By Dan Horan | Indian river Consulting Group
Your customers are used to making purchases online in their daily lives. And, more and more, they expect ecommerce in the working world, too. Too many distributors don’t focus enough on their B2B ecommerce – in some cases because they believe in-person field sales is their one and only go-to sales method, or because they feel they can’t compete with Amazon, so it’s pointless to invest in ecommerce. But in today’s market, you can’t afford either approach. And while it’s true you can’t beat Amazon at its own game, there are B2B marketing strategies distributors should implement to stay competitive. Here are seven:
Protect and Promote Your Brand. Your brand isn’t just a logo or a tagline. It is how customers – and your employees – view your company. And every contact a customer has with your company, whether online or in person, should reinforce your brand. Having an online presence makes your brand both more important and more vulnerable. Using the free tool Google Alerts is a good way to monitor your brand to ensure brand consistency.
Unify Marketing and Sales. Marketing and sales departments should work together as a team. That may be difficult at first, but conducting alignment meetings regularly allows both groups to develop a mutual understanding of companywide goals, and messages and strategies aligned with those goals.
Satisfy the Need for Speed. According to Hubspot, 47 percent of customers expect a webpage to load in two seconds or less.