5 Marketing Strategies for Effective B2B Marketing

Event marketing is the best way to promote your company, launch a new product, and attract new customers. But just like any other marketing campaign, you need to make sure you have all the pieces of the puzzle. Fit them all together, and you have a completed image that screams success.

The key to any successful B2B marketing campaign is to get into your customers’ mind. What are they looking for, and what are their deal breakers? Essentially, you need to know what makes them tick. Marketing at a trade show is no different. Here we look at five strategies for effective B2B marketing:

Pre-Show Marketing

Pre-show marketing is an essential part of any strategy. Having a well designed and memorable exhibition stand is important of course. But if you’ve not done the ground work, how will your clients and customers know where to find you? How will they know if you’re there?

1. Social Media

Free and easy to use, social media is one of the best marketing strategies to implement before attending a trade show. And with so many sites available, the possibilities are endless. Firstly, with Twitter you can use a particular hashtag to find people who are attending a join in conversations. Holding a twitter chat is also a great way to network before the event, and build a buzz around your brand.

You should also join Facebook and LinkedIn groups, relevant to your niche and the event. Promote the show, as well as your attendance. A great way to add some mystique and allure to your brand is to upload a YouTube teaser advert. Make sure it is interesting. Make people want to visit your stand to see what you’re launching or promoting.

2. Direct Mail

As well as reaching out to prospective clients, don’t forget about past and present ones. Open up your mailing list and send postcards or flyers to the people who have already brought from you. In B2B marketing, building relationships is vital. By keeping these connections alive, you can often secure a repeat purchase.

Make sure your mail shots are personalized and feature your corporate branding. You don’t want your marketing efforts mistaken for spam or junk mail. If your budget doesn't stretch to direct mail, implementing an email marketing strategy is just as effective. Some companies may wish to do both.

On-the-Day Marketing

On the day of the trade show, you still need to be in marketing mode. Just because you've attracted a crowd, you shouldn't feel like your work is done. By integrating the following marketing strategies, you can boost your B2B trade show success:

3. Face-to-Face Networking

We’ve mentioned the importance of relationships in B2B marketing, and this is where you need to put them into action. Take the time to visit other stands at the exhibition, and hand out business cards. If you’re interested in others, they will reciprocate and see what you have to offer.

Make sure you have a private meeting space to discuss sales with your customers. They’ll appreciate the chance to talk away from the busy event, and are much likely to sign on the dotted line. Have in place everything they may need, to make the decision quick and easy for them.

4. Freebies and Giveaways

B2B companies are always looking for something that makes day-to-day proceeding quicker and easier. One of the best ways to show customers what you can do for them is to give it away for free. Have you written an eBook or whitepaper? Giving visitors access to them for free at your stand is a great marketing technique.

You should also consider offering a free service for people who attended your stand. Whether this is a free audit or something similar; businesses will appreciate the gesture. If you can show what you can do, and give them something for nothing, customers are much more likely to pay for further services.

Post-Show Marketing

The final part of your B2B marketing strategy needs to take place post show. Converting leads to sales is perhaps the most important part of your marketing campaign. But are you following up in the best ways?

5. Following Up

Integrate all of the methods you have previously implemented to seal the deal with ‘on-the-fence’ consumers. The key though, is timing. Don’t chase up the very next day as email inboxes will be full and messages will get lost. Don’t leave it too long, otherwise you’ll be forgotten.

Extend the offer on your giveaways to entice fellow businesses to check you out online, and make them want to work with you. By following up enquires post event, you can increase your chances of making a sale. Not everyone will buy on the day, but this is a great marketing strategy to encourage them to work with you in the end.

Special thanks to RB Design & Displays for today's guest post.  RB knows that the key to trade show success is a great exhibition stand. Visit the website to find out more about custom built exhibition stands for your business.

Trade Shows Made Simple

Preparing for a trade show can be a very scary and frustrating time, especially if it is your first time. The amount of worrying and anxiety that goes along with planning a trade show can sometimes be as daunting as planning a wedding. You may ask yourself questions like: What do we take for our trade show display and how do we present it?

The first thing you need to do is contact the trade show vendors and organizers. Find out the specifics, like how big of a space you will have to showcase your business. Before you start ordering attractions make sure that your space will be large enough to accommodate them. This will save you a ton of headaches later.

Once you have all the necessary information regarding how much space you will have to work with you can then  move on to the brainstorming phase. Try to think of attractions that will showcase your business and also draw people into your booth or over to your table. Put yourself in the attendee’s shoes, what would you like to see? 
Here are a few great ideas to help you get ready. 

1) If your trade show display table does not have a table cloth, get one! Make sure you choose a color scheme that is eye catching but also compliments your company logo or color scheme. If your table does come with a table cloth, bring something anyway. Something as simple as a table runner can make you stand out from the crowd and be the difference between a successful trade show and an unsuccessful one.

2) If you have the space make/buy a presentation board. Have this board showcase the benefits your company can provide potential customers with. Remember BE CREATIVE. Some blown up Microsoft excel spreadsheet is not going to draw people in, think form the attendees perspective. What would attract you to a board? Pictures, bright colors, and creativity. Keep all of these in mind. 

3) Look into purchasing or renting some trade show attractions or giveaways. Nothing draws people in like the chance to win something. If your budget allows it, why not look into renting or purchasing some attractions to have at your booth? Look into having something that will set you apart from your competition!

4) Arrange your trade show display table in levels. Put the larger items at the rear, shorter items in front of those, and even shorter items in front of those. No one will be able to see smaller items if they are behind larger ones. Don’t make a mistake like this, you have a very limited amount of time and you want everyone that stops by to be able to see EVERYTHING you have to offer.

About the Author
This week's guest post is from Shannon Martin who is a writer for TradeShowMarketing.Com, she lives in Palm Coast FL.

Allocating your Budget is Critical to Trade Show Success

Take a look at your trade show budget. Is it focused on developing sales or just on generating leads? Of all of the important line items in your budget, how many focus on converting the leads into sales? Chances are that if you are taking a traditional approach to allocating your trade show budget, your marketing efforts may fall short of producing the number of sales and revenues that they should.

Here's why. Industry statistics show that a staggering 80% of trade show leads are not followed up on. If your follow up plan does not extend much beyond giving the leads out to the sales team, then you're the rule rather than the exception. Developing trade show leads into sales opportunities takes a more strategic approach. By helping your sales team at this crucial stage you can significantly impact their effectiveness and production.

It's critical that your trade show marketing plan does not stop at the show floor. There are several important steps necessary to develop the leads into sales opportunities. Leads must be called, decision-makers must be reached, and opportunities must be qualified to leverage the time of your sales team.

Allocating a portion of your budget for marketing to qualify the leads before the sales team takes over will impact the success of your show tremendously. Whether you invest in your marketing team, an inside sales team, or a lead qualification company like Lead Generation Solutions, the key is having the expertise that you need to execute the following techniques:

• Call every lead immediately after the show. This allows you to reach the prospects when their interest level from the show is at its highest. It also allows you to beat slow moving competitors and make sure that no leads fall through the cracks. While calling six weeks or six months later is better than not calling at all, it's critical to call every lead immediately after the show. You are investing a lot of money on the show to initiate a personal relationship. Mailing catalogs or a power point presentation and hoping the prospect will call is not enough to maintain it.

• Call several times until you reach the decision maker. It takes several calls to reach the decision-maker. The higher their level of authority, the more calls it takes. This is one of the areas where the breakdown occurs. It's very difficult for sales reps to make enough calls to reach the decision-maker. To make things more challenging, often the right company stops by your booth but not the right decision-maker. Many sales are lost because it is difficult to maintain the follow up needed to penetrate deeper into the company to find the opportunity. While some sales take extra resources to develop them, the investment will pay off in the long run.

• Quality grade and prioritize the opportunities for the sales team to leverage their time. The sales reps time is valuable and is best spent only with the leads that have a qualified opportunity. However, even among these ideal prospects, they need to know exactly who to focus their time on. The first priority is the prospects that have a need and want to meet right now. Second are the prospects that have a need and want to be followed up on within a specific time frame. This way they will never waste time with non-qualified prospects.
  

Put your trade show budget where your sale is. There is a sports saying that holds that every baseball team will win one third of its games, and lose one-third of its games. What separates the winners from the losers is what they do with the remaining third. It is the same with companies exhibiting at a trade show. There will be obvious leads that will be cherry picked and quickly result in sales. There will also be leads that will never turn into sales opportunities. But how you budget and execute the qualification process with the remaining leads will really determine how successful your trade show will be.

About the Author
At Lead Generation Solutions, we specialize with helping companies to maximize the effectiveness of their trade show follow up. Please give me a call me for a no-obligation discussion or take a moment to visit our web site at www.leadgenerationsolutions.com.