketing, marketing, marketing. Recent studies have shown that unsuccessful marketing initiatives is one of the three leading causes of systemic business failure.

In other words, if your new business isn’t coupled with an effective marketing strategy, then it is likely that it won’t hit the three year mark. That shouldn’t be too much of a surprise, either. To give an example, a child can set up a lemonade stall, but it isn’t going to do too well if it’s positioned in their back garden shed. As a business, it is your prerogative to set out your stall on the most prominent street you can find, with a clear “in” for the specific niche audience who will be walking past.

Speaking of that niche, it is also important that your marketing strategy works for the kind of company you are and the clientele that you want to draw in. A B2C organisation, for instance, is bound to have alternative marketing tactics compared to a B2B company. This is because B2C have entirely different initiatives when it comes to who they are marketing to.

B2C Markets Directly To New Customers

When it comes to B2C, it is all about how you can make your next sale. It is important to pinpoint the largest customer pool and try to make a product that is based around them. Similarly, when marketing your company, you do not want to fit into a specific niche, but rather create a strategy that will cover a wide target audience.

This is done most prominently through social media campaigns and engaging content which can speak to customers on a human level. With 3.2 billion people using social media platforms worldwide, this is the largest potential customer pool to extract a wide and expansive amount of new clientell (hence why it is such a popular marketing tool for B2C). In essence, a B2C organisation is attempting to convince multiple people to buy. A B2B organisation, however, is only attempting to convince one.

B2B Is About The Individual Business

B2B differs compared to B2C as a single client has far more weight and meaning than a single B2C client. If you manage to secure a business investment, then that can provide a large amount of income which will be damaging to let go of. In this way, a lot of the marketing has to be directed at the existing customer in order to retain their loyalty.

This is done through a range of B2B marketing channels, but perhaps the most efficient comes in the form of loyalty programs. If a client promises to remain loyal, then they will be equally rewarded by the business they are dealing with. This, in turn, is a marketing strategy in itself, as loyalty programs lead to visibility of existing customers, which is highly beneficial when attracting new clientele and encouraging them to engage.

Be Confident In Your Own Market

If you are a B2C or B2B company, then it is important that you are aware of your own market and do the research into how to position yourself. If you are B2C, what is your target audience and how can you make the net as wide as possible? How do you attain new customers and gain more footfall? If you are B2B, what specific businesses need your service? How can you retain those businesses and ensure their loyalty over the next few years?

In order to be successful and break through that initial teething period of business, then you have to ask these questions and plan your marketing strategy accordingly.