Social media as a tool for B2B marketers is a relatively new phenomenon. Many B2Bs have been skeptical of social media's effectiveness, particularly because they felt there was no way to measure its ROI. The truth is, the reason B2B marketers have found social media ineffective for lead generation is because many of them are doing it wrong.
Set Goals
Goals are what motivate us to get out of the bed in the morning, they are what propel us toward continually growing our company's success. Without goals, we are only doing half the work.
When coming up with your goals, it's best to be realistic - while we all want to grow by 1000% each month, the likelihood of that happening is small. It's best to look at previous months and see how you have grow in order to make your projections. Once your goals are set, it's important to outline a strategy to attain them.
Strategize
The so-called "Spray and Pray" strategy doesn't work - not for traditional marketing, and certainly not for social media marketing. In order to carry out a successful social media marketing strategy, you need to actually have a strategy!
Coming up with a game plan requires you to sit down with your marketing team, and occasionally sales as well, and decide what you want to accomplish and how you are going to get there. Things continually writing quality blog posts, putting on webinars and creating more gated content are all examples of strategies you can use.
Campaigns
As B2B content marketers, we tend to not only promote our company, service, product etc., but white papers, webinars and other gated content as well. In order to keep track of each of these promotions individually, it is important to keep everything in campaigns.
While you are promoting that new case study, you might also want to let people know about a webinar you are putting on. If you are number oriented, and want to see exact metrics of each of your activities individually, the only way you can do this is by creating campaigns.
LinkedIn Groups
If there was a place where your exact target market spends hours a day discussing topics relevant to what your company does, why wouldn't you be there?
LinkedIn Discussion Groups are the most fertile ground for any B2B marketer. Not only do they provide an opportunity for fantastic networking and establishing thought-leadership, they are also a great place for lead generation - if done correctly.
Don't Be Sales-y
We have covered on this blog, in great detail, the reasons that overt promotion on your blog as well as on LinkedIn is a poor strategy for B2B.
Content marketing is not meant to make a direct sale, it should be focused on establishing yourself and your company as a thought-leadership. This is accomplished by imparting readers in your target market with useful information. Writing and distributing content that is overtly promotional doesn't only negatively affect your content marketing, you also risk being flagged for the dreaded LinkedIn SWAM.
Follow Up
Social media is meant to be... social. It's important that your social media marketing strategy include keeping an eye on all your posts and continually engaging with those that comment. These types of conversations become a tool for nurturing relationships that may, in the future, create a new customer or client.
Engage
Starting your own conversations is a great strategy, but you also have to keep an eye on your Propinquity Points - places that your target market visits to gain information and discuss industry-relevant issues.
Once these points are identified, it's important to spend time "listening," and find discussions that you feel you can add value to.
Measure
Historically, B2B marketers have hesitated from putting real effort into social media - mainly due to a perceived inability to see actual ROI.
How can you know if you have reached your goals if you aren't able to measure your success?
Today, things are different. Tools allow people to look at metrics such as clicks, likes, engagements and, most importantly, conversions.
B2B companies can no longer risk to not have a solid social media marketing strategy. As opposed to years past, B2B marketers have the tools needed to utilize social media in order to generate leads and see actual ROI.
The post '8 Things B2B Social Media Marketers Are Doing Wrong' first appeared on the Oktopost Blog.