The Influence of Big Data in B2B Marketing

The Influence of Big Data in B2B Marketing

Over the past decade, it has become evident that Data is the oil of any business; its absence will cause dependence on trial and error for any operation. Big Data has been popular because it allows more extensive capabilities for gaining accurate insights, and companies can capitalize on it heavily. There are various ways to leverage Big Data in marketing and sales to gain a competitive advantage.

Big Data is the collection of enormous quantities of structured and unstructured data from multiple channels, which would be impossible for traditional models to analyze effectively. Data analysis techniques and analytics tools are used to examine and process the data. This Data offers possibilities to build highly responsive and accurate campaigns with its ability to precisely target the three critical Ws – who, when, and what.

How Big Data Affects Marketing

Since sales and marketing have different targets to cover and measure success, it has often led to disagreements. Applying the old and siloed approach to the various teams causes conflicts. Big Data analytics helps collate all these different systems into a unified structure with a collective set of particular goals. These systems act as data sources that help set up different segments and audiences for marketing, create a precise go-to-market strategy, and guide targeted advertising campaigns.

Big Data helps reshape the company’s anatomy, provided all the departments are interconnected and function in an integrated way to leverage the benefits.

Knowing where to focus marketing efforts is essential, and with Big Data, businesses can achieve amplified results in lead generation, targeting, and increased sales. When combined with AI and analytics, Big Data can identify target audiences’ locations, preferences, behavior, and activities.

This responsiveness delivers a better ability to create new market segments, demand generation, and opportunities to optimize and enhance omni-channel and multi-channel marketing experiences.

B2B sales and marketing now have only one end goal – providing complete and exceptional customer service across all channels. And this experience can be provided through customization and personalization.

Personalization helps in relevant and precise targeting, like creating an offer, webpage, ad, or coupon that shows different copies for existing or frequent visitors compared to new ones. This strategy can be tweaked according to the type of business and types of marketplaces- like digital storefronts or online shops.

Another example would be customizing the price based on the customer-product combination, which is valuable for B2B businesses. Each customer is different, and there must be an automated data stream to help optimize and allow orders and reorders with information from earlier purchases. Analyzing a complete data set to decide the most beneficial customizations can help boost conversion rates.

Big Data and ABM Strategy Go Hand in Hand

The challenge B2B faces compared to B2C is the number of users available for conversion. But, even though these numbers aren’t large, the customers demand highly customizable services. Here, every customer acts as an island himself, and segmenting them into groups does not stay relevant anymore. This issue has led to the birth of the ABM approach.

With ABM, treating every account as a separate market becomes more manageable, causing a clear shift from the regular MQL strategy. Therefore, Account-based Marketing is one of the most popular approaches that leverage Data and propel growth. The fundamental prerequisite for creating an ABM approach has precise, accurate, quality data that helps identify paramount accounts and makes targeting easier. With the help of demographic and firmographic data, identifying markets, reaching them across multiple channels, and delivering relevant content becomes a swift process.

Takeaway

Every organization has its set of distinct opportunities and challenges, but with proper technology like Big Data, organizations can reap the benefits, regardless of size. The key is high-quality data that drives better decisions. Data quality is the critical determining factor for building a go-to-market strategy, as every year proves, and this will continue to impact every single thing in the future.

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Data Enrichment Strategies to Boost Revenue

More data is always welcome, especially in B2B. But the ground reality is that the information is good only when accurate. This accuracy calls for data enrichment.

Data Enrichment

Data enrichment is about turning tons of raw data into cleaned, structured, dependable data with updated data points, which is verified with third-party sources.

Third-party databases and tools make it easier to analyze the accuracy, remove redundant data, and add new insights. We can use this data to build robust account–based marketing campaigns, segment audiences, and more.

Benefits of Data Enrichment

Data enrichment helps teams make better decisions by providing access to more accurate data. It doesn’t just help augment the data but also enhances the quality as there is not just addition but also verification of accuracy. We can highlight new opportunities that otherwise could have been missed by analyzing and enhancing data.

Data Enrichment vs. Data Cleansing

People often incorrectly interchange these two words, even though they are related to data hygiene but mean different things. Enrichment verifies and improves data with third-party databases, while Cleansing removes inaccurate, corrupt, or redundant data.

Data Enrichment Strategies to Amplify Sales and Marketing Outputs

Companies with extensive databases or those which are generating a large number of leads every month find the data overwhelming.

Here are a few strategies that help enrich the lead data.

Starting with a strategy that is the most relevant, and then adding new ones to the process as per the requirements will be a good move.

Creating Longer Forms to Gain More Details

Even though looking for deeper information could result in fewer leads, these will be higher-quality ones. So, instead of wasting time on longer lead gen forms, it may be smarter to integrate a chatbot that asks these questions in a less intrusive way but helps gather more details.

This data can be compared with the CRM or email marketing tool to confirm its accuracy.

Leveraging Lead Gen Tools

Lead generation and data science tools identify online visitors as per IP address and domain and then match that information with the contact database. This tool allows one to check where the company visitors work, the company’s size, location, and the best point of contact.

Cross–checking other databases, adding new info to the current one, and importing into the CRM to see it all together can be done by retrieving the behavioral data about each lead, such as the pages they viewed, how much time they spent on a page, when they exited, what page didn‘t interest them, acquisition source, and so on.

Sending Out Surveys to Prospects/Customers

There are many data enrichment tools in the market; but that also means that competitors also have the same data. Gathering first-party data about the audience is a reliable way to ensure the data is valid and valuable for the organization.

Customer surveys make it easier to obtain the necessary information, which can then be used to segment audiences, target them with upsells, and deliver better customer service.

Using LinkedIn Sales Navigator

LinkedIn Sales Navigator is the best friend of a B2B sales representative as it offers deep insights into individuals and organizations. It helps sales teams to discover target accounts by digging for companies and filtering them based on location, industry, and more. As it also integrates with different CRMs, verifying data that is already there about prospective leads becomes effortless. This sure-shot information helps the sales team cold call with more accurate information about prospects.

Takeaway

Data enrichment is crucial for improving the data quality so the organization can make more profitable decisions. When marketing, sales, and business leaders have sounder data, they can build better campaigns, target more accurately, and make strategic decisions that increase the organization’s revenue.

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5 Transformations to Embrace in the B2B Market in 2023

Since the past few years, all B2B market solutions have been revving their digital transformation. But it is challenging because many businesses take longer to attain the expected outcomes from digitization. The evolving technology infrastructure and the resulting inadequacy of companies to understand its requirements and full potential are the prime reasons for failing digital transformations.

The new marketing and sales trends in 2023 will impact everyone, including leadership and each member of the entire organization.

Check out the process modifications to adopt in 2023 to the ever-changing market.

  1. Artificial Intelligence to Rule

The impact of Artificial Intelligence on various industries is quite intense and is expected only to increase in upcoming years. To understand their target audience better, marketers use AI-based tools to collect accurate and valuable customer data that will help define insights to develop marketing strategies for better audience attraction and retention. These insights and data are crucial for marketers to optimize spending, customize and create targeted content, and personalize the customer experience. Furthermore, it predicts industry trends to help in future planning.

AI-based lead prospecting tools enable marketers to bridge the gap between the present situation and desired goals. It helps them augment their outreach campaigns with intelligent features.

With such tools, organizations can drastically enhance their B2B database with the most reliable information to reach ideal prospects while generating optimal lists of millions of decision-makers.

Any organization can use new AI solutions to revolutionize its commercial game, regardless of size. Such tools assist B2B firms at both the micro and macro levels, making it evident that AI technology will soon become the core of sales and marketing.

  1. Corporate Social Responsibilities Matter

Consumers today prefer brands that balance their revenue-focused endeavors with socially beneficial causes.

Numerous consumers now check the brand values when purchasing something. To make a positive difference with their purchases, customers are conscious of the brands they associate with. This has also driven marketers to start taking their social responsibility seriously by showcasing their efforts in CSR campaigns. The advantage also comes from a positive re-enforcement of brand image, as customers are inclined to pay more for brands that exhibit social responsibility. It could be merely giving a portion of the profits to charity and sponsoring community services. It helps build a good reputation and trustworthiness amongst the market and potential customers.

  1. Data Privacy is a Must

Data privacy and security are the major growing concerns. While people knew about identity theft and data breaches, the rise in different cyber-attacks has made customers aware of their data vulnerability. Many well-known companies are taking measures to ensure customer security.

Even though this doesn’t fall under any marketing strategy, providing increased data security allows customers to sign up for demos quickly, services, trials, white papers, e-books, reports, and other similar offerings without fearing identity theft or data leaks. Ensuring privacy helps build trust amongst prospects.

For generating qualified leads, upgrading the privacy software and only requesting data when required to carry out further operations will prove vital.

  1. Humans Win Over Bots Any Day

Even though chatbots are available 24 x 7, nothing beats person-to-person conversation, specifically when trying to settle essential issues like payment or order status.

Very few B2B buyers buy online, and companies should focus on personal interactions to tap into its benefits by gaining more prospects.

Businesses need to understand that B2B buyers also expect similar purchasing experiences as B2C. Whether online or offline, B2B buyers now wish for instantaneous response and service. They prefer information that is simple to find and effortless to use. They also want to quickly place repeat orders online, which many brands still need to offer on their sites. The challenge for B2B marketers here is to take notes of the excellent customer assistance skills that B2C agents provide online and try to replicate them as much as possible.

  1. LinkedIn Audience Targeting to Get Sharper

Audience targeting has seen disruptive changes over the decade, especially since the pandemic, due to an explosion of media options and innovative brand strategies. Even though B2B has fewer options of channels compared to B2C, some of them will stand the test of time, while others will not. Unless LinkedIn brings some impractical features, it will likely remain a reliable B2B channel for upcoming years.

Changes to Expect in Demand, Content, and Intent on the Threshold of 2023

Changes to Expect in Demand, Content, and Intent on the Threshold of 2023

The year is about to end, and every organization has started the B2B marketing and sales goals planning for 2023. As the competition for attracting and retaining customers is high, devising a B2B strategy that delivers expected results needs serious-minded preparation, implementation, and management. It becomes essential in B2B because the business purchase decisions are based more on the bottom line than the number of consumers. After all, return on investment (ROI) is a principal focal point for all corporate decision-makers.

So, while planning for 2023, the key priorities revolve around demand, content, and intent.

Re-designing Demand Gen Campaigns to Capture More Incredible Opportunities

Most demand-generation organizations, until very recently, were focused on growing the number of leads at the least possible cost. But after witnessing the inevitable drop in performance and knowing the rise of ABM-focused thinking, there is a drastic shift in the thinking pattern of these organizations.

For 2023, these are the anticipated insights to advance and gain momentum in the following areas:

In-depth understanding of buyers’ journeys – time and place to take actions

Gaining better visibility into buyer research activity and focusing on things that could be done better will help to recognize more opportunities and speed up the efforts. But it is one thing to understand what is happening and another to do something about it. Teams that understand and execute this effectively will achieve more growth in their journey.

Different indicators will suffuse Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs)

Nobody asks the marketing teams to forsake MQLs completely. The organizations will have to incorporate much more data on the buyer’s journey and get the team’s input into their qualification methods. This approach will help in generating suitable MQLs.

ABM-focused thinking will continue to impact demand-generation practices

Some companies used to have a dedicated ABM resource to work on a group of accounts, but now most firms admit the known benefits of perceptively sectioning and prioritizing their audiences. After checking these concepts, new practices using ABM principles as inspiration will be selected and rolled out.

The B2B Content Creation Challenges

B2B buyers have an unappeasable hunger for data when they search for de-risking their operations and improving execution, and they also like to stay updated. Their preferences for learning and accessing the content keep changing over time. The increasing need for information and constantly changing priorities for the nature of content further indicates that organizations need to keep up to speed with these searches.

Here are a few ways to keep up with these challenges in the coming year:

The dependency on data will increase to manage buyer’s lifecycle issues

The teams will focus on being more data- and market-driven instead of relying on word-of-mouth and hunches. Solid data will take precedence in planning insights, brand positioning, messaging style, targeting, and delivering to various disparate targets across all touchpoints.

To execute at scale and overcome obstacles, organizations will use process innovations

Organizations will have to make more systematic approaches in devising content ideas for advancing in management, staffing, executions, and measuring their outputs.

B2B leaders will focus on maximizing the reach and impact of owned media by increasing the organization’s participation

The concept of thought leadership must extend beyond the marketing team’s assets or the contributions made by corporate leaders. It is essential to start enabling the sales team from the beginning and eventually leverage most employees to maximize reach. This way, a company can boost its brand presence.

Embracing the Growing Importance of Intent Data

Even if there is excitement in the market around the impact that intent data can have on business potential, there still needs to be clarity about how to leverage it to its fullest potential. This confusion holds for many such categories that are still evolving, as there are crucial nuances and intricacies that the go-to-market teams should understand while they evaluate investments.

Here are some ways people will be utilizing intent data in 2023:

Creating more refined techniques for acquiring and leveraging intent

Today, many organizations are past the reluctant stages of intent data adoption and have a more precise direction on bringing together people, methods, and technology to create value and retain it.

B2B organizations will focus on leveraging insights more broadly to address the buyer needs

Even though it has been known for some time now that buyers and buying teams are dynamic, the GTM (go-to-market) organizations are expected to outperform themselves in 2023. This expectation is based on the likelihood of them better incorporating data and its insights into their planning and action.

Go-to-market organizations will implement intent data to more use cases

The first generation of intent data adoption is almost gone, and it has become a must-have for advertising and related marketing campaigns. Also, many people are already aggressively trying to harness intent data within their sales organizations. In the coming year, it will be correct to expect that intent insight will impact planning to direct the communication and brand position and to serve as input during the product initiatives.

Amplifying Demand Generation ROI by Building TALs in a Smarter Way

Amplifying Demand Generation ROI by Building TALs in a Smarter Way

Every demand generation marketer creates Target Account Lists (TALs) for campaigns, as it is crucial to devising the brand communication based on the audience’s niche. However, that’s winning only half the battle. Many marketers need help to reach actual in-market buyers because they rely solely on their CRM’s static account information.

It is shocking to see when Salesforce’s 2021 State of Marketing report mentions that only 39% of marketers feel complacent with the target accounts they have found for their ABM campaigns.

Taking the TAL and Campaign Creation Up a Notch

Leveraging intent data and layering it into the TALs for determining high-revenue prospects will prove beneficial for companies. Such prospects can be identified based on various channels’ recent and diverse buying signals. This way, it will be easier to contact pivotal decision-makers who might be in search of the solutions being offered.

It is easier to nurture high-value prospects across their journey with precise and personalized communication via the proper channels, when there is clarity on who researches what, when, and works at which firm.

Building Intent-based TALs Allows to:

  • Identify accounts that are in dire need of a solution, based on keywords and engagement
  • Create relevant and clearer Call to Action
  • Develop well-intended landing pages that have clear messaging
  • Formulate crisp ad copy and straightforward emails aimed at the buyer’s intent
  • Devise the most resonating content for in-market buyers

How to Reap Benefits of Building Intent-driven TALs

Refining Selection Process for Target Accounts and Choosing those that Best Fit the ICP

All marketers use demographic, firmographics, psychographic, and behavioral data to build and categorize TALs that closely match their ICPs (Ideal Customer Profiles). However, having these datasets and utilizing them to launch targeted marketing programs for prospects with buying intent are two disparate things. Knowing the mindset of potential buyers when they make a decision and the steps they may take in different situations, is the key to unlocking the revenue capabilities.

This is where quality intent data comes into the picture. Applying it to all the knowledge layers helps predict buying journeys better and offers a more targeted and personalized buying experience.

It would make more sense if the intent data providers could send two reports – one based on TALs and the other based on ICPs as a more comprehensive parameter. Comparing these two lists will help identify in-market yet new accounts with high intent scores that fit in the ICP but are not present in the current TAL. Planning targeted marketing programs with a precise TAL and niche contacts will be able to deliver higher conversion rates than a generic marketing campaign with a large TAL.

Tapping into ‘Behind the Firewall’ Buyer Intent Signals and Adding Data Diversity

Intent signals from various buyer personas can be gathered via multiple channels across multiple touchpoints. To get a complete picture of target accounts, the data needs to be adequately diverse.

Buyer intent signals range from app and tool activities, all the way to comments on blogs, videos, and forums, reviews, ratings, and comparisons. Information about ad clicks, websites, and third-party and owned content is also an intent signal. But some of the most important yet ignored intent signals can be found from ‘behind the firewall,’ meaning helpdesk Q&As, infrastructure monitoring information, downloads, remote support interactions, and community platforms.

The value derived from building TALs and the power of intent data highly depends on the source. It is essential to choose an intent data provider that can identify and administer engagement signals via all touchpoints, including the ones behind the firewall.

Expanding Reach to In-Market Accounts by Blending Own and Third-Party Intent Data

Combining first and third-party data builds the most reliable indicator of buying intent. It offers broader coverage and full-funnel, in-depth account-based signals. It speeds up the creation of new prospect segments with purchase intent and customizes the marketing and sales outreach campaigns.

Blending first-party intent data from owned and operated channels with reliable third-party data from intense market research and communities’ insights, builds a high-quality and fully scaled TAL.

Capturing actionable intent signals from this combined set of all-party intent data will help gain better reach into the buying collective. With a better understanding of the actual use cases of intent data, identifying the most critical questions for B2B intent data vendors will be much simpler.

What to Expect After Building Intent-based TALs

The quality and depth of intent data utilized to build TALs will be an essential factor in determining the success of the demand generation campaigns.

Appropriately created focused intent-based TALs will help in –

  • Building a robust sales pipeline
  • Shortening the duration of the sales cycle
  • Driving better acceleration on the pipeline’s influence
  • Creating relevant, targeted, and personalized content
  • Gaining higher quality lead funnel with prospects that are on the verge of conversion
  • Saving time and enhancing efficiency by targeting the in-market prospects
  • Gaining zoomed-in and clear visibility into the buying intent of the prospects
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Harnessing the Power of an Impeccable Triad – Research, Content, and Communities

The current business environment has presented several challenges for B2B marketers. One of them is the complex transformation to an almost entirely digital journey. This is probably the basis for the belief that buyers are more likely to contact B2B vendors only in the later stages of their purchase cycle.

Such rumors cause two misconceptions:

  1. B2B buyers don’t consider vendors suitable to their purchase cycle

B2B buyers need community forums, credible publications, and subject matter experts to identify products and solutions that will help them sustain or grow their businesses. They also assume that vendor teams have a high level of expertise because they make the solution. Hence the idea that they like to connect with these experts at a later stage of the buying cycle doesn’t make sense. Expert help is needed early on in the requirements discussion. To prove this to be accurate, the change marketers need to make is to become a reliable and trusted source of insights for buyers, and they will gain entry early on in the decision-making process for buyers.

  1. Till the end of the cycle, B2B buyers prefer to avoid personal interaction with vendors.

False, again. Even though digital connection is the preferred form of outreach, personal interactions are always in fashion. B2B buyers like personalized communications and not just generic outreach, messaging, or emails that address a whole market. Here, marketers need to create well-intended personalized digital touch.

The B2B environment is creating new possibilities to engage closely with the buying collective, even though it is complex and challenging.

So, to engage with B2B buyers in the most effective way, the best strategy is to leverage the power of the triad – content, research, and community. Marketers can generate a more significant ROI with this communication combo.

Strategies to leverage the power of the triad and engage with buyers more efficiently –

STEP 1: Elevating all the experiences under the triad

Enhancing research-based marketing experience

Research must be credible and legitimate and not simply dull. Although, marketers are yet to fully utilize market research to entrust buyers and persuade them to test the viability of a new product or service. The power of in-depth analysis is immense as it helps with planning the direction of marketing strategies and creating a vendor-neutral narrative for more credible content.

Market research will be critical for B2B sellers to build thought leadership, enlighten and guide choice, and offer reliable data. If the data is credible, then buyers can utilize and disseminate it.

Enhancing the content-marketing experience

B2B buyers seek reliable, influential, and independent voices on the topics they are interested in. They prefer brands that have a reputation in domain expertise.

In the ocean of content available for consumption, brands can level up by harnessing plausible editorial representatives to stand out in B2B content marketing. They act as trusted sources of information that address the audience’s pain points and bridge knowledge gaps.

When trusted and well-known editorial voices deliver on the topics that B2B buyers care about, they are more likely to associate with the brand and respond positively to the ads and content sponsorships.

Enhancing the community marketing experience

Communities are essential for professionals to connect on what’s important, new, informative, and trending. But, the buying collective immediately identifies and disregards the brands that try to hide behind community conversations only to accomplish their sales pitch.

This doesn’t mean that the buyers have problems with vendor representatives being on the seats of stakeholders. They must be part of it, and buyers like to have personal interactions to get informed, educated, and engaged with the brands. The key is not to be salesy, as communities are not built for hard selling. Being an honest community member that offers value and holds stakes is what brands should focus on becoming.

STEP 2: Connecting the dots to produce exponential results

Combining and leveraging the power of the triad – research, content, and community initiates a value-first experience, enhances outcomes, and enables the brand to:

  1. Shine on highly reputed editorial channels and publications
  2. Engage with the entire buying collective
  3. Increase brand recall at every stage of the buyer’s journey
  4. Build authentic personal relationships on all channels

Steps to connect the triad – research, content, and communities; seamlessly

Audience Insights

Intense market research, insights, and information from the communities and gatherings are the key to building a solid foundation in knowing the customers and their needs. The brands should also cross-verify the information they get with original intent data they have on their prospects.

An authentic brand voice

Once the insights are in place, focusing on creating value for the customers is essential. The information from the communities and research enables brands to create content and communication that helps buyers learn and decide. It is paramount to support valuable content, reply to queries, solve issues in the community, and share independent research that helps buyers make correct decisions.

Consistency

A brand’s outreach must be consistent and convincing to ensure these steps succeed in building customer connections across all channels they are in. Posting stand-alone content or jumping into conversations in an ad-hoc manner will never help gain the desired traction.