You’ve probably heard the phrase “content is king.” Bill Gates made this proclamation in 1996, which still holds today. Content marketing generates 3x more leads than traditional marketing, costing 62% less. While developing and leveraging content is vital for any business, content marketing uniquely suits B2B businesses and the work required to clinch—and keep—long-term clients. A B2B content marketing strategy that engages your audience has the power to influence customer decision-making significantly. In fact, 52% of B2B buyers report being more likely to buy from a brand once they have read its content. 

Keep reading to learn more about B2B content marketing and how it can help you reach your B2B brand’s goals.

 

What is B2B content marketing?

At its core, B2B content marketing is a strategic approach to content production aimed at driving brand awareness, engaging with a specific audience, and capturing and maintaining quality customer leads to help increase sales.

B2B marketing addresses that your audience isn’t an individual who needs emotional swaying to make a purchase. B2B brands are typically more focused on courting decision-makers within larger teams who may be looking for solutions or services that impact business operations, long-term success, and an overall return on investment. 

Rather than an unwelcome cold call or hard sell, a B2B content marketing strategy meets your audience where they are with the information they need at that moment. It educates, informs, and invites your audience into relationships. It joins and expands the conversation around your industry and your niche, forging a deeper understanding of the pain points your brand ultimately aims to solve.

Examples of B2B content include:

• White papers
• Webinars and online courses
• Infographics and listicles
• Videos and podcasts
• Long- and short-form articles and blog posts
• Case studies
• Testimonials

With a focus on providing education and support along every stage of the buyer’s journey—from interest through consideration to conversion—a B2B content marketing strategy gives your audience what they need. 

 

What are the benefits of B2B content marketing?

Yes, producing and leveraging content takes time and resources. All good marketing does. But a comprehensive B2B content marketing strategy is good for business. 

B2B content marketing can help to:

• Build brand awareness. As your content spreads, so does the reputation of your brand. When your target audience looks for a solution to their pain points, they will see your brand as a source of advice and insight.
• Build trust. When your business provides consistent, authoritative, professional content, your audience begins to trust your brand.
• Invite prospective customers by providing content supporting each buying journey stage.
• Improve the quality of your leads. An educated audience knows more about their pain points—weeding out leads who are less likely to be a good fit for your product, service, or business model.
• Improve your online search visibility. As more users discover your content, search engines will validate it as a helpful resource and display your web pages higher in search results.
• Increase customer loyalty through valuable communication with current clients.
• Invigorate your social media engagement with a consistent source of quality content to promote across multiple platforms. 

What goes into a robust B2B content marketing plan?

Building a solid B2B content marketing plan involves grounding your business in achievable goals and knowing your audience and brand. 

First, you need extensive knowledge of your target audience’s pain points. What are the problems they face? What challenges hold their businesses back from meeting their goals or from growing?

Second, you must know your brand and what it does best. What does your business do better than any other business? How is your business uniquely positioned to ease the pain points of your target audience?

You should also consider mapping your potential buyer’s path to decision-making. Understanding this level of information about your customers will help you create the right kind of informational content to help customers decide more easily. 

Before potential customers can even care about your product, they need to know how to solve their problems and trust that your business can help them solve them. 

 

How to leverage your B2B content

A good B2B content marketing plan leverages your content to boost exposure and engagement through every channel your audience uses.

Ways to promote your B2B content include:

• Organic and paid social media
• Collaboration with influencers to increase content reach
• Email campaigns
• Newsletters
• Direct prospect outreach 

 

Get support with your B2B content marketing strategy

Content marketing is a critical tactic for B2B brands. If you’re stuck with developing a plan, one avenue for support is to check out your local SBDC or other small business training center. They frequently offer relevant training to help you break down concepts and map out the first few steps of developing a B2B content marketing strategy. 

If the idea of tackling it on your own is overwhelming and an in-house marketing team isn’t in your budget, finding a marketing partner to support your efforts is a faster route to getting out of the starting blocks and making progress toward your business goals. Agencies like ours make marketing easy, freeing you and your team to focus on what you do best. Reach out for a no-cost, no-obligation exploratory call today!