14 Ways Your Small Business Can Attract B2B Clients

Do you ever feel like you’re fighting an uphill battle to make a sale?

You’re not alone. A top marketing goal for small business owners is to gain and keep customers, which is a constant challenge due to time and budget constraints. Even if your client list is in good shape, you must keep your sales pipeline full for the coming months, or risk running into serious cash flow issues.

Make 2023 the year of increased sales! Here are 14 small business marketing ideas that will have customers lining up to do business with you.

1. Launch A New Product or Service

If your current offerings satisfy your clients but you want to expand, it may be time to try something new. Pay close attention to your customers’ feedback and look for new ways to help them. People are willing to pay more to solve bigger problems, so think about what complex client problems you might be able to solve by launching a new solution.

The reason you need a new product is that many B2B businesses are constantly looking for new ways to be creative and innovative in response to changing market demands, which leads to the launch of new products and services. But first, determine what you are solving for, and spend some time to make sure that you understand every flaw, benefit, and nuance of the new product before marketing it.

2. Promote Your Expertise

It is important to sell yourself and what you do. People should know you are good at it! They need to know why they should do business with you instead of your competitors who offer similar services, so be sure to tell them what makes your business unique and outstanding.

Invest in building brand awareness with webinars and guest-contributed content. These two efforts are great at showcasing your knowledge and expertise so you can more easily stand out against competing brands. 

3. Use Social Media to Build Relationships

Social media, when used properly, can be a very powerful tool. It can drive traffic back to your website and it gives a personality to your brand, which will help you strengthen a connection with your audience. 

Using social media to engage with your customers and respond to their questions and comments is one way to use this channel effectively. However, you also want to be incorporating different strategies so you can keep your social media calendar robust and diverse. 

Share and discuss your business with videos of your employees at work, in team-building activities, or at conferences. Create visuals that share industry knowledge and stats to educate your social followers. Keep your social media presence consistent with regular posts and make sure you have someone ready to respond to questions or to comment with followers.

4. Ask Your Current Clients for Referrals

Create a simple referral template you can share with your best clients. If you catch them in a positive state of mind when they are happy with everything that you are doing for them, they won’t mind going the extra mile to send more business your way. You can ask your clients to refer you to family and friends and give them a discount for the referral when they next buy from you.

5. Max Out the Potential of Your CRM

CRM and sales pipeline software are loaded with automation and customizations that can take the drudgery out of your marketing processes, so take advantage! 

One of the benefits of a CRM is that it improves your ability to connect with and sell to your prospects and customers. However, in order to see all the benefits your CRM can offer, you need to utilize the software fully.

A CRM works properly with the right data. And with BenchmarkONE, contact data like social profiles, company, email, and name are all pulled for you. Our CRM tool also helps your small business tap into customer behaviors, like how they interact with content on your website, so you can send them the right emails at the right time. Also, when new leads are added to your CRM, BenchmarkONE’s marketing automation allows you to automate follow-up emails and promotions.

6. Use Facebook and SEO for Local Businesses

While Facebook advertising and SEO for the mass market can be tricky business, even for seasoned pros, it’s an incredibly lucrative and cost-effective technique for local businesses. If you’re hoping to land local B2B clients, create a Google Business profile and start optimizing your website for local search terms. Use local language in your Facebook ads (“Hey, Chicagoland business owners!”) to attract attention.

The following are some of the benefits of using Facebook and SEO together:

• It greatly enhances your online presence
• It aids in traffic generation
• It helps in ad cost reduction
• It aids in increasing sales rates
• It aids in the creation of brand awareness
• It allows you to target specific demographics based on location, age, gender, and interest

7. Use Direct Mail to Stand Out

You may be wondering if direct mail is still a marketing strategy that businesses use. The answer is, of course, yes. Sure, digital marketing is more popular, and perhaps more provably effective, but direct mail is a great method if you’re looking to wow a specific lead. 

If you sell a high-ticket product or service, what better way to stand out than to send personalized mailers or offers to your top prospects? While your competitors may be remarketing to potential clients with impersonal emails, you’ll leave a stronger impression by sending a sleek brochure, postcard, or gift.

8. Get a Booth at a Trade Show

Trade shows are the “meat and potatoes” of B2B marketing. Why? These events are full of decision-makers in your target audience who are ready to buy. But if you go, go prepared. Find out who will be attending and tailor your marketing message to their industry. Most importantly, have a pre-show and post-show plan. Entice potential customers to your booth with an email campaign beforehand, and be sure to nurture your visitors after the event.

9. Study Your Competitors

If you’re not sure which marketing avenue to pursue, use your competitors as a guide. Which search terms do they rank for? Are they running digital billboards around town, sending out local mailers, doing YouTube video ads, or attending trade shows? Tap into your industry’s trends to get new ideas for approaching your own marketing strategy.

10. Network With Other B2B Small Business Owners

It is important for a small business owner to link up with other small business owners. Get to know what they do and how they do it, and also tell them about your business. Try to go to a business summit where you can meet up with these owners and talk about your business with them. Whenever they have a client in their network that is in need of your services, they will definitely reach out to you.

11. Offer Discounts and Promotions

One of the ways to attract new customers to your business is by offering discount prices. Depending on what is viable for your profit margins, consider offering a 5% or 10% discount. You could run it as a time-limited promotion or holiday special to instill urgency, and potentially could attract some brand new clients!

12. Actively Listen to Client Feedback

It is important to listen to client feedback if you want to grow. If the same feedback comes up time and again, you should definitely consider implementing a change that addresses it. Your customers will feel heard and will be more likely to stay loyal to your business. Also, you’ll be able to avoid issues with future clients by correcting any wrongs ahead of time. 

13. Digital Marketing/Advertising

 If you do not advertise what you do, nobody will know about it, and if they don’t know about it, you can’t make sales. A Google display ad, PPC, or Instagram ad may only cost a few hundred dollars but can reach a highly qualified, ready-to-buy audience with minimal hassle. One of the best parts about digital marketing is its flexibility: if an ad isn’t working, it only takes minutes to make adjustments.

14. Integrate a Content Marketing Strategy

How can you attract B2B customers to buy from you online? You must develop strong content to drive your digital marketing strategy. This means you need to actively create and publish content with the intention of capturing interest, raising brand awareness, increasing traffic to your website, and continuously generating leads. 

Content and digital marketing go hand-in-hand, so integrating content with your marketing strategy isn’t a difficult endeavor. Just make sure your marketing strategy includes different forms of content, such as:

• Blog posts
• Infographics
• SEO optimized content
• Podcasts
• Email marketing 
• Online advertising
• Social media marketing 

All these digital marketing tactics are essentially different forms of content. They all play their part in capturing the interest of your audience, bringing them back to your website, and converting them into leads. 

If you’re looking for ways to refresh your B2B marketing strategy, simply follow these tips. With a little extra effort, you’ll soon be attracting brand-new B2B clients and growing your small business! 

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