If you’re involved in marketing B2B products or services, acquiring quality leads is probably your top priority. Attracting leads through increasing website traffic always requires rigorous strategic long-term planning.

When it comes to SEO, keyword opportunities may be considerably more limited in the B2B sector than in B2C. You need to leverage any possibility to rank high for a limited number of keywords available to you.

That’s where engaging and insightful content, which provides value and is keyword-optimized, comes into play. In this article, you’ll learn, how effective content marketing strategies can help B2B marketers like you beat the competition.

Importance of Content Marketing for B2B

Assume that you have developed B2B SaaS software for project management. How would you reach potential prospects who are ready to pay for high-quality project management software? What is the most efficient way to stand out from the competition?

Grabbing low-hanging fruit would be to create a long-read article that compares your product to the well-known project management software. It is crucial that people learn what benefits your software provides that JIRA or Asana lack, and what features are unique. 

It can be a written post or a video review. As long as your content is relevant, up-to-date, and includes valuable information, you’ll reach your audience faster than you expect. If you can convey all the beneficial info to your leads and help them cast aside their doubts about the product — you are on the right track.

However, content creation alone is not enough, and that’s why we need content marketing. Simply put, content marketing means effectively spreading the valuable content you’ve created.

When it comes to basics, content marketing has three purposes. The first one is to increase sales, then comes saving costs, and last but not least building a loyal customer base. Engage in content marketing as if your business depends on it. Spoiler: it does.

Content Marketing Strategies in B2B

Any content marketing strategy should focus on creating content, defining the audience you will reach out with that content, and the distribution approach you’re going to use.

Following the suggestions below may boost your traffic, and by doing so, contribute to the growth of your B2B product or service.

• Identify your buyer persona. TA for short, the target audience is the people who can benefit from your products or services. The very first step in content marketing is to get to know, analyze, and understand your TA’s frustrations, needs, and goals. You can utilize different analytical tools, like Google Analytics, social media sites, or interview potential clients by creating polls in communities like Quora, Reddit, or Facebook groups. 
• Define your purposes and objectives. Create a statement where you briefly describe what your focus is going to be. The draft should contain TA characteristics, the content topics to catch your TA’s interest, and, most importantly, your unique selling proposition - some features that make you stand out from the competition. 

There you have your initial roadmap to start communicating your brand to the audience. If you include potential business profits in the plan as well, then you’ll be one step ahead.

• Choose content forms relevant to your business. Content genres range from blog posts to promotional videos, from webinars to email newsletters. Research, how your audience consumes content and follow their lead in terms of the format.

• Determine your content creation model. This mostly depends on the resources you have and the optimal ways to make use of them. For example, if you don’t have time to create content yourself, try outsourcing on freelancing platforms, like Upwork, Fiverr, or hire an SEO agency like Rocket labs, etc.
• Establish a schedule. Every strategy includes planning, and having a schedule is an essential part of the plan. Failing to do so may bring unexpected throwbacks. If you are not interested in premium products for scheduling, you can try Google Calendars.
  
  Select a date, specify the content you are going to publish that day, set a reminder. Easy as that. Bear in mind that if you have a tight publishing schedule, it is worth getting assistance from tools like Asana or Hootsuite.

• Assess the outcome & make forecasts. To make sure your efforts deliver results, analyze the content performance using Google Analytics. Try out several platforms with analytical tools that come with social media sites to determine what’s best for you. Then regularly review conversion rate, traffic, engagement, ROI, or any other metrics that fit your line of business.

Content Writing Best Practices

B2B marketing is not an easy feat. It takes continuous and consistent content creation efforts to drive organic traffic, increase customer flow, and gain more profit.

However, this is also one of the most rewarding approaches to business growth compared to other SEO methods. Content marketing done right provides long-term, impressive results.

Promoting your products or services by developing a high-quality informational blog can become the best course of action for beginners. Follow the upcoming guide to attract your prospects through top-notch content:

1. Create useful content. Provide your readers with valuable actionable info on the topics they’re interested in. Also, make sure the info is engaging and hooks visitors with the very first words or visuals. Prove your content is worth subscribing to. Those subscriptions have the potential to turn into leads, then to prospects, and ultimately to your clients.
   
2. Implement storytelling. Whenever readers feel like you’re telling them a story, they are much more likely to read till the end. Your story should not be a fictional one. Tell them why you started your business, what values your brand conveys, and only then what your products or services are capable of.
   
3. Avoid hard-to-read words, long sentences, and paragraphs. Albert Einstein’s “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough” quote should be your guide to create any post. Prefer two short sentences to a longer one. Don’t try to impress readers with your vocabulary. Instead, impress them with conciseness, showing respect to their time and keeping short attention spans in mind.
   
4. Research the keywords. Play with different SEO tools and platforms that can help you with keyword selection (to name a few, Keyword.io, Ubersuggest, Google Keyword Planner). Learn to discern awareness, consideration, and decision traffic keywords.
   
5. Build credibility. Gaining credibility is a long process while losing it is possible in an instant. If you wish to include any data, statistics, or other related info, double-check them before publishing.
   Once lost, it will not be easy to get your credibility back. Whenever possible, provide sources of your information and use positive reviews from actual clients to your advantage, building a social proof of your trustworthiness.
6. Prefer active voice to passive voice. The passive voice sounds robotic. Great content sounds human. Pretend you’re an expert explaining concepts to your friend in a conversational style.
7. Don’t forget to add visuals. Graphics, charts, pictures, videos, and the like will not only make your read more engaging in general. Visuals also prolong the users’ sessions on the page, give you more time to persuade them, and send a positive signal to search engines, improving your ranking factors.
8. Double-check for errors. To err is human. Rereading your post yourself, asking for feedback, or using grammar and spelling checking tools are your go-to ways to ensure high content quality. You may benefit from the Microsoft Word Proofing feature. For more advanced tips and suggestions, try Grammarly. Even though the free version goes a long way, the premium version is recommended for those who create lots of content regularly.
   
9. Craft an appealing intro. If you can’t get the reader’s attention within the first few seconds, don’t expect them to finish the post, not to mention purchase something from you. Explore and implement the AIDA method.

Providing relevant content for readers is a challenging task. But things get easier as you get more and more familiar with your niche and target audience’s needs. Keep writing for your business, and success will follow in no time.