B2B Marketing Series - What’s different?
April 18th, 2006What is the difference between Consumer (B2C) and Business (B2B) Marketing?
I read this interesting (albeit a bit academic) take on the difference between B2B and B2C on the website of the American Marketing Association. Note the observation about long sales cycles, small number of customers and sales focused on key account management. Because of these characteristics a lot of companies believe that all they need to do is hire a sales person. They are selling themselves short.
Apart from the reliance on individuals (who may come and go) to control your destiny, there are some fantastic opportunities these days that can enhance your marketing performance. And current technology offers a fantastic opportunity. Let’s look at two key functions of marketing, communications and customer satisfaction.
Creating longterm relationships - generally relationships exist on a sales and technical level, but not at a corporate level. Creating a relationship at a corporate level has a number of advantages. A significant one is that if your sales person leaves, they don’t take the relationship with them. How?
- Start with a corporate customer/prospecting database that can be used effectively to communicate with prospects/customers.
- Conduct at least two small events a year; could be anything from a drink to a full-blown product launch.
- Find out how you can use your website to let your customers communicate with you directly, i.e providing feedback, access to information that is important to them etc.
Creating value - what do you do to deliver value to your customers? Is it a good product and good customer service?
It is easy to end up making decisions based on anecdotal information from feedback from sales people or technical people. Use this as a starting point to explore other opportunities.
- Find out what your competitors do - even a internet based search and some targeted telephone calls to partners and customers are a good start.
- Ask your customers - conduct regular surveys; if you have good relationships you can do this via email and internet at virtually no cost to your organisation
