Question

Topic: Strategy

B2b Marketing Practices

Posted by Anonymous on 7/21/2014 at 12:01 PM ET 250 Points
This may seem silly, because I have been in marketing promotions for several years, but I'm looking to better understand B2B marketing better. I've been tasked to develop a strategic plan for our products in a relatively small industry, but I realized that I know so little about customers, competition and etc. What is the best way for me to better understand customers and the customer buying-decision process? I feel am taking more of a shotgun approach to marketing to them and want to find a more tailored and target approach for each customer (200 total facilities). Thoughts/ideas? What recommendations would you offer me as a first and second step to being more strategy in my marketing practices?
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by mgoodman on 7/21/2014 at 12:30 PM Accepted
    Two things:

    1. There are a few books that deal with marketing strategy issues. You should probably become familiar with them. (Starter list here: https://bit.ly/9bnxbr )

    2. It would probably help if you met with a few customers for informational interviews. You would need to prepare yourself for the interviews and establish some clear objectives, but these interviews are the best way to learn what is on your customers' minds, what they think about your company and your competitors, etc.

    Of course you can hire a market research professional to do the interviews for you, and summarize their findings for you, but there really is no substitute for doing at least a few of these yourself. (Perhaps a combination would be best if you've never done this sort of thing before.)
  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 7/21/2014 at 1:20 PM Accepted
    What is the best way for me to better understand customers and the customer buying-decision process? By talking with everyone in your company that communicates with customers, with current customers, with past customers (why did they leave), and prospective ones (how do they choose).

    What recommendations would you offer me as a first and second step to being more strategy in my marketing practices? First, understand the baseline metrics & KPIs your company is using to measure its effectiveness. Next, see how your competition is doing things - better and worse - and companies like yours in other regions/markets. Then try applying these tactics to your business and measure the results. Repeat, measure, and analyze.
  • Posted by telemoxie on 7/21/2014 at 8:06 PM Accepted
    great ideas above. In order to help you organize your thoughts and data, I would recommend looking up marketing topics of interest on Wikipedia. Articles on sales and marketing frequently have fairly comprehensive outlines which can help you be sure to cover all your bases.
  • Posted by Peter (henna gaijin) on 7/21/2014 at 9:08 PM Accepted
    To understand this myself, I use a SWOT and PEST(el) analysis as guidelines to get myself going. I start by writing the basic headings and then fill in info that I know. Then start trying to research the info I don't know, and fill in data as I go. over time it gets more and more complete. You likely never will get it totally complete, but at some point you will know enough to make decent choices.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PEST_analysis
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