How to Take Advantage of the New B2B Buying Behavior

The smart, sassy folks at Velocity make an excellent point about B2B buying behavior in their new ebook, The New B2B Marketing Manifesto.

The Big Idea: People don't buy What You Do. They buy Why You Do It.

Let's' think about that. Most people don't care that you make a widget or provide consulting or digital or you name it services. They want to know what your product or service will do for them. Will it make them more money? More revenue? Gain more status? Will buying from your company make them look smarter or more secure in their job? For years, for example, managers knew that buying from IBM was the safe choice. No one would question it.

The fact is that buying decisions ultimately aren't completely rational, much as we would like them to be. That is, you may have the best product or service in the world but if people don't understand its value or find you credible you might as well post your "going out of business sign."

As Velocity notes:

"Part of the brain responsible for rational processes is not the part that drives decisions. If we start with beliefs, we light up the part of the brain that drives decisions and behavior. Then people can rationalize their feelings of trust and loyalty, like the feature/function stuff."

That's why relationship-building, or to use the catchword of today in B2B marketing, lead nurturing, is so important. As we all know, people buy from people they trust. Fortunately, the Internet has enabled many ways to develop relationships and build trust. Foremost among these is developing content that speaks to your expertise and your prospects' needs. It's the next best thing to shaking someone's hand and having a conversation. And like its real word counterpart, digital relationship building brings your prospect closer to you.

Think case studies, customer testimonials, white papers, articles, videos, podcasts, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn posts, cell phone apps and on and on.--for your content marketing. Now you don't have to do everything at once but think sequentially. If you do white paper, for instance, you can easily turn that into a white paper, and a social media post. Don't of course churn out dry as dirt content but make it informative and easy to digest. Remember people have different preferred ways to absorb information; some folks are print whizzes while others eat up videos. So you'll want to have a variety of types of content--some with visual and audio appeal, others print-focused.

Here's an important caveat. None of the content should be self-promotional but written in a way that captures the needs of your prospects. For example, if your product saves people money, consider having a calculator that lets them see in a glance exactly how much money they'll save. That's much more engaging than you're barking that they will save thousands of dollars. And don't forget to your clients and prospects for their feedback and ideas...and listen to it!

Lastly, don't forget your content needs to be found. As Velocity's ebook reminds us, Every B2B purchase starts at Search. You want to be sure your content has the keywords people search under so you get found in the search engines. Consider having landing pages that use those keywords. Search today is the bait that lures someone into your content so make the most of it.

Wendy Marx, B2B PR and Marketing Specialist, Marx Communications