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It wasn’t so long ago that the idea of B2B companies using social media sites to market themselves was enough to get you laughed out of the room.

Many respected marketers didn’t even like social media for most B2C industries. It’s really only been in recent years that marketers have found they can produce a consistent ROI from these sites.

Fortunately, this applies to B2B companies, as well. If you understand what tactics to use, even Facebook B2B marketing can be successful.

Understand That Facebook B2B Works Differently for Each Industry

One of the reasons it’s taken so long for Facebook B2B marketing to catch on is because of how many companies followed the lead of their B2C counterparts, especially those that work in ecommerce. Those companies tend to utilize a fairly simple strategy.

They pay for ads that put their Facebook page in front of potential leads. Then, after enough success, they use lookalike audiences – a targeted audience that Facebook designs off of an earlier list of traits the company imported. That brings their page even more followers, at which point, they can start running ads that lead straight to landing pages.

Why Facebook B2B and B2C Tactics Aren’t the Same

The reason this kind of approach doesn’t always work for B2B companies is that B2B and B2C buyers are different. Even the ways they act on Facebook are different enough that marketing strategies for one may not work for the other.

For example, “product catalog sales” may be a helpful KPI for B2C marketers using Facebook, but it probably wouldn’t fit for B2B. The same goes for “store visits” unless your B2B company uses ecommerce.

3 Facebook B2B Marketing Strategies Proven to Work

So, let’s talk about what does work for B2B companies on Facebook. There are three main strategies worth trying, but before we describe them, one more note: success on Facebook is always the result of rigorous testing. Fortunately, FB marketing is also extremely affordable, so you should find it worthwhile to run as many tests as it takes to get promising results.

1. Run Reach Campaigns

The reach objective for Facebook marketing is fairly straightforward: you build awareness by getting your content in front of potential leads. For B2B companies, it should mean showing off your top-of-the-funnel content and then using retargeting to connect with them again and again until they come back to your site.

You can even drop the retargeting for now if you like and simply rely on Facebook ads to help introduce your company to thousands of new leads without spending much.

2. Send Traffic Right to Your Site

Facebook also offers a traffic objective. This is what most B2C companies use to bring prospects to their Facebook pages.

Don’t do this for B2B, though. Very few prospects are going to actually like your page, which leads to an inflated cost-per-lead. Instead, tell Facebook to point them back to your site. Once again, you can then use retargeting to keep them interested. What’s even better is that you can get hyper-specific about the audience you target with your traffic ads, which makes for much more powerful retargeting later.

3. Generate Leads Right from Facebook

Finally, Facebook lead-generation ads have shown a ton of promise for B2B companies. Again, if you only ever paid attention to B2C marketers on Facebook, you’d probably ignore this option completely. Most B2C companies don’t have much use for lead-gen forms.

But in B2B, this kind of information is extremely valuable. Facebook will auto-populate the forms for your leads, too.

A Final Word About Testing

It’s worth reiterating the importance of robust testing for B2B Facebook advertising. It is almost certain that you’ll need at least a few tries before you get this right. At the moment, lead-gen ads may seem ideal, but after trying a few, you might realize that your market doesn’t react well and would rather just check out your site.

Test, test, test, and test some more. The overhead is negligible, but the returns could be absolutely massive (especially if your competitors are still reticent about Facebook).

How to Get the Best ROI from Your Facebook B2B Marketing Campaigns

Given the low investment, most B2B companies could actually find that Facebook becomes their most successful channel for finding brand-new prospects and turning them into qualified leads.

Still, if you’d like much better chances with every prospect you bring back to your site through the Facebook B2B ads we covered above, our company can help. B2B companies that use Hushly have seen their conversions immediately skyrocket by more than 50%.

Want to see how? Contact us today.

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