It’s taken a while, but the business-to-business community is finally jumping onto the social media bandwagon. Many companies plan to increase both their time devoted to social networking and the money they invest in it during the coming year, recognizing the importance of connecting with potential clients and business partners on these platforms.
An effective B2B social media marketing strategy is very different than the ones employed by business-to-consumer companies. Instead of trying to reach a mass audience, these businesses want to connect with a very targeted one. Here are five steps that every B2B company trying to implement a social media marketing strategy should take.
1. Put One Person in Charge
Many B2B companies are also small businesses, and one of the biggest mistakes they make is not putting one person in charge of their social media strategy. Instead, they spread the tasks around so that everyone takes part. It’s best to have a consistent voice and regular posting schedule, however, and you can only achieve that by having one person oversee the effort. Keep others involved but not in charge.
2. Find the Right Outlet
Pinterest is a wonderful site for reaching out to bakers, fitness fanatics and people obsessed with random quotes, but when you’re trying to reach other businesses, it may not be the ideal site to focus on. Instead, you may want to push your efforts toward LinkedIn, which has a huge base of business users and is a great place to connect with people in your industry.
You can still use Pinterest, of course, but make sure that you’re emphasizing the social networks that will give you the greatest return on investment. Investigate specialized social media sites that might be focused on your industry, as well.
3. Set Up a YouTube Account
If you don’t already have one, set up a YouTube account so that you can have a single place to store all your videos, which you’ll want to promote across social media. Video is an especially good tool for B2B companies because it allows you to get into the technical aspects of your business without having to go into long explanations. Instead, you can just show it on the video. When you post video on your social media sites, link to your YouTube page and you may entice people to stick around and watch more videos after they’ve finished the first.
4. Make More Than One Twitter Feed
Some B2B companies have a wide focus and target lots of different business segments with their wares. If that’s the case for your company, consider establishing more than one Twitter account. That way you’ll keep the different streams relative to a smaller audience and boost the chance that people are really reading what you put out there, because it’s more relevant to them.
5. Humanize Your Company
Just because you’re not a direct-to-consumer company doesn’t mean you can’t have a little personality. After all, the businesses you want to buy your products are all run by people, and you’re all human. B2B companies could use a little loosening up when it comes to social media. Have a reasonable amount of fun and enjoy making connections. That will increase your business exponentially.
