Source: distributionstrategy.com
Distributors may realize marketing helps drive sales, but they don’t always understand how. Meeting Customers Where They Live
COVID is where distributors often draw the dividing line when customer expectations shifted. COVID changed many things in B2B, including driving many customers online, where they would research products before speaking to a sales rep, and even look to complete the transaction digitally if they could. They wanted less face-to-face. In a 2022 DSG report on The State of Distributor Customer Experience, 22% of customers said they never want a field sales rep to visit; 20% said an onsite once a year is enough.
According to Forbes, 12.7% of employees work from home full-time, while 28.2% split their time between in-office and remote. However, by 2025, 32.6 million Americans will be remote. Hernandez confirmed an out-of-office effect of COVID has lingered into 2023 for distributors. “There’s a number of customers that aren’t in the office now,” Hernandez said. “Also, I think the willingness to do events, whether it’s trainings, open houses or a lot of the traditional things distributors used to do has declined. I think it’s having a significant impact on how distributors do business.”
And it’s increased the importance of marketing in the sales equation.