B2B marketers today use an increasing number of social media platforms to effectively connect and engage with both customers and employees. Everything has to be available on mobile, and big data has transformed from “nice to have” to “must have” in order to make informed choices.

Combining these things with the adoption of agile marketing and learning to respond to changes, Russ Fradin’s recent article, “Five B2B Marketing Trends to Watch,” reveals key marketing trends that can be tapped into in order to bring innovation and success to your company.

    • 1)

Employee Advocacy and Social Selling.

    Employees make great brand ambassadors, and the constant use of Facebook and Twitter in our culture has only increased potential audiences for companies. In the past, there were restrictions placed on employee’s online communications around the company they worked for, but marketers now want to capitalize on media’s pervasiveness and thus encourage employees to tell the world about their brand. Some companies even design special social media programs to validate the medium as a tool to increase performance and productivity.
    • 2)

Content Marketing.

    All of the available information that today’s customer can access directly influences each stage of the buying process. Marketers must focus their plans and efforts on customer engagement with compelling, engaging content, by using quick content machines that create a flow of brand-and-customer information to be viewed or shared over social media on a regular basis.
    • 3)

Mobile and Consumerization.

    Mobile has become the primary screen and the preferred method for interactions among both employees and customers. As employees increasingly expect their interaction with technology in the workplace to be easy and enjoyable, this gives rise to BYOD (bring your own device) policies that make it essential for marketers to think mobile first in staying informed and sharing content.
    • 4)

Big Data.

    For B2B marketers, “Big Data” allows us to gather essential insights about our target audiences. We are able to gather this intelligence from Facebook posts, tweets, click-throughs, and other website metrics in order to form a more accurate analysis of who we’re trying to reach with our marketing efforts.
    • 5)

Agile Marketing.

    To be agile marketers, we must still adhere to central strategic marketing principles, but we also have to act in faster and more responsive ways. Social marketing is essential to staying relevant and informed, while new automation technologies are crucial to being responsive and staying relevant to your audience.

If you’re in healthcare, insurance, technology or other professional services industries, and need help with a PR, marketing or social media campaign, contact Scott Public Relations.

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