When the home is now the office and the office (and home school!) is in the kitchen, B2B marketers need to be able to cut through an awful lot of noise. The Covid-19 pandemic has touched all areas of our lives. Tried and tested B2B marketing tactics and techniques may need a new angle if they are going to stand out. Here are some considerations for how to adapt your B2B marketing strategy for a pandemic and beyond.
Consider niche acquisition campaigns
There’s nothing like a pandemic to shake up everyone’s plans. It’s no secret that whilst some businesses have sadly been destroyed, others have flourished. Keeping the sales funnel topped up with new leads is always going to be a major part of your marketing strategy. But how you do this may need to change with the after-effects of Covid.
Acquiring new customers can be costly if not managed correctly, even more so if your budget has been reduced due to the pandemic. Whether your budget is high or low, if you’re branching out into new markets or targeting new personas then start small with a highly focused list of targets. It’s worth consulting B2B data experts like us, as we can support you with helpful information such as the number of people that match your target criteria. This will help you with planning your campaign budget and channels. Focusing on a well-researched niche with high-quality data can yield better results and help you learn valuable lessons to optimise future campaigns.
Don’t neglect existing gold in your database
As well as attracting new life into your database, it’s also worth thinking about how you can adapt and make the most of the leads you already have in your CRM. This time is a great opportunity for reinvigorating and revisiting existing contacts to clean up your database and ‘minesweep’ any missed opportunities. Getting a balance between acquisition and retention is important. The pandemic has shown us just how important customer loyalty can be.
Many CRM’s are full of ‘cooler’ leads that either weren’t a good fit, or they weren’t ready to buy at the time. Refreshing these leads is always a potential source of new business. You’ll also have previous customers’ details in your CRM. But before you start executing your marketing strategy with these less recent contacts, it’s advisable to run a database cleanse to make sure you’re not spending precious time and money marketing to dud data. With our database cleansing services, we can detect spelling errors, missing or incomplete details. We can even identify obsolete and illegal data so that when you’re ready to run your campaign, your data is in tip-top form.
Create flexible content
With markets still adjusting to new buyer behaviours, it’s sensible to have an agile and flexible approach to any marketing campaigns you plan. You should also be ready and able to adapt and change course based on your successes or learnings. Now is not the best time to be splashing out on big, long term fixed plans, as none of us knows what’s around the corner. Think about planning smaller, more focused campaigns into your strategy that build on a theme. They should also be delivered via different methods or channels that can be evolved or expanded over time.
One tactic that seems to be working well in B2B marketing right now is displaying empathy and humanity. The boundary between our personal and professional lives is more blurred than ever. As we’re wired for survival, anything that makes us feel safe, secure and like we belong is bound to do well. A simple touch to better engage with a contact is to use personalisation in your email campaigns. Personalisation increases open and click-through rates, which are both important KPI’s that influence the success of your strategy.
There is no doubt that these times continue to be challenging. With that, though, also comes the potential for opportunity, if we can remain open to it. This means we can plan and execute a strategy that is in alignment with shorter-term, more focused goals.
For more insight into B2B marketing strategy you may also find the following blogs helpful:
3 tips to keep your B2B marketing strategy on track
The importance of strategy in a B2B marketing campaign
