An interesting blog on the Sandberg|Trygg weblog about B2B marketing and social media. Don’t just think about social media as a way to spread your message. Use them to hear what your customers want to buy.
Most B2B sales differ a lot from how B2C works. More people are involved and ordering procedures are more complicated and often take much longer than they do in B2C. Therefore social media should not be used for spreading your message but rather to monitor and listen to what your customers have to say.
Make full use of the possiblities
I think Sandberg|Trygg is wrong when they say you should use social media in a passive way and mainly to follow the debate in blogs and forums. Also in B2B you can actively make full use of the possiblities social media has to offer.
Of course you should not use social media to produce a (miniature) copy of your website. Use the social media for the activities they are designed for. And that is mainly to communicate with your customers.
A few ideas
Just a few ideas for social media contents:
- invitations for seminars or fairs
- alerts for new software or product versions
- information about your employees (introducing new employees, people that move to other positions within you company, people to contact etc.)
- special sales actions
- the release of new sales brochures
- information about recent applications of your products
- input from customers that are crazy about your products (and are willing to help you promote your products)
And you may think of a lot more ideas for your social media sites.
Take the lead
Some of these activities also are possible on your website, but the social media turns information into a conversation and encourages your customers to react and provide feedback. That way you hear what your customers think of you and your company. But you are now playing the leading role.
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