Hey B2B Marketer, are buyers not taking your campaigns seriously?
You need to do this!
For most of us, or so I hope, we work for an organisation we believe in. We either believe in the usefulness of the service / product to solve certain problems for the world out there (Self flying drone could be a good example). Secondly, our trust lies in the (kickass) team of people responsible for delivering the promises that we as marketers and sales people make to the buyers.
Now, we might have confidence in either or both of the above. But what if our potential buyers don’t show any trust in us? There’s always a hierarchy in this world and it’s there in organisations too. Higher an organisation is in that ladder, tougher it is going to make it for you. They need real stories of how you have handled other customers like them. They are going to verify them too. After all, a lot is at stake for them. But you don’t have those stories as yet. And since they don’t believe in you — as yet —the lead flow to the Sales team will be too meagre. Your dashboards will show a lot of growth resistance. Soon, you will be left with a frustrated Marketing, Inside Sales and Sales team.
Well, if that’s where you are stranded, you need to ask yourselves a few questions:
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Does our target market know us? If yes, what are their readiness levels in trusting us?
We cannot answer this question without taking different geographies into consideration. Every region is likely to have its own perception, or a lack of it, about us. A marketing / lead generation campaign that succeeded recently — have you measured its success regionally?
Answer the above using the metrics you use to measure success of your campaigns. It differs from industry to industry, platform to platform, time to time — so we will not get into details here. Once we have measured the above, it’s time to qualify our brand image by asking the next set of questions — region by region.
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What size of organisations are we struggling to sell to?
Break into accounts who are not used to being approached by bigger players like you. And deliver them a product / service that makes them feel privileged.
Identify the market you want to sell to but which refuses to acknowledge our capability to serve them. They are likely to have a valid reason at their end — putting so much at stake, how do they trust you? The solution is simple — you need to first target the segment just below the one we are struggling with. In case of large corporate / enterprise level organisations, the decisions are a lot riskier for them — simply because there’s a lot more at stake. They are likely to rely on experience whenever they let someone else manage something heavy duty, through a product or a service. Naturally, they prefer going for partners who are known amongst others in the same segment as theirs. But as a brand looking to happily spiral out of their “circle of mistrust,” you need to establish your brand at ‘level (-1)’ first i.e. a segment below the one you were originally targeting. In parallel, continue to strive to cross over into their “circle of trust”. But in order to do both, you need to wisely divide your focus.
70% of your focus should lie in the smaller segment.
Break into accounts who are not used to being approached by bigger players like you. And deliver them a product / service that makes them feel privileged. Build confidence amongst them and also utilise the situation to optimise your processes and bring innovation in how you approach your services. The value it adds to you is not just one dimensional. A lot of people in these prospective organisations will also surely rise ‘up’ the corporate ladder. Establishing your brand in this market segment today will ensure that tomorrow, in most likeliness, you will be selling to a lot of the same buyers who have now moved into organisations in a segment above it. Your transition will be much easier. Have a plan for a specified period, and kill it. But beware that you don’t find your comfort levels in that zone. Have a strict plan to transcend the immediate success — that you are likely to get.
What about the rest 30% focus?
Meanwhile, you will have your original competitors celebrating this move. You have emptied some war-space for them. But they don’t know that a 30% of your present focus — razor sharp — is still here and this is the same that’s going to spell doom for them in future. The key here is this — you need to play a number game here. There are a few organisations who are too pressed in terms of their budget, or they are just used to exploiting others on cost — owing to the brand value they can offer to your portfolio. They would finalise a few service providers / products and let the total cost be the final decider on who wins. You may also choose to play a low margin game there — for a limited period.
This is very critical for you. Your prime objective here is to stay well within the market — without the frustration of not breaking into accounts — and more importantly build some brilliant case studies — during this stint. This will all help you immensely later on. I suggest, keep a highly focussed team of warriors fighting hard in this zone.
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How should I approach both the market segments simultaneously?
Well, you will have to behave like 2 businesses right now. Each with its own business model (with sufficient overlaps, of course)
For the smaller segment: Prepare a solid marketing plan where you go aggressive in selling to the focussed accounts in the lower segment market. Build a temporary business model around it if necessary. Have a strict marketing strategy. Your presentations might need to change for them. Your email campaigns might need to change for them.
For the larger segment: Prepare another business plan where you go aggressive in 70% brand building - 30% selling approach — towards the original and future target market. I suggest that you strictly follow an Account Based Marketing approach here. Have only a set of focussed accounts and remember, don’t try to only sell to them right now. It’s more important to communicate to them all the innovations you are bringing in your approach and delivery. Be sure to communicate to them at every step of your success. This period will help you gain some acknowledgement and selling will be much easier later. What this will also do is cover any areas of opportunity loss you think you will undergo during this period. But don’t worry, you are going to recover it very soon.
In all of the above, remember the key is a strict timeframe to which you commit yourself to make things happen.
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Well, this is a broad outline of a strategy you could employ to bring yourself out of a situation like above. If there’s anything you wish to discuss in detail, please post it in comments below and I would be happy to cover it.
