Digital's Impact on
Today's B2B Companies

MARKETING & SALES ROLES ARE FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGING

Traditionally, the sales approach involved cold calls, trade shows, purchased contact lists, and other activities—many of which would be deemed spam-worthy by today’s standards. The marketing department produced brochures, one-sheets, and other marketing collateral to support sales efforts. When a buyer needed a product or solution, they would contact a vendor, get a brochure, engage a salesperson, listen to their pitch, and if they liked what they heard, make a purchase. The process was straightforward and predictable.

But today’s buyers have access to all the seller information they need (via Google search), and the B2B buying process has become a complex, non-linear journey—with the elimination of sellers occurring well before the salesperson is involved. In fact, according to a recent survey, only 12% of B2B buyers even want to meet with a sales representative. As a result, marketing, rather than sales, is responsible for feeding and nurturing the sales funnel, and the salesperson is reduced to assisting buyers in the final stages of the purchase journey.

Digital's Impact
on Today's B2B Companies

MARKETING & SALES ROLES ARE FUNDAMENTALLY CHANGING

Traditionally, the sales approach involved cold calls, trade shows, purchased contact lists, and other activities—many of which would be deemed spam-worthy by today’s standards. The marketing department produced brochures, one-sheets, and other marketing collateral to support sales efforts. When a buyer needed a product or solution, they would contact a vendor, get a brochure, engage a salesperson, listen to their pitch, and if they liked what they heard, make a purchase. The process was straightforward and predictable.

 

But today’s buyers have access to all the seller information they need (via Google search), and the B2B buying process has become a complex, non-linear journey—with the elimination of sellers occurring well before the salesperson is involved. In fact, according to a recent survey, only 12% of B2B buyers even want to meet with a sales representative. As a result, marketing, rather than sales, is responsible for feeding and nurturing the sales funnel, and the salesperson is reduced to assisting buyers in the final stages of the purchase journey.

Marketing's Role: Then & Now

Direct interaction between the buyer and seller has been steadily decreasing. Consequently, marketing has become an organization’s primary demand generation engine and needs to cover a much wider part of the sales funnel. In this new B2B era, sales and marketing teams must work together. The diagram below reflects the difference between sales and marketing roles in the old and new buyer’s journey.

sales marketing roles funnel 6

Consider these statistics about how today’s B2B buyers interact with suppliers and vendors:

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Only 17% of the B2B buying process is spent meeting with vendors
0
Almost 90% of the buyers journey is complete before engaging a vendor
0
62% of B2B buyers say they can make a purchase selection based solely on digital content

Marketing's Role: Then & Now

Direct interaction between the buyer and seller has been steadily decreasing. Consequently, marketing has become an organization’s primary demand generation engine and needs to cover a much wider part of the sales funnel. In this new B2B era, sales and marketing teams must work together. The diagram below reflects the difference between sales and marketing roles in the old and new buyer’s journey.

sales marketing roles funnel 6

Consider these statistics about how today’s B2B buyers interact with suppliers and vendors:

0
Only 17% of the B2B buying process is spent meeting with vendors
0
Almost 90% of the buyers journey is complete before engaging a vendor
0
62% of B2B buyers say they can make a purchase selection based solely on digital content

SHIFTING TO DIGITAL INTERACTIONS

The B2B Sales & Marketing
Inflection Point

In the past decade, the adoption of digital technologies moved forward at a steady pace. But in just a few months, COVID-19 brought years of change in the way companies do business. According to a recent study, the pandemic sped up digital transformation by 5.3 years, and it is estimated that spending on digital transformation will nearly double between 2020 and 2023. The prevailing wisdom used to be that e-commerce was only for small-ticket items. Not so anymore. Now, more than 75% of buyers and sellers state they prefer digital, self-guided service and remote interactions over in-person engagements. As buyers shift more activities online, businesses will need to accelerate marketing and sales transformation plans to stay relevant and competitive.

b2b marketing video cover 2

SHIFTING TO DIGITAL INTERACTIONS

The B2B Sales & Marketing Inflection Point

b2b marketing video cover 2

In the past decade, the adoption of digital technologies moved forward at a steady pace. But in just a few months, COVID-19 brought years of change in the way companies do business. According to a recent study, the pandemic sped up digital transformation by 5.3 years, and it is estimated that spending on digital transformation will nearly double between 2020 and 2023. The prevailing wisdom used to be that e-commerce was only for small-ticket items. Not so anymore. Now, more than 75% of buyers and sellers state they prefer digital, self-guided service and remote interactions over in-person engagements. As buyers shift more activities online, businesses will need to accelerate marketing and sales transformation plans to stay relevant and competitive.

Understanding The Buyer's Journey

The Buyer’s Journey is the process consumers go through to become aware of, evaluate, and purchase a product or service. These three stages make up the inbound marketing framework: awareness, consideration, and decision. Dymic analyzes the Buyer’s Journey through this lens to conceptualize the buyer’s path and create relevant, buyer-persona-targeted content for each stage in the buying process.

Stage 1. Awareness

In this stage, the prospect is becoming aware of a problem or need. They're seeking answers to questions, defining pain points, and establishing their goals/objectives. At this point, it is important to provide buyers with information about the product, service, and company in a neutral, educational, and non-salesy way.

Stage 2. Consideration

With a clearly defined goal or challenge and a commitment to address it, this phase is where buyers evaluate different methods to solve their problem. The goal here is to help them understand and frame the problem, explain the various solutions, provide a competitive analysis, and guide them toward your product or service.

Stage 3. Decision

The final stage is where buyers make decisions about solutions and vendors based on their research. If the purchase involves a monetary investment, they'll likely have to get buy-in from upper management. The focus should be on information about pricing, endorsements, and ROI to justify the decision and expenditure.

Understanding The Buyer's Journey

The Buyer’s Journey is the process consumers go through to become aware of, evaluate, and purchase a product or service. These three stages make up the inbound marketing framework: awareness, consideration, and decision. Dymic analyzes the Buyer’s Journey through this lens to conceptualize the buyer’s path and create relevant, buyer-persona-targeted content for each stage in the buying process.

Stage 1. Awareness

In this stage, the prospect is becoming aware of a problem or need. They're seeking answers to questions, defining pain points, and establishing their goals/objectives. At this point, it is important to provide buyers with information about the product, service, and company in a neutral, educational, and non-salesy way.

Stage 2. Consideration

With a clearly defined goal or challenge and a commitment to address it, this phase is where buyers evaluate different methods to solve their problem. The goal here is to help them understand and frame the problem, explain the various solutions, provide a competitive analysis, and guide them toward your product or service.

Stage 3. Decision

The final stage is where buyers make decisions about solutions and vendors based on their research. If the purchase involves a monetary investment, they'll likely have to get buy-in from upper management. The focus should be on information about pricing, endorsements, and ROI to justify the decision and expenditure.

PUSH VS. PULL

New B2B
Marketing Mindset

Today, B2B buyers do most of their research online, and they value suppliers who make it easier for them to navigate the purchase process. When there is an interaction with sales, it is much more consultative—with sellers providing helpful information about products and services via case studies, white-papers, and other forms of buyer-driven content. Instead of always-be-closing (push-logic), the new approach is always-be-helping (pull-logic). This makes content offerings for each stage of the journey essential to helping the buyer through their decision-making process. Moreover, it means content marketing is critical to B2B sales and marketing success.

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76% of marketers use organic traffic as a measure of content success
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Over half of all content created in 2019 was for the top of the sales funnel

PUSH VS. PULL

New B2B
Marketing Mindset

Today, B2B buyers do most of their research online, and they value suppliers who make it easier for them to navigate the purchase process. When there is an interaction with sales, it is much more consultative—with sellers providing helpful information about products and services via case studies, white-papers, and other forms of buyer-driven content. Instead of always-be-closing (push-logic), the new approach is always-be-helping (pull-logic). This makes content offerings for each stage of the journey essential to helping the buyer through their decision-making process. Moreover, it means content marketing is critical to B2B sales and marketing success.

0
76% of marketers use organic traffic as a measure of content success
0
Over half of all content created in 2019
was for the top of the sales funnel

IDEAS, INSIGHTS & THOUGHT-LEADERSHIP

Content: New B2B Marketing Fuel

The emergence of digital raised the level of expertise required for marketing success and now there are hundreds of skills and disciplines in the B2B marketing toolkit. But in a world where buyers are inundated with advertisements, nothing matters more than hyper-relevant, buyer-focused content because people care about their problems more than they care about products or services. Since marketing now owns most of the sales pipeline, content has become the sales consultant, sales pitch, and subject matter expert. The importance of ideas, insights, and thought-leadership—expressed through content—has never been clearer. Here are some of the content creation benefits, along with a link to download our B2B Content Marketing Strategy Checklist.

Trusted Source

Position the company as a thought leader who can help buyers solve their problems

Inspire Engagement

Encourage buyers to reach out to the sales team for answers to their questions

Lead Generation

Generate more leads by accessing people already looking for the product or service

Lead Nurturing

Progress existing leads - moving them along your marketing funnel - until they’re sales-ready

Retargeting

Build a database for lead-nurturing, retargeting, and to measure the value of content

Brand Exposure

Expand the company's reach and influence to get in front of more decision makers

Contribute

Establish the brand as a valuable resource and an asset to the community

Sales Support

Give the sales team more ways to engage and add value before and after the sale

IDEAS, INSIGHTS
& THOUGHT-LEADERSHIP

Content: New B2B Marketing Fuel

The emergence of digital raised the level of expertise required for marketing success and now there are hundreds of skills and disciplines in the B2B marketing toolkit. But in a world where buyers are inundated with advertisements, nothing matters more than hyper-relevant, buyer-focused content because people care about their problems more than they care about products or services.

 

Since marketing now owns most of the sales pipeline, content has become the sales consultant, sales pitch, and subject matter expert. The importance of ideas, insights, and thought-leadership—expressed through content—has never been clearer. Here are some of the content creation benefits, along with a link to download our B2B Content Marketing Strategy Checklist.

Trusted Source

Position the company as a thought leader who can help buyers solve their problems

Inspire Engagement

Encourage buyers to reach out to the sales team for answers to their questions

Lead Generation

Generate more leads by accessing people already looking for the product or service

Lead Nurturing

Progress existing leads - moving them along your marketing funnel - until they’re sales-ready

Retargeting

Build a database for lead-nurturing, retargeting, and to measure the value of content

Brand Exposure

Expand the company's reach and influence to get in front of more decision makers

Contribute

Establish the brand as a valuable resource and an asset to the community

Sales Support

Give the sales team more ways to engage and add value before and after the sale

New B2B
Marketing Engine

THE MOST IMPORTANT B2B MARKETING PILLARS

The key to understanding how search, social, and inbound work together is in the problem they solve: buyer information discovery. When brands capture their expertise, package it, and distribute it through these channels using the inbound framework, it helps buyers do their jobs and make smarter decisions. Moreover, it earns attention, creates value, establishes trust, and develops a more valuable brand-buyer relationship. These three pillars are critical to earning more traffic, driving more conversions, and building a formidable content brand, and it’s how successful B2B brands are winning the battle for their buyer’s attention.

b2b weapons light crop 6

New B2B
Marketing Engine

THE MOST IMPORTANT B2B MARKETING PILLARS

The key to understanding how search, social, and inbound work together is in the problem they solve: buyer information discovery. When brands capture their expertise, package it, and distribute it through these channels using the inbound framework, it helps buyers do their jobs and make smarter decisions. Moreover, it earns attention, creates value, establishes trust, and develops a more valuable brand-buyer relationship. These three pillars are critical to earning more traffic, driving more conversions, and building a formidable content brand, and it’s how successful B2B brands are winning the battle for their buyer’s attention.

b2b weapons light crop 6

Tap image to enlarge

Search
Pillar #1

Increase Traffic
& Bridge the Divide

Understanding what people are searching for, the answers they seek, the words they use, and the type of content they need is essential to B2B marketing success. The answers to these questions enable brands to connect buyers with the solutions they offer. High quality content is what earns backlinks, and it's what search engines crawl on a website. Creating content that aligns with the audience’s intent is one side of the SEO coin. Delivering it in a way that buyers and search engine’s can find and understand it – is the other side.

0
48 percent of people cited web design is the #1 factor in determining the credibility of a business.
0
67% of marketers say SEO is the most effective marketing tactic
Website Design

Turn the organization's brochure website into a lead generation machine.

SEO

Use content strategy to optimize the buyer’s journey & increase traffic

PPC (Google Ads)

Get in front of new, more qualified prospects actively seeking solutions

Conversion Optimization

Streamline the sales funnel & customer experience to improve conversion rates

Social
Pillar #2

Solve the B2B
Social Media Problem

Social media is especially challenging for B2B brands, and they typically fall prey to the following pitfalls: posting without purpose, creating content that falls flat, and building campaigns that come across too salesy. But Social Media offers a way to differentiate, demonstrate authenticity, and build trust. Moreover, it provides an opportunity to make life better for the audience. Whether it's helping them buy with confidence, making them wiser about the industry or giving them insight into the brand and its products or services. And when companies make it easy for buyers to make smart purchases, they voice their positive experiences, leave positive reviews, provide endorsements, and refer their friends, families and business associates.

0
46% of all social media traffic to company websites come from LinkedIn
0
85% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.
LinkedIn Marketing

Access decision makers, generate leads & build a database for lead nurturing

Social Media Marketing

Create a content strategy to differentiate, build trust and educate the audience

Review Management

Integrate reviews and endorsements in the B2B customer experience

Public Relations

Connect with partners, suppliers & investors to help scale the company

Inbound
Pillar #3

Adopt & Embrace
the Inbound Methodology

The Inbound Marketing Methodology integrates content marketing with a range of other digital marketing tactics, like SEO, PPC and email, to maximize the generation of traffic, leads and revenue. Most importantly, it aligns digital marketing efforts with the buyer’s needs, pain-points, and decision making process at a time when they are most interested in finding a solution. When marketers understand the way their buyers make decisions, it’s much easier to see which tactics play a role in each stage of the journey. Not only does the Inbound Strategy produce more qualified, sales ready leads, but it does so for a fraction of the traditional outbound sales and marketing costs.

0
60% of marketers say that inbound is their highest quality source of leads
0
On average, every $1 spent on email marketing results in $44 in ROI
Buyer Persona
Development

Create buyer personas to define target customers & refine messaging

Customer Journey Mapping

Optimize customer experience across touch-points for buyer personas

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

Track interactions and capture customer data for marketing automation

Inbound Marketing Automation

Engage, nurture, and automatically guide buyers through their journey

Search
Pillar #1

Increase Traffic & Bridge the Divide

Understanding what people are searching for, the answers they seek, the words they use, and the type of content they need is essential to B2B marketing success. The answers to these questions enable brands to connect buyers with the solutions they offer. High quality content is what earns backlinks, and it's what search engines crawl on a website. Creating content that aligns with the audience’s intent is one side of the SEO coin. Delivering it in a way that buyers and search engine’s can find and understand it – is the other side.

0
48 percent of people cited web design is the #1 factor in determining the credibility of a business.
0
67% of marketers say SEO is the most effective marketing tactic
Website Design

Turn the organization's brochure website into a lead generation machine.

SEO

Use content strategy to optimize the buyer’s journey & increase traffic

PPC (Google Ads)

Get in front of new, more qualified prospects actively seeking solutions

Conversion Optimization

Streamline the sales funnel & customer experience to improve conversion rates

Social
Pillar #2

Solve the B2B Social Media Problem

Social media is especially challenging for B2B brands, and they typically fall prey to the following pitfalls: posting without purpose, creating content that falls flat, and building campaigns that come across too salesy. But Social Media offers a way to differentiate, demonstrate authenticity, and build trust. Moreover, it provides an opportunity to make life better for the audience. Whether it's helping them buy with confidence, making them wiser about the industry or giving them insight into the brand and its products or services. And when companies make it easy for buyers to make smart purchases, they voice their positive experiences, leave positive reviews, provide endorsements, and refer their friends, families and business associates.

0
46% of all social media traffic to company websites come from LinkedIn
0
85% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.
LinkedIn Marketing

Access decision makers, generate leads & build a database for lead nurturing

Social Media Marketing

Create a content strategy to differentiate, build trust and educate the audience

Review Management

Integrate reviews and endorsements in the B2B customer experience

Public Relations

Connect with partners, suppliers & investors to help scale the company

Inbound
Pillar #3

Adopt & Embrace the Inbound Methodology

The Inbound Marketing Methodology integrates content marketing with a range of other digital marketing tactics, like SEO, PPC and email, to maximize the generation of traffic, leads and revenue. Most importantly, it aligns digital marketing efforts with the buyer’s needs, pain-points, and decision making process at a time when they are most interested in finding a solution. When marketers understand the way their buyers make decisions, it’s much easier to see which tactics play a role in each stage of the journey. Not only does the Inbound Strategy produce more qualified, sales ready leads, but it does so for a fraction of the traditional outbound sales and marketing costs.

0
60% of marketers say that inbound is their highest quality source of leads
0
On average, every $1 spent on email marketing results in $44 in ROI
Buyer Persona Development

Create buyer personas to define target customers & refine messaging

Customer Journey Mapping

Optimize customer experience across touch-points for buyer personas

Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

Track interactions and capture customer data for marketing automation

Inbound Marketing Automation

Engage, nurture, and automatically guide buyers through their journey

THE DYMIC DASHBOARD

Tracking B2B Marketing Performance

Dymic’s Analytics Dashboard provides clients with comprehensive campaign reporting to track and measure incremental gains and key metrics in the three pillars (search, social, and inbound) of their B2B marketing strategy. This reporting tool integrates with Google Analytics and social platforms to show Dymic clients exactly how their marketing campaigns impact their bottom-line. And the dashboard can be used on any device so clients can see the value of their marketing investment anytime, anywhere.

THE DYMIC DASHBOARD

Tracking B2B Marketing Performance

Dymic’s Analytics Dashboard provides clients with comprehensive campaign reporting to track and measure incremental gains and key metrics in the three pillars (search, social, and inbound) of their B2B marketing strategy. This reporting tool integrates with Google Analytics and social platforms to show Dymic clients exactly how their marketing campaigns impact their bottom-line. And the dashboard can be used on any device so clients can see the value of their marketing investment anytime, anywhere.

B2B Marketing
Testimonials

Web Design, SEO & Digital Marketing
Our law firm remained the same size for nearly 3 decades — one location, two attorneys and about 3-4 legal secretaries. Since launching our campaigns with Dymic, our firm has over tripled in size. We just purchased a second office building to meet our growing needs and now staff 9 attorneys and about 20 legal staff. Their team is extremely talented. I highly recommend reaching out to Dymic.
Adam Savin

Partner, Law Offices of Savin & Bursk

Review Management & Social Media Marketing
I have the professional pleasure of working with Dymic with their Review Management and Social Media services, and I could not be happier. I have worked with countless agencies and marketing service providers in the past 20 years, and the sheer professionalism, clear communication and responsiveness to our account is unparalleled. Thanks Dymic, for making my professional life easier and for making the clients look like rock stars!
Heather Schueppert

CMO, Unified Women’s Healthcare

Web Design & SEO
Dymic has worked with me to address my needs as an artist and a business from our first meeting. They recommend solid solutions and know how to implement them. The SEO work they've put into my website is solid. I was lost in google and now you can find me on the first two pages of Google. They are knowledgeable, responsive, and effective. The people that work there, from design to SEO, are true professionals you can actually trust.
Caroline Malouf

Owner, Caroline Malouf Photography

SEO Client Testimonials

Web Design, SEO & Digital Marketing
Our law firm remained the same size for nearly 3 decades — one location, two attorneys and about 3-4 legal secretaries. Since launching our campaigns with Dymic, our firm has over tripled in size. We just purchased a second office building to meet our growing needs and now staff 9 attorneys and about 20 legal staff. Their team is extremely talented. I highly recommend reaching out to Dymic.
Adam Savin

Partner, Law Offices of Savin & Bursk

Review Management & Social Media Marketing
I have the professional pleasure of working with Dymic with their Review Management and Social Media services, and I could not be happier. I have worked with countless agencies and marketing service providers in the past 20 years, and the sheer professionalism, clear communication and responsiveness to our account is unparalleled. Thanks Dymic, for making my professional life easier and for making the clients look like rock stars!
Heather Schueppert

CMO, Unified Women’s Healthcare

Web Design & SEO
Dymic has worked with me to address my needs as an artist and a business from our first meeting. They recommend solid solutions and know how to implement them. The SEO work they've put into my website is solid. I was lost in google and now you can find me on the first two pages of Google. They are knowledgeable, responsive, and effective. The people that work there, from design to SEO, are true professionals you can actually trust.
Caroline Malouf

Owner, Caroline Malouf Photography

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