Companies looking to market their solutions in a B2B environment face unique challenges that differ from a B2C environment.
While B2C marketing focuses on quick solutions and fun content, B2B marketing focuses on building long-term relationships and proving the return on investment of your product to your business customers. To achieve this, B2B marketers need to work with different tools than B2C marketers.
In this post, we will discuss a set of tips that will help you hire the right talent to lead your company’s B2B marketing strategy.
Comparing B2B Marketing to B2C Marketing
Before we start discussing the skills required for a B2B marketer, it is important to understand the key differences between B2B and B2C marketing in order to hire the right talent for our business. It would be a clear mistake to simply look for a digital marketer for the position without asking if the candidate is B2B or B2C.
Messaging
B2C marketing typically uses short, simple messages that speak directly to the consumer’s emotions. B2B marketing, on the other hand, requires longer, more detailed and specific messages that appeal to people’s logic and industry knowledge.
Channels
B2C marketing primarily relies on advertising. These ads can be broadcast through channels such as television, radio, and print media for offline marketing, and through paid digital media such as Google Ads and Facebook Ads for online marketing. Unlike the consumer world, B2B marketing relies less on advertising and more on content in the form of blog posts, white papers, and videos. However, this does not mean that paid advertising should be excluded from your business-to-business marketing strategy. Paid advertising is a great way to start a conversation with potential B2B customers, for example, by getting users in your niche to click on a sponsored content article. However, advertising only plays a small role in the B2B marketing mix and is not enough to position your company as a trusted partner with whom you can build a long-term business relationship.
Content is king
Trust is the main concern when companies look for external solutions for their needs. And trust is primarily achieved by somehow demonstrating to potential customers that you are a leading expert in your field. This is the main reason why B2C strategies such as paid advertising don’t work well with B2B customers, as companies often don’t trust advertising when making strategic decisions.
Decision makers need to go through a meticulously crafted inbound marketing funnel before they feel ready to buy from another company. For example, if a CTO is searching for a technology solution on Google, they need to find a lot of high-level technical articles written by content marketers to trust your company. The first article simply grabs their attention, the second article positions your company in their eyes as an industry expert, and the third article hopes to get them to contact you to discuss a potential collaboration. What does this mean for hiring someone to handle your B2B marketing strategy? Not only do you need someone who knows your products and services inside and out, but you also need someone who can write blog posts and white papers that highlight how your solution solves industry pain points. Easier said than done!
Request content samples
This one’s easy. Don’t trust a candidate who says they can write. But be sure to ask for examples of blog posts, white papers, and videos they’ve created throughout their career.
The candidate may say the content was created under their supervision, meaning they assigned the writing to someone on their team. It won’t hurt if they can complete their portfolio with content they created themselves to prove that their writing skills meet your expectations. Even if you hire someone to manage copywriting at your company instead of directly creating content, keep in mind that that person still needs to know how to write to review the content your team creates.
Look for fast learners
Ideally, content strategy should be left to industry gurus. However, finding these gurus is not easy, and you’ll soon find that even if they know your industry inside and out, they may not have all the skills you need for the role.
Don’t waste time looking for the most knowledgeable person in your field, look for someone who is a fast learner and has a proven track record of excelling in a new industry. Industry details and trends are something many can learn quickly, but writing catchy articles and producing high-quality marketing videos are skills some people have a natural talent for and others simply don’t have (and can’t easily learn).
Public speakers are a must
A big part of B2B marketing consists of trade fairs, exhibitions and other public events. A great way to expose your company’s expertise to your target group is through presentations, workshops and keynotes where your employees can demonstrate their industry know-how.
You’ve probably been to a trade fair or exhibition and you know that there’s nothing worse than listening to a boring speaker for 30 minutes. This will make people not want to buy your product and will not create a good impression of your brand.
You don’t need to hire the next Steve Jobs to captivate potential customers, but make sure you find someone who can give a decent public speech. Ideally, you should watch a video of the candidate giving a keynote speech to determine whether they’re the right person to present your company’s products and services. Someone who comes across as shy in an interview is unlikely to be particularly engaging when presenting in front of an audience, so you should be sure to invite reasonably outgoing people to interview for B2B marketing roles.
