B2B Sales and Marketing Tips
Selling is a skill that can be learnt. Sales and Marketing are two sides of a very important part of your business - revenue generation.
Business to Business (B2B) is where your organisation is selling a product or service to another business. There is also Business to Consumer (B2C), Business to Government (B2G) and other combinations e.g. Business to Business to Consumer (B2B2C). Knowing what your business model is will help you understand how to market and sell better.
What are some of the challenges in B2B Sales?
- Buyers are more skeptical: due to increased cold calling, emails and constant advertising buyers are more aware and skeptical of people they don't know or trust
- Testimonials are paramount: having testimonials is incredibly important. Adding in various case studies and you have a winning combination.
- Buyers are risk adverse: with budgets often shrinking, there is more pressure for every purchase to deliver immediate return on investment
Strategies to generate more B2B Sales
- Relationships first: There is a great saying at one of the networking groups I attend - relationships first, no overt sales. This means you can talk about sales, but the paramount objective should be to build relationships.
- Referalls Referalls Referalls: The cheapest way to sell your brand is to have your customers, prospects and network do it for you. Don't be afraid to ask for referrals. If your business is half as good as you think it is, you should be having a line out the door.
- Create sales enablement material: create content and guides that you can share and market on your website. By demonstrating your knowledge through articles, white papers and case studies you are demonstrating your value to potential customers.
- Run a sales seminar: 79% of marketers use events to generate more sales. This provides you the opportunity to put prospects in a room with the sales person. Done well, events can have a 5x ROI. We have created a free guide on how to plan a sales presentation here.
- Align sales and marketing metrics: There is no point having a marketing team who have different targets to your sales teams. Make sure they are aligned, targets are transparent and any promotions are well communicated.
- Sell solutions: You are there to solve a problem. Instead of talking about unique features, you should be there to talk about how your product or service helps free up the business owners time to focus on other things, how your product helps generate 2x ROI or how your service can help decrease expenses through your unique auditing service.
- Leverage your staff: Empower your staff to post on social media. Provide some training on how to write posts, and give them the freedom to write at work. Besides giving your staff new skills, you are ensuring you have a constant stream of content that mentions your business.
- Revisit ex-clients: Find out why they left, how they are going now and whether they would like support. Just because someone isn't a client anymore doesn't meant they can't provide value (or a referral).
