Five surprisingly visual B2B marketing hacks

If you have responsibility for generating leads - for sales, revenue, origination or investor recruitment - you're probably wondering where your buyers have gone. Who are they this year? If your Google Analytics is radiating down-ticks and flat lines at you, you may already have bitten your nails to the quick.

You're not alone. But you could be way out front if you're prepared to take action. See how much traditional sales approaches are changing in 2020 Gartner report on the decline of the sales pipeline.

Today, right now, is the moment you can start to develop your advantage. What kind of messaging will work most effectively and through which channels?

Visualise the Good You Do

1. Show more than tell

If your buyers can't see it, it doesn't exist. So visualise. Channel your inner Damien Hirst or Ridley Scott. Or, hire someone who can.

The arguments for visual content are overwhelming. Retention from video is 89% better than text. Our brains are wired to process visuals 60,000 faster than text. And to prioritise visual processing 80% over everything else. That's a visual preference four times larger than text. Don't take our word for it, get inspired by visual thinkers and their stats like Killer Visual Strategies and Interaction Design.

2. Reveal more than you used to

On average (so caution advised here), nearly sixty percent of pre-homeworking era B2B buying decisions were formed impersonally online before influencers or decision makers ever connected with suppliers. That number can only have grown through the pandemic.

How your particular number stacks up against that is not necessarily the same as average, but the trend is almost certainly the same - upwards. Meaning your prospects' buying decisions are now surprisingly more influenceable than ever online. Marketing has become more important than sales. Zoiks. Better shape up.

3. B2B buying is twice as emotional as consumer buying

Surprised? Very few marketers believe that B2B buying is twice as emotional as B2C, until they consider confidence, optimism, empathy, surprise, loyalty and trust. These are business emotions.

In 2013, Google, Gartner and Motista conducted a survey of 3,000 B2B buyers that proved this, and more. They discovered that a whopping half of the decision is emotional. And in 2020, Gartner went on to prove the collapse in the influence of selling, and the rise of difficulty in buying, due to the paucity of helpful (i.e. open) information.

We attribute this to the competitor-cloaking effect. Simply hiding relevant buyer information, because we don't want our competitors to steal it. But that train has already left the station. Buyers favour B2B services who reveal and reassure.

4. Your market hasn't just changed, it's had trauma, surgery and therapy

Let's triage and heal. Call time on the dead leads. Heal the wounded with a refreshed proposition, suited to their revised needs.

And needs are hugely more important now - Gartner showed that buyers now have greater faith in their own judgements even in complex sales - than they have in your promises. No, it's not scary. It's just different.

For prospects that have grown or pivoted in some sizable way, you can map out traits and new pain points which will help you to adapt your offering to them. And a great way to start here is the new top 100 client questions.

Ask your sales team to map out the questions they've heard most frequently from enquirers. These topics are clearly of interest to your audience and even if they're once in a blue moon, they'll be very much on the minds of clients and frequently on the fingertips of their searches. Most firms can do this list in an intensive hour. Just cull the list and weed out repetitions.

5. Routes to market have transformed too

Have a look at your marketing channels - they've drastically changed. Many are muzzled by the impact of homeworking because offices are empty, and commuting and gathering are down. Somewhat gone are trade-shows, telesales, direct mail, networking, and trade awards.

Search marketing agencies have become more costly due to elevated homeworking demand. Indeed, many web firms have followed suit, so new websites cost more during this era.

That leaves social media, your website content, Zoom and email prospecting. These channels you have full control over - you can increase frequency, change message, offer new things through all of them without care or concern for cost.

Already got this covered?

If you already have business videos and they're not generating response, there's much above that will help you improve their performance. But what would be even better than your current business videos?

One-minute Improvers

• Cross-check all your business videos largely follow the above suggestions, or deviate for good reasons
• Ensure you've used on-site CTAs which match your buyer journey moments
• Ensure your social videos, articles and posts have off-site CTA's that match your buyer journey
• Check your business videos match the messaging your audience needs to hear
• Check viewing behaviours - if audiences aren't watching to the end, revise your video


What's at Risk here? A one-minute test

The risk of doing something wrong always hinders us as decision makers. And equally, the risk of doing nothing lurks behind that too. Both carry the risk of failure. So why not delay - deferring looks safer. Like a Whitehall mandarin. Is that the kind of decision maker you want to be? Thought not. So here's a helpful checklist for wise decision maker inside you that's aching to be heard.

The One-minute Decision Checklist

1. Do buyers want to know what you're like?
2. Do buyers want proof of your success?
3. Should you provide buyers with the information they want?
4. Do buyers want a sense of what will happen to them if they buy from you?
5. Do buyers need to find you easily via search and social media?
6. Do you need to be seen as relevant and modern?

If the answer to any three of these is yes, you should almost certainly proceed with this. Or at least be questioning why you have so many no's.



Conclusion

We've covered five ways to change your marketing, with an impact on sales. That's five ways to improve and of course five areas to track the impact:

• Show more than tell: choose an agency that can provide effective visual content
• Reveal more: choose an agency that allows you to open up. To sing.
• Embrace emotion: think of empathy as well as reveal when you define your project
• Heal and adapt: find the answers to enquirer questions
• Transform: choose an agency that capitalises on the change to marketing channels.
• Do track, otherwise you'll never know what worked best!
• Selection: make an informed choice from the pros and cons listed

Remember the good you do, and have it tell your story to your audiences.

So, now you've acquired five new visual hacks, you've moved towards your goal. Time for a chat about success with video?

Book a Video Marketing Demo