Although a business is still selling a product, there’s actually a big difference between B2B and B2C marketing.
B2B marketing, where a business sells to another business, has a completely unique buying decision than B2C marketing, where a business sells directly to the consumer. Most B2B purchases revolve around logic whilst a consumer purchase is primarily built on emotion.
Companies don’t behave the same as individual buyers, they act differently to marketing strategies and behave differently when they make buying decisions.
B2B Marketing
When a business markets directly to another business, it’s vital their key selling point is the logic of buying the product. To do so, the business needs to focus on promoting the features of the product and its usefulness.
Businesses typically will not be emotionally involved in the product, so there needs to be a focus on understanding the organisation’s needs and why the product fulfils them better than any other companies.
Businesses tend to be information seekers and they’re typically interested in the concrete facts of the products.
- – What would be a realistic ROI from their purchase?
- – How will your product save money?
- – How will your product save time?
- – How will your product save resources?
B2B marketing strategy needs to be logical and substantiated with statistics, facts and data.
B2C Marketing
One of the main differences between B2B marketing and B2C marketing is emotion. Whilst emotion does play a part in B2B marketing, it’s more prominent in B2C marketing. Businesses are still built on people, but they tend to focus on data rather than how they personally feel about a product.
Consumers are less likely to be interested in statistics, long marketing messages and hard data. Businesses usually prefer in-depth marketing, whereas consumers want to know the benefits of the product sharpish.
Consumers focus on the benefits of the product to them personally and they want your marketing to convey why your product will help them.
Whats the Key Difference Between B2B and B2C Marketing?
There’s actually three.
The Decision-Making Process
Consumers may consult their family, friends or peers to help with their buying decision. They might ask for opinions, but they won’t necessarily follow their advice. For example, if a consumer asks their family for their thoughts on a hat and they encourage them not to buy it, they still could buy it anyway.
The B2B decision-making process is a bit more complex and the opinion of others is a more significant factor. A business may need a seal of approval from stakeholders, managers and buyers to buy or invest in a new product.
The Speed of Sales
There’s no middle man with B2C sales. The business deals directly with the consumer, so the transaction is pretty fast.
B2B sales can be long-winded. It could take months of relationship building, lead nurturing and consistent engagement to conduct a sale.
Building Relationships
There’re more consumers than there are businesses. With this in mind, lead building is not as complex as a process when there’s millions of consumers to choose from.
For B2B, however, businesses need to invest more money in developing and maintaining close relationships with a handful of businesses.
What Does This Mean?
It’s crucial marketers and businesses understand that their strategies need to vary dependent on who they are targeting. While B2B and B2C sometimes have similar marketing methods, like email marketing, they do have variant goals, strategies and methods of carrying out their marketing.
What do you think? Do you disagree? Let us know in the comments.
Why not check out our Digital Marketing Terms Glossary?
About the author:
Marie Harwood is a Digital Marketing Assistant at Different Gravy Digital, Hale, Cheshire.
Different Gravy Digital are a full service Digital Marketing Agency operating in the Hospitality & Leisure, Financial Services, Legal & Property sectors. Products and services range from; 3D & 360° Tours, Website Design & Build, Social Media, Video Production, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), Content Creation, Email Marketing, Online Feedback / Review Systems and Paid Advertising (Google, Bing and Social Media).
Contact Details:
marie@differentgravydigital.co.uk
0161 706 000
120a Ashley Road, Hale, Altrincham, Cheshire, WA14 2UN