B2B Marketing with Social Media
In the past social media advertising was the preserve of B2C companies – selling to other professionals and businesses on Instagram or Facebook was seen as a little inappropriate as social media use was a personal leisure activity. Over the last ten years that has changed dramatically; with more flexible working and a blurring of the lines between professional media and personal media people are now more receptive to work related content in their leisure time. Businesses who sell to consumers realised that their ideal leads were also personal social media users, and could be reached on the traditional social channels.
For B2B companies LinkedIn is one of the best converting social platforms there is. The site has conducted research into their advertising offering and found that LinkedIn users have twice the influence on purchase decisions and are six times more likely to convert than the average web user. Within the user base 80% of people are decision makers, so a strong LinkedIn strategy can give you much better returns on your investment than a similar campaign on another social channel, or through PPC advertising.
Of course, LinkedIn has an ad platform like other social platforms where you can post sponsored content, videos, text ads and even send InMail (direct messages) which can be very lucrative when done right – providing a solution to a common problem is a great hook for an InMail campaign. There are many other ways of using LinkedIn to promote your company, generate leads and raise your profile within your industry, so while paid ads are worthwhile it's wise to complement a paid campaign with some organic activity.
One of the common arguments against investing time and budget into LinkedIn is that it's not as active as other platforms. While this is true, when people visit LinkedIn they do so not out of boredom, as they might for Facebook or TikTok, but with a mind-set that is actively engaged in professional topics. Each week 40% of members engage with a page organically, so there is a lot of intentional activity that isn't driven by nudges and ads. LinkedIn visitors are there because they're in the mood to consume, converse and engage.
LinkedIn has lots of business groups aligned with particular industries and topics, and they're a fantastic place to make connections and get your name out there. When you post blogs on your site make sure they're not just promoted on your Twitter and Instagram, post them in a relevant group too. This improves visibility and encourages more website traffic – you'll see from your web analytics just how many people actually do click through and read your pieces from LinkedIn.
Starting conversations in groups is a benefit of posting blogs there. You can learn a lot from the comments you get, including insights and expertise you'd usually have to pay a consultant for. Those same consultants are using LinkedIn to show their expertise and attract clients, and the way they do so is to provide advice and insights in relevant groups.
Starting and moderating a useful discussion in the comments section also encourages other group members to connect with you and gets your name out there, so it is a worthwhile activity that might take an hour a week at most, but can provide long-term benefits that compensate you for that hour many times over.
If you're not already using LinkedIn for your B2B marketing there's no time like the present to get started. The platform is also ideal for recruitment, checking competitors, and finding the names and job roles of the decision makers you need to know for account based marketing strategies. Parua can help you blend LinkedIn seamlessly into your digital B2B marketing strategy.
