It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day…
Despite being the backbone of the modern economy, there can be telecommunication companies that struggle with their Digital B2B Marketing strategies. It’s not a function of intellect, passion or even process but a misunderstanding of the modern funnel found in Digital channels. For most companies, B2B or B2C, once the niche is determined, the hardest part is lead generation. This will be the case for all time but it doesn’t have to be that way.
On average, today’s buyers might be anywhere from two-thirds to 90% of the way through their journey before they contact a vendor. For this reason, a brand’s website, content and marketing communications are more critical than ever–this is especially true for the telecommunications industry.
B2B Lead Generation for Telecommunications
Like most of us, bigger purchases, especially those on contract, are completed on a longer timeline than something found within impulse shopping. Telecom customers are no different: this is about creating trust and motivating action for a longer relationship so it’s best to educate and inform potentials rather than interrupting and selling.
- What is the “job” that your services and products can solve? Is it awareness of tools and processes? Is it a simple product? Rather than pushing a service or product because the engineers or leadership might find it important, try to understand the initial questions posed by prospects and leads as they engage with your brand. Website content should be helpful and informative for the initial sales inquiry. Update this often.
- Social media can be a double-edged sword but if your telecommunications company is pushing toward having an identity of being helpful and understanding needs, negative interactions are merely the starting point for something positive. Buyers and stakeholder influencers spend time researching and keep up to date with industry advancements, and social media is at the center of the behavior.
- Content marketing, according to Demandmetric, costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates about 3 times as many leads. Sharing content on relevant third party sites can help gain recognition as ‘thought leaders’ in the industry. This functions both as a way to grow the brand voice, as well as feed robots and search engines. Keep in mind that Content Marketing is only one branch of SEO (see below)
- For Digital, a website is the hub for all digital marketing activity for a given telecom. Because it’s online, almost everything can be tracked, synced, recorded or challenged with a little effort and a lot of creativity. In knowing this, don’t be afraid of asking “what if” and testing that theory. The best gains we’ve seen are when companies pose a strategy and commit to testing it against other ideas. See more below about how to quantify that work.
- SEO is an entire blog post (and blog) by itself. At its core, the idea is the same as it has been for the past few years: how does a website’s presence provide value to an end user searching on a particular topic? Said another way, is the website as relevant as possible to its customers? If not, then SEO is needed to course correct. If so, then SEO is needed to grow even more relevant. Digital B2B marketing requires the same thoughts and actions. To succeed and be “first”, which can meet a lot of things, SEO is a must.
- Data-driven decision-making trumps guesswork. We have a saying, the HiPPO’s opinion should be weighted equally. The “HiPPO” is the Highest Paid Person’s Opinion. When it comes to digital, testing is everything. Just because a title is higher than another doesn’t always mean the ideas are better. To keep that simple: digital analytics facilitate telecoms in spending marketing money pragmatically. Using analytics to measure digital marketing efforts is a must and should be a daily practice for powering leads using SEO, social media and digital advertising.
These are just a few ideas to kick off the review of any telecommunication company’s digital marketing strategies. If you’re looking to grow your B2B leads, contact us to get started. We’re excited to get rolling!