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Why Networking for B2B Businesses Should Include Social Media

Posted by Lisa Smith on Mar 9, 2016 11:00:00 AM

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Networking for B2B businesses relies on industry events and meetups, but these don’t happen every day, making them somewhat unreliable. Similarly, the potential leads for a B2B business aren’t exactly the general public. When attempting to reach such a small, segmented list of buyer personas, the best place to turn includes virtually everyone you want to reach: social media platforms.

 

B2B marketers must have an increased focus on which social media networks their potential leads utilize. Less time spent on an all-enveloping social media presence means more time for crafting engaging, helpful inbound marketing content for potential leads.

 

Let’s look at the top social media networks for B2B marketers and the networking strategies utilized on each:

 

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is specifically designed to help craft business connections, which is ideal for B2B marketers. This is an excellent forum for marketers to learn more about potential leads and start developing a personal connection with them.

 

Personal messages or endorsements can be used to nurture leads directly. Your business can also share articles or discussions to draw in a larger audience. Sharing business content can help you to establish your presence as a thought leader in the industry.

 

Advertising on LinkedIn is extremely targeted, allowing you to select demographics like location, industry or even job title so you can focus on networking with viable leads. This will give your marketing materials an increased sense of relevancy, improving your chances of networking with the right people.

 

Twitter

With its 140 character limit, the “microblog” style of Twitter is great for getting the word out about your business quickly. You can create Twitter lists to share content with specific people in your industry to create a more intimate networking atmosphere. You can also use retweets to start a direct dialogue with individuals.

 

Following hashtags or key terms about your industry can help you find conversations about your business or industry, lowering the chance that you will miss out on potential networking opportunities.

 

Facebook

Facebook has long been considered B2C territory, but this is starting to change. 85 percent of B2B marketers report that they are now using Facebook to advertise promotions, event announcements, and deliver client services.

 

B2B businesses have also found that Facebook makes it easy to collect buyer persona data. By cataloguing which posts get interactions from your audience, you can learn more about the needs and interests of your readers. This can help you segment customer lists more effectively so you can engage with relevant messages in the future.

 

YouTube

Video content is soaring in all facets of marketing, and the easiest way to share videos is on YouTube. Videos can be shared and embedded on a variety of websites to boost your content. Creating engaging content can also help you explain technical aspects of your work more effectively. Many B2B businesses also use video to give potential customers or investors an inside look at ongoing projects. This will help nurture growing relationships while helping to drive qualified inbound leads back to your website.

 

Google+

Other social networks might keep people talking about you, but Google+ is the network that gets the conversation started. Listing articles or other content on Google+ helps establish ownership, boosting the authority of your content on the Google search engine. This will ultimately give you more exposure with your targeted audience. Google+ business pages also allow people to engage with your brand on the Google search engine by using your profile to learn more about your business and leaving reviews.

 

B2B businesses must use social media to improve their relevancy. If your buyer personas rely on a particular social channel to get news about your industry or make connections with business partners, then your business should take advantage of this. Social media can help you both with learning more about the personas you would like to connect with and boosting engagement with these individuals. Check out our introduction to social media marketing for more tips.

 

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Topics: marketing