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This presentation shows the basis to develop inbound marketing strategies for a Business-to-Business company. The slides are an English summary of my E-Book "B2B Inbound Marketing: How to win active Prospects as Clients" (German only).
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chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 1 www.chainrelations.de
B2B Inbound Marketing
How to win active Prospects as Clients
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 2 www.chainrelations.de
The Active Prospect I
• According to Marketing Sherpa’s “B2B Lead Generation Handbook” 80
% of all clients found their vendors by themselves.
• Therefore, 20 % of all clients are the result of direct marketing, tele-
marketing and sales calls.
• Which strategies do companies use to better reach this 80 %?
• Current discussion is mostly about activities instead of strategies,
mostly online-marketing on a trial-and-error-basis. A structured,
strategic basis for Whitepapers, SEM or Weblogs is needed.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 3 www.chainrelations.de
The Active Prospect II
• New situation: Active prospects search for vendors and contact vendors
when they are ready.
• This is possible because of the volume of information available from
vendors, market analysts, media and other sources, mostly via internet.
• Additionally, as corporate decision-making has gotten more and more
complex, a fast ROI is mandatory and the decision-making climbs up the
corporate ladder, the preparation must be right to the point.
• Therefore, a new strategic approach is necessary:
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 4 www.chainrelations.de
B2B Inbound Marketing
• Companies exist to integrate and transfer their micro-segmented
competencies into complex value propositions relevant to the needs
of their clients.
• B2B Inbound Marketing is the ability of a company to adjust their
value propositions to the clients and value needs of individual clients.
• B2B Inbound Marketing follows the processes of a client (decisions,
production, SCM etc.).
• Basics of Inbound marketing are competencies, relationships and
information/content.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 5 www.chainrelations.de
B2B Inbound Marketing in Lead Generation
• B2B inbound marketing in lead generation follows the decision
processes of a client.
• Targets:
– Inform the prospect, so he starts the contact with the vendor
– Demonstrate competency and ability/strengths of a solution
– Reduce the client’s risk evaluation
– Pre-qualify the prospect for the sales contact
• Highly individualized communications is needed in inbound-marketing.
– Don Peppers/Martha Rogers: “As the interactive age arrives, every enterprise
has to learn to treat different customers differently”.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 6 www.chainrelations.de
Decision process I
• Separates itself into preparing for the decision and then making it.
• Inbound marketing focuses on the preparation:
– Recognize and describe problems
– Time-table for an investment
– Develop requirements for products and suppliers
– Choose suitable solutions and vendors
– Research dependencies with current infrastructure
– Research costs (investment, service, usage, maintenance etc.)
– Define necessary process changes, market or other (dis)advantages
– Evaluate make or buy
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 7 www.chainrelations.de
Decision process II
• The preparation (as well as the decision making) is rarely a well
structured process.
• The person responsible for the preparation can’t rely on routines. His
job is very complex and he welcomes any relief.
• The person preparing to make a decision needs to feel he can trust
the vendor and their information.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 8 www.chainrelations.de
The 5 “I” of B2B Communication to build Trust
• Developed by Kleinenkamp/Ploetner (1996)
– Intensity: Trust can only be built long-term and in small steps.
Individuality: As every prospect prefers different content and presentation
forms, trust must be built on an individual basis.
– Irradiation effects: As competence and reliability are hard to perceive in
advance, prospects look for alternate information, e.g. size of vendor.
– Intelligence: To communicate intelligently means to deliver the right, risk-
reducing information to the decision maker. References are helpful.
– Integration: Integration means that all communication activities and the
prospect have to be involved.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 9 www.chainrelations.de
Content Marketing I
• Eingine of inbound marketing is content that:
– Focus on decision makers & show solutions from different perspectives (Individuality)
– Meet decision maker‘s interests, i.e. are relevant (Individuality, Intelligence)
– Help decision making/preparation because of personal/prof. reasons (Intelligence)
– Are somewhat exclusive (Individuality)
– Are consistent and complete (Integration)
– Allow a long-term dialogue and a step-by-step increase in expertise (Intensity)
– Make the competence of a vendor and the capability of a solution tangible (Irradiation
effects, Intelligence)
– Are easily available, e.g. registration for download (Integration)
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 10 www.chainrelations.de
Content Marketing II
• The vendor needs a concrete content marketing strategy. He must define
– Who (decision maker, preparer, influencer) should receive
– Which content (messages) in which detail
– Because of which influencing factors
– Via which communication channels and activities
• The vendor needs to see himself as a publisher of high-quality content
competing with other information publishers.
• Content is released on corporate blogs, Twitter, micro sites or external web
sites (e. g. whitepaper portals).
• Holding back information like before is counter productive.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 11 www.chainrelations.de
Content Marketing III
• Marketing has to know the person it wants to connnect with.
• Buyer persona (David Meerman Scott): Instead of large target groups
marketing should reach personalized decision makers.
• Make buyer persona more lively with names, positions, biographies
• A buyer persona needs to identity his needs, responsibilities and risk
evaluation in marketing communications.
• All members of a buyer center must be considered.
• Make it easy for everyone to get hold of your content.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 12 www.chainrelations.de
Content Marketing IV
• Risk evaluation of a buyer persona depends on:
– Investment type
• Product, system or plant
• Recurring purchase, purchase with changes or first-time purchases
– Technology diffusion along the technology adoption lifecycle (Everett M.
Rogers/ Geoffrey A. Moore)
• Innovators
• Early adopters
• Early majority
• Late majority
• Laggards
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 13 www.chainrelations.de
Micro-positioning I
• A vendor must communicate their value propositions (capabilities) to each
buyer persona = Persona propositions.
• This general approach is reflected in the content and the level of detail.
• All influence factors/parties have to be considered.
• The difference to classical positioning is in the micro-orientation towards the
buyer persona.
• There are three way to get an insight into what a buyer persona wants:
– Internal or external expertise
– Analysis of requirement specifications
– Qualitative, field research
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 14 www.chainrelations.de
Micro-positioning II
• Basic messages (persona propositions) are developed based on the
expertise or the results of the analysis or field research:
– per buyer persona
– per investment type
– per risk evaluation
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 15 www.chainrelations.de
Three Steps of B2B Inbound Marketing
• The 3-step-process to support prospects in their decision making
process and to generate them as leads is:
– Find
– Providing information and getting contacted by prospects
– Nurture marketing and lead qualification
• Generally it is best, if marketing and sales define together, what a
sales ready lead is. One possible way is, that marketing is responsible
for these first three steps. If the (pre-qualified) prospect wants
concrete information on solution, sales steps in.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 16 www.chainrelations.de
Find I
• Prospects do not only limit their supplier search to the internet. To
reduce risks they will (Enquiro Research):
– Look for existing/certified suppliers
– Ask colleagues inside and outside their own company
– Ask existing suppliers with other solutions
– Comb through general information of suppliers
• But in most cases they will research potential suppliers online first.
• Additionally, most information research and dialogue will happen
online – especially early in the sales cycle.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 17 www.chainrelations.de
Find II
• No separation between online & offline. Users are savvy to navigate
in-between.
• Central B2B inbound marketing activities are:– Search engine optimization (SEO)– Search engine marketing (SEM)– Blogs & Twitter– Social media– Public relations– Exhibitions– Public speaking– Industry associations
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 18 www.chainrelations.de
Providing information and getting contacted by prospects
• As soon as an evaluator starts to consider a concrete, complex solution, he
needs a connection to the vendor.
• To inform himself and to initiate he uses channels the supplier offers:– Websites– Blogs, Podcasts & Twitter– RSS-Feeds– Whitepapers– Webinars– Product tests– Bulletin boards– E-Books – Call-back buttons– Online Chats
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 19 www.chainrelations.de
Nurture Marketing and Lead Qualification I
• Vendors have to nurture the prospects until they are ready to decide.
This might take months. Marketing establishes a continuous
information exchange and a dialogue with the prospect.
• The care consists mainly of materials that the prospects chooses by
himself (newsletter, webinars, whitepapers).
• In parallel the vendor tries to speed up the decision process. The
buyer persona might need additional information to push the decision
process internally or to see the relevance of a decision.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 20 www.chainrelations.de
Nurture Marketing and Lead Qualification II
• Sales takes over as soon as the prospects is sales ready. Marketing
and sales should decide on when it‘s the case.
• As the prospect builds up expertise during the process, sales efforts
will decrease.
• During the process and the dialogue the vendor receives information
for the lead qualification. Web analytics can be very helpful.
B2B-Inbound-Marketing
chain relations || Torsten Herrmann || 24.07.2009 || page 21 www.chainrelations.de
chain relationsTorsten HerrmannGeorg-Speyer-Straße 2D-60487 Frankfurt am MainTel. +49/69/31 01 90 [email protected]://www.chainrelations.dehttp://www.twitter.com/torstenherrmannhttp://www.linkedin.com/in/torstenherrmann https://www.xing.com/profile/Torsten_Herrmann