The B2B vs B2C Thing

Chris, you forgot one: B2E. That’s Business-to-Employee. :-) You’re too focused on the marketing angle. What’s much more important is a community mindset of openness and sharing. If a partner doesn’t understand how you sell to customers, they won’t be a partner for long. Want your employees to come up with better ideas for products and services? Get them out there engaging with customers and partners.

A community (and teamwork) mindset is what will transform organizations and entire industries (e.g. pharma is leading the way). What/how/where/when to use tools like social media is secondary.

- http://twitter.com/lliu

I like the B2E angle even if it isn’t part of the post. ;-)

It helps engage employees for teamwork, ideas, and in so doing encourage innovation in these rough economic times (morale is a biggy). Social media can do a lot for companies looking to lift up their employees spirits, bridge international gaps, and just bring people together. It can also help to decrease costs in various areas such as telecommunication.

On a high level, it has the ability to increase an individual’s productivity and thus allow corporations to monetize on this. Social media is not just for knowledge management anymore in the corporate environment. We’ve gone beyond that.

As a fairly new reader of your site, I just wanted to comment that your posts always get me thinking. Thinking not only about where we sit on the marketing spectrum as public relations professionals in the B2B technology realm, but also as an individual consumer. There are differences in the sale to and in the execution of marketing to businesses versus consumers but in my opinion it’s challenging to make generalizations as nuances always play in, whether it’s the dimensions of the sale, the market size, the state of the economy, etc.

As a fairly new reader of your site, I just wanted to comment that your posts always get me thinking. Thinking not only about where we sit on the marketing spectrum as public relations professionals in the B2B technology realm, but also as an individual consumer. There are differences in the sale to and in the execution of marketing to businesses versus consumers but in my opinion it’s challenging to make generalizations as nuances always play in, whether it’s the dimensions of the sale, the market size, the state of the economy, etc.

To complement our marketing view, Dave Stein’s blog post today cuts the issue from the B2B strategic selling perspective. Same hurdles, same opportunities, different angle, a different urgency. As Dave puts it: “If a salesperson’s buyers have really embraced social media as a way to establish and build relationship with those who would provide them with valuable products and services, great. Those companies do exist. But in general, and regretfully for some I’m sure, we’re just not there yet.” Read the full post: http://davesteinsblog.wordpress.com/2009/01/28/social-media-in-b2b-sales-is-the-time-right/

Chris, you couldn’t be more right. I run a B2B marketing agency. We market enterprise software and services. Our clients’ average sales cycle is often measured in years and not months. We invented our own process for taking such solutions to market and called it “continuous customer capture”. Continuous (a word you’ve used in your post) is hugely meaningful in this context. This B2B marketing process is ALL about selling the “next step” – read this white paper, read that blog post, come to this event, learn more about the subject – and eventually the lead goes from nuture phase to a lead you can work on selling to. But timing it critical and so a process that gives you multiple bites of the cherry is the best type of B2B programme. In B2B you have to become a resource for the potential customer. Social tools are bang on for this.

I have to ask myself – does it really matter? I wonder are B2B companies getting too hung up on “it’s different for B2C and we can’t do it because (insert excuse here)? The B2B sales cycle and buying process is indeed different. For one thing, the focus is on getting qualified leads for sales people to make the eventual sales. Yet everyone seems to forget about the sales people – a prime group companies can target using Social Media marketing – alongside existing marketing channels – to make their lives easier. No leads = No Sales. At the end of the day, regardless of sales process as Seth Godin so aptly put it on Amex Open Forum, having thousands of “friends” on Facebook or “followers” on Twitter are pretty useless to a B2B company if they don’t somehow work towards signing that million dollar contract in good time for it to add to the bottom line.
However – if you are a B2B company or any company you want to do business. To do that you need customers. Many B2B customers may not be using Social Media – there’s an opportunity for the B2b company to educate by leading the way. It goes back to this “What is the business problem the company needs to solve? Is it getting more clients? More people to know about you? Advocates? Innovation, market share? More qualified leads? Social Media can help B2B companies in doing all these and more. But, as I always say, it isn’t about the tools. It’s about the approach. And about how it’s going to improve the bottom line. Every business person’s job depends on that bottom line, no matter how fluffy we want to get about “conversations.”

Here’s a suggestion for B2B companies. Why not start from the inside out? Ask sales people what they need. Do they need info so they can bring in more qualified leads? Then why not start with an internal wiki? Or an internal blog? Does the company need to innovate/ (what a question) Why not establish a private community or forum to enable your customers to contribute new ideas, suggestions? I can guarantee they will have more than you ever will. Same goes for improvements to all your channels.

B2B companies need to listen to their markets, just as their B2C counterparts do. So why can’t they set up Google Alerts to see and measure what is being said about the company – and not just by your customers? Why not use Twitter as a listening and learning post? Why not survey your customers? Most are usually very happy to be asked for their feedback most companies never bother, or never do anything with it if they do) if it means you’re making it easier to do business with you. Encourage ratings of online content.
Do B2B companies need recommendations? Advocates? Influence? More customers? More leads? Referrals? Then B2B companies should be engaging their key audiences and social media provides a way to do it. They need to use Social Media for lead generation. Do B2B companies want to be aware of marketplace threats or do they want to discover them only when their customers of many years have switched to the savvier competition?
Oh, and one other thing… as with anything new, be prepared to fail at least at first. No one is exempt from that. But marketers can do small pilots to mitigate the risks.

Bottom line – It’s a waste of time getting distracted by B2B vs B2C differences – so I agree “don’t get hung up on the B2b/B2C thing.” Companies are not personal entities so why pretend they are? Not all B2C efforts have been successful anyway. Regardless of the selling process and the diverse needs of B2B marketers they need to start where they are, change their approach to being two way, be strategic and start engaging their people. Look for what they can do, even if small, rather than what they can’t.

I have to ask myself – does it really matter? I wonder are B2B companies getting too hung up on “it’s different for B2C and we can’t do it because (insert excuse here)? The B2B sales cycle and buying process is indeed different. For one thing, the focus is on getting qualified leads for sales people to make the eventual sales. Yet everyone seems to forget about the sales people – a prime group companies can target using Social Media marketing – alongside existing marketing channels – to make their lives easier. No leads = No Sales. At the end of the day, regardless of sales process as Seth Godin so aptly put it on Amex Open Forum, having thousands of “friends” on Facebook or “followers” on Twitter are pretty useless to a B2B company if they don’t somehow work towards signing that million dollar contract in good time for it to add to the bottom line.
However – if you are a B2B company or any company you want to do business. To do that you need customers. Many B2B customers may not be using Social Media – there’s an opportunity for the B2b company to educate by leading the way. It goes back to this “What is the business problem the company needs to solve? Is it getting more clients? More people to know about you? Advocates? Innovation, market share? More qualified leads? Social Media can help B2B companies in doing all these and more. But, as I always say, it isn’t about the tools. It’s about the approach. And about how it’s going to improve the bottom line. Every business person’s job depends on that bottom line, no matter how fluffy we want to get about “conversations.”

Here’s a suggestion for B2B companies. Why not start from the inside out? Ask sales people what they need. Do they need info so they can bring in more qualified leads? Then why not start with an internal wiki? Or an internal blog? Does the company need to innovate/ (what a question) Why not establish a private community or forum to enable your customers to contribute new ideas, suggestions? I can guarantee they will have more than you ever will. Same goes for improvements to all your channels.

B2B companies need to listen to their markets, just as their B2C counterparts do. So why can’t they set up Google Alerts to see and measure what is being said about the company – and not just by your customers? Why not use Twitter as a listening and learning post? Why not survey your customers? Most are usually very happy to be asked for their feedback most companies never bother, or never do anything with it if they do) if it means you’re making it easier to do business with you. Encourage ratings of online content.
Do B2B companies need recommendations? Advocates? Influence? More customers? More leads? Referrals? Then B2B companies should be engaging their key audiences and social media provides a way to do it. They need to use Social Media for lead generation. Do B2B companies want to be aware of marketplace threats or do they want to discover them only when their customers of many years have switched to the savvier competition?
Oh, and one other thing… as with anything new, be prepared to fail at least at first. No one is exempt from that. But marketers can do small pilots to mitigate the risks.

Bottom line – It’s a waste of time getting distracted by B2B vs B2C differences – so I agree “don’t get hung up on the B2b/B2C thing.” Companies are not personal entities so why pretend they are? Not all B2C efforts have been successful anyway. Regardless of the selling process and the diverse needs of B2B marketers they need to start where they are, change their approach to being two way, be strategic and start engaging their people. Look for what they can do, even if small, rather than what they can’t.

For those interested, here’s a blog post I wrote recently to help B2B marketers get started. It’s called 7 practical tips for B2B Social Media Marketing.
http://nickyjameson.com/2009/02/07/7-practical-tips-for-business-to-business-social-media-marketing/

Lawrence Liu (Telligent), Craig Huffstetler, Nicky Jameson touch upon the B2E element as well:
In B2B the illusion still exists that you are selling to a company, not people. This illusion allows a company functioning in that capacity to overlook social media as a viable strategy, while relying on the safe, ROI-trackable methods of Mar Comm.
Where social media can be revolutionary when implemented, is it gives companies the ability to empower employees to be the faces of the company. First, however, companies need to be revolutionary in their approach to employee empowerment.
As leaders in business, we should be salivating at the opportunity to empower each of our employees to be champions of the company and lead innovation – in sales or otherwise.

Lawrence Liu (Telligent), Craig Huffstetler, Nicky Jameson touch upon the B2E element as well:
In B2B the illusion still exists that you are selling to a company, not people. This illusion allows a company functioning in that capacity to overlook social media as a viable strategy, while relying on the safe, ROI-trackable methods of Mar Comm.
Where social media can be revolutionary when implemented, is it gives companies the ability to empower employees to be the faces of the company. First, however, companies need to be revolutionary in their approach to employee empowerment.
As leaders in business, we should be salivating at the opportunity to empower each of our employees to be champions of the company and lead innovation – in sales or otherwise.

@ John Varlaro
“As leaders in business, we should be salivating at the opportunity to empower each of our employees to be champions of the company and lead innovation – in sales or otherwise.” Excellent point.
I believe empowering employees would be the making of companies. And not just B2B. 99 percent of the time employees know exactly what should be done and how to do it. They are on the front line with the customers. They are the ones often on the receiving end of customer complaints and, yes, praise. But they need support from the top down. They cannot do it alone.
Can you imagine a company that empowers its employees to champion the company and lead innovation? It’s a beautiful thought. Some might be in a much better place than many we are reading about daily.
Sadly, many companies would figuratively rather cut off their right arms before they empower their employees, (including those who pay lip-service to employee “empowerment”) so all the innovative sparks will go out or get short shrift.

When it comes to Social Media, there are so many options that no one person can do it all, and no one department can do it justice. Every facet of a B2B company can benefit…but not w/o the employees. I like to look on the bright side. The opportunity for bright sparks who understand how it works inside and out to become Social Media consultants to their past employers. It wouldn’t be the first time.

The biggest discernible difference in business communications between those two groups is the justification of purchases.

There. Am I wrong?

Yeah,you're right

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The biggest discernible difference in business communications between b2b and b2c groups is the justification of purchases.

There. Am I wrong?

Yeah,you’re right