What is Interactive Marketing? Does Every B2B REALLY Need It?

What is Interactive Marketing?

If you didn’t have enough B2B marketing buzzwords to worry about, get ready for one more: interactive marketing.

What is interactive marketing exactly?

Well, you’re already familiar with interactive elements thanks to B2C apps, websites, and software you use every day.

Amazon, Facebook, Ali Express, and YouTube have all nailed down AI-driven interactive experiences.

Think these types of features don’t cut the mustard in B2B?

Big mistake. 65% of businesses expect a personalized experience like the one they’ve come to expect from B2C apps and if B2Bs don’t deliver it, they’ll consider switching vendors.

Here’s what interactive marketing means in a B2B context, why it matters, and how to incorporate it into your marketing strategy.

What is Interactive Marketing?

Generally speaking, interactive marketing uses AI learning to create a personalized experience for every visitor – whether they’re a lead in your system or anonymous visitor.

Imagine that you visit the Amazon home page, but you’ve forgotten to log in.

Amazon will show you several interactive widgets and carousels filled with different product categories. Once you start searching for products or clicking on product pages, Amazon’s AI technology will remember your preferences and continue showing you related products (“customers ultimately purchased” and “customers who bought this also bought”).

At this point, you suddenly realize you forgot to log in. Once you log in, the Amazon homepage looks completely different because its algorithm can use information about your account’s past searches and purchases to suggest products instead of your anonymous IP address.

You see this same algorithm and interactive technology on just about every website in the B2C sector today because it’s an experience that customers expect.

What is Interactive Marketing for B2Bs?

Your buyers’ expectations for interactive and personalized algorithms don’t vanish once they get to work.

The likes of Amazon and Spotify have created lofty expectations for personally curated content and B2Bs that don’t live up to these expectations will get left behind.

On average, an estimated 7 team members are involved in business decisions. For B2B marketers, interactive content can help you provide personalization on an individual level to buyers at every influence level.

It removes the guesswork because AI technology adapts based on behavior and other data sources to supply each visitor with related content.

What is Interactive Marketing Good For?

Now that you understand what interactive marketing means for B2Bs, what is interactive marketing good for? What are the benefits? Well, there are quite a few.

Generating More Leads

Your target audience is probably much younger than you expect.

In 2015, Think with Google reported that about half of all B2B buyers were millennials – up 19% from 2012. If the trend continued, that means about 65% of your potential leads today are under 40 years old.

Interactive content allows you to supply the same experience they enjoy everywhere else online.

Plus, when someone arrives at your website, you have no idea what their role is in the buying process. Interactive content removes that problem by providing relevant content to everyone.

Allowing Leads to Self-Nurture at Their Own Pace

Leads of all ages consume at least three pieces of content from a vendor before deciding to pick up the phone, write an email, or follow up with a potential sale.

Does your lead like videos, podcasts, eBooks, whitepapers, or blogs? Interactive content allows leads to educate themselves at their own pace with the type of content they prefer.

Conversion Rate Optimization

The design experts at Nielsen-Norman say that B2B websites need to appeal to both “choosers” and “users.”

In other words, your website needs to take the experience of both leads and current clients into consideration. Interactive content shows that you genuinely care about a person’s digital experience on your website and you’re not just trying to close a sale.

Eliminating Forms

According to Think with Google, 70% of all business searches will happen on mobile devices by 2020.

Responsive design is a necessity that is obvious but if you haven’t ditched clunky forms, your website still isn’t mobile-friendly.

Interactive content collects data silently and allows leads to self-nurture. Leads supply bare-minimum contact information when they’re ready so you can get rid of forms for good.

Think with Google Responsive Design

Source: Think with Google

Lower Marketing Costs

Interactive marketing does most of the work for you. You’ll spend less time sifting through forms, making phone calls to answer questions, and verifying leads because AI technology takes care of the leg work.

How to Use Personalized Interactive Marketing in Your B2B Marketing Strategy

What is interactive marketing like in action? You have several options for incorporating AI-driven interactive elements into your website to reap the full range of benefits above.

  • High-quality personalized content: To give your AI technology some information to work with, you need to start by creating high-quality personalized content for different segments of your audience such as various stages of influence at a company and each stage of the sales funnel.
  • Adaptive content hubs and resource centers: Put all your best content together in one place and let AI decide which topics and types to show your visitors and leads based on their preferences. EBooks, white papers, podcasts, case studies – make it easy for leads to find exactly what they need in one location.
  • Content bingeing: Get rid of dead-end landing pages for good. Give your visitors an endless stream of high-quality and relevant content so they can decide how much time to spend on your website educating themselves.
Interactive Marketing

Source: Sage Intacct

Create an Individualized Interactive Experience and Generate More Leads Now

Hushly makes it easy to create a personalized interactive experience for every visitor – both anonymous and known – through adaptive AI-driven interactive content.

Features like adaptive resource centers, content bingeing, and human lead verification can help you generate 51% more leads, close more sales, and ditch forms for good. In short, you can provide the experience your buyers expect at every stage of the sales funnel.

Give Hushly a try today. You’ll only pay for each verified lead and never for our software alone. See it in action now!

What is Intent Data? Why You Need Information to Fuel Your B2B Strategy

What is Intent Data?

“What are your intentions with my daughter?”

As a sitcom joke, this line is obviously outdated – but think about it from a B2B marketing perspective.

“What are your intentions with my website?”

When someone visits your website, wouldn’t it be great to know exactly why they’re there?

Specifically, wouldn’t you love to know which leads are ready to buy – right now?

According to Marketing Profs, companies with an account-based marketing strategy generate 208% more revenue than those that don’t – but you need the right kind of data to deliver successful results.

If you’re wondering “what is intent data,” that’s the gist of it: understanding why someone has visited your website. Here’s why it’s important and how you can use it to fuel your B2B marketing strategy

What is Intent Data?

Using information about a visitor’s online behavior, intent data tells you their stage of the sales funnel.

Think about how you conduct online searches and how Google guides your search:

  1. You type “sore knee after running” into Google and browse some of the links.
  2. After learning about common running-related knee conditions, you type the letter R into the search bar and Google prompts you to finish a search for “runner’s knee.”
  3. You return to the search bar and type “il” and Google assumes you’re typing “iliotibial band syndrome.”
  4. After learning about IT band syndrome, you go back to the search bar and type “IT band” and Google already knows that you’re looking for “IT band syndrome treatments.”

From here, you can see why this prior search history and other information like age and gender may be useful for a physical therapy office. They can understand your intention – that you’re seeking treatment from running-associated knee pain – while running PPC ads and providing personalized content on their website.

However, that’s B2C. What is intent data in a B2B context?

Topic Data

Intent data involves two components: behavioral data and context.

When someone visits your website, you may not think you know much about them, but other websites do. Using topic data, you can figure out:

  • Which website they visited before arriving at yours.
  • How long they spent reading about specific topics.
  • Which other topics they’ve recently researched.

Context Data

Context data supplies background to your behavioral data which may include:

  • The company a visitor works for.
  • How long they’ve worked there.
  • A visitor’s job role and buying power.

It’s easy to see how combining behavioral and context data can help you identify a lead’s stage – and role – in the buying cycle.

Where Does Intent Data Come From?

Intent data can either be anonymous or known. It can come from either first-party sources (your website and lead magnets) or third-party sources (other websites, social media, other email lists, and other websites’ lead forms).

  • Anonymous Intent Data: You have an IP address and other information based on it (like Google search history and company name) but not a name or face.
  • Known Intent Data: You know more personal details about a visitor based on information from sources like forms.

Why is Intent Data Important?

Intent data sounds cool, but why does it matter? Is it worth the time and effort?

Yes. Here’s why.

It’s Useful for Personalization

65% of businesses say they’d have no problem switching vendors if a company does not provide personalized content.

That’s a lot of lost revenue. 

With intent data, you can gain a better understanding of your leads and website visitors so you can create personalized content for leads at every stage of the buying cycle.

It’s Hyper-Relevant

Intent data doesn’t just give you information about website visitors – it puts that data into context.

Context is especially useful when the time comes to run personalized email campaigns and retargeting ads on social media.

It Saves You Time and Money

You’ll know which leads are ready to buy, which aren’t quite decision-makers, and which are just browsing so you’ll be able to laser focus your marketing efforts.

Every dollar will stretch much farther when you know the buyer intent of each lead.

It’s More Accurate than Predictive Analytics

Predictive analytics are useful, but they’re often delayed. Intent data is based on real-time behavior and information so it’s the most correct and up-to-date data available.

What is Intent Data Useful For?

Here are a few ways you can incorporate intent data into your overall B2B personalization strategy.

Creating Effective Account-Based Marketing Strategies

If you’re only targeting senior-level executives, you’re missing out.

According to research from Think with Google, while 64% of senior execs have the final say, non-C suite members still have a massive influence in the buying process.

Intent data can help you identify how much influence each visitor has, which role they play, where they’re at in the buying stage, and which other competitors they’ve researched.

What is Intent Data?

Source: Think with Google

Personalize Your Website’s Experience for Everyone

With features from Hushly like content bingeing, adaptive content hubs, and self-nurturing landing pages, you can use intent data to personalize content – even for anonymous visitors.

Filtering Your Audience List by Engagement

Since intent data happens in real-time, you’ll be able to score leads more effectively and offer them the most relevant content at any given moment.

Running Successful Retargeting Campaigns

Retargeting ads through email marketing and social media can play an extremely useful role in your B2B marketing strategy, but if it’s not hyper-personalized, it won’t deliver results you want. Intent data can optimize your retargeting game.

Improve Your Personalization Strategy Now

Hushly can help you create a personalized experience for every website visitor. Using data-driven technology, you can create adaptive content hubs and self-nurturing landing pages with content bingeing features that allow your leads to educate themselves at their own pace – perfect for account-based marketing.

Best of all, Hushly uses human verification to make sure all of your leads are not only real people but also real B2B buyers by cross-referencing LinkedIn information. You only pay us for real leads, not using the platform. Check out the demo now!

Every B2B Lead Generation Marketing Template Needs Personalization

Lead Generation Marketing Plan Template

Now’s an exciting time to be a B2B marketer.

B2C has already had its moment with personalized entertainment and shopping experiences for everything from meal kit delivery to pharmaceuticals.

We probably won’t see any more groundbreaking technology emerge from B2C for a while.

B2B, however, is ripe for innovation and new strategies.

Long gone are the days of cold calls and in-person meetings.

That’s not to say that face-to-face business is obsolete, but it’s far from the only way to reach your prospects.

Automation and data collection make it easy to reach your leads with personalized content at every stage of the sales funnel.

Sadly, many B2Bs lag their B2C colleagues in terms of putting these technologies into effective use.

As you develop a B2B lead generation marketing plan template, it’s crucial to include some personalization tactics. Your business needs it and your target audience expects it.

Why Does Your B2B Lead Generation Marketing Plan Template Need Personalization?

Your buyers expect a personalized experience.

Companies like Amazon and Facebook have set the stage for hyper-personalized curated content on an individual scale. You may think that doesn’t apply to B2B websites and marketing – but it definitely does.

Your buyers and target audience know personalization technology exists because it’s available in every consumer app on their phone. Their expectations don’t change once they get to work Monday morning.

73% of buyers say they want the same personalized experience that B2Cs supply and half say businesses are not meeting expectations. Meanwhile, 30% of B2B companies say they’re dabbling in personalization strategies

That leaves a huge gap with countless companies not supplying the type of experience their buyers look for.

Personalization and automation aren’t going anywhere. They’re more important in B2B today more than ever.

With your B2B lead generation marketing plan template, personalization can help you understand your leads and how to address their problems.

6 Personalization Strategies to Use in Your B2B Lead Generation Marketing Plan Template

Personalization involves much more than just using your lead’s first name in an email and creating retargeting ads. Use some of the strategies below to stay ahead of your competitors and meet buyer expectations.

1. Multi-Tier Segmentation

In B2B, your segments change a bit compared to B2C.

You could segment your audience based on which company a lead works for, their job role and salary level, how long they’ve worked for the company, their buying influence, and location (to nail down the best time of day).

However, you should also note how your leads like to consume content. Do they want video, blogs, podcasts, eBooks, email, or something else? For example, 49% of B2Bs watch videos during the buying process while 64% listen to podcasts and 76% enjoy infographics.

2. Drive Data from Personalized Content

Data can make or break your personalized lead generation marketing plan template.

For AI tools to learn anything about your audience and provide them with personalized content, it needs to consume data – and a lot of data.

You could start by creating personalized in-depth blog posts for different segments of your audience. From there, your AI tool would watch the visitors of those posts, take notes of which other pieces of content they visit, and continue learning about their behavior to provide similar content.

The more information you collect on leads, the more you can improve your AI personalization strategy for all potential prospects.

3. Adaptive Resource Centers

Here’s where you start putting AI learning and your hyper-personalized lead generation marketing plan template into action.

Think about all the valuable content you’ve created as part of your marketing strategy. Now imagine putting it all in one place where leads and current clients can access it.

With a resource center, you can divide your content into categories like eBooks, case studies, reports, and tutorials. However, instead of simply putting it together, you’d use AI-driven technology to adapt new selections for each visitor based on their unique data.

Here’s what an adaptive resource center looks like in action:

Adapted Resource Center

Source: Sage Intacct

4. Automated Content Bingeing

Selecting the types of content each visitor will like is just one part of the process.

You also must meet their expectation for endless streams of content that companies like Netflix provide.

Make no mistake, your buyers will appreciate removing dead-end landing pages. 78% of buyers say they consume at least three pieces of content from a vendor. Content bingeing allows your leads to self-nurture and educate themselves at their own pace.

By the time they’ve decided to provide their email address or reach out to you with questions, they’ll already have a solid idea of your company’s products or services and they’ll be further along in the sales funnel.

5. Triggered Email Journeys

Based on where your lead gave you their email address, you can create unique email campaigns that introduce them to your brand and how you can help.

Triggered campaigns go out at specific times based on actions a subscriber takes. Did they listen to a podcast about a specific topic? Send an automated email.

You’ll always be one step ahead.

6. Intelligent Retargeting

Retargeting is important through channels like email and LinkedIn but without personalized data, it’s not effective.

If you’re sending the same LinkedIn ad to everyone who ever visited a page on your website, that’s not personalized retargeting. Instead, use features like matched audiences to choose specific ULRs a lead visited to personalize your ads.

Take B2B Personalization to the Next Level

Hushly is specially designed to provide personalization on an individual scale using data you already have about your visitors and leads.

Through tools like content bingeing, adaptive content hubs, thorough lead verification, and more, you can reach your leads on a personal level and help them self-nurture. Not only will you generate more leads, but your leads will be much higher quality and further along in the buying cycle by the time they supply their email address.

Want to learn more about the benefits of using personalization in your B2B lead generation marketing plan template? We have an eBook for that! Check out the 5 Personalization Strategies that Dominate B2B and learn why they’re important.

How to Get Started with LinkedIn B2B Lead Generation

LinkedIn B2B lead generation

For years, LinkedIn was a bit of a paradox for B2B marketers.

On the one hand, you absolutely had to have a presence on this social media platform. It was the one place online you could be sure your prospects visited. Everyone has a LinkedIn account, even if they’re not incredibly active on it.

On the other hand, LinkedIn’s advertising platform used to seem as though it was designed as some kind of cruel practical joke. Even though the site had all of your leads listed with a ton of valuable information about them, ads featured next-to-no helpful features and costed a small fortune. You would have been better off paying for a billboard outside your prospect’s office.

Fortunately, that’s changed. Today, if you know what you’re doing, LinkedIn B2B lead generation could easily be one of your company’s best investments.

3 Tips for Getting Started with LinkedIn B2B Lead Generation

Over time, you’ll learn how to modify your company’s LinkedIn B2B lead generation strategy to best serve your unique goals.

For now, concentrate on just getting started by using the following tips. The sooner you are able to put a strategy into place, the sooner you can turn it into a force multiplier for your marketing budget’s ROI.

1. Focus Your Company’s Page on Lead Generation

This may be a beginner’s tip, but it’s also one that 99% of companies seem to miss completely.

If you look at most company’s LinkedIn accounts, it’s as if they’re trying to put you to sleep. A lot of them are literally the About Us section from their website cut-and-pasted into the account. It’s all accurate information, of course, but who cares? If it’s not generating leads for the company, it’s not making any difference.

Do not make this simple mistake.

Instead, turn your company’s profile into a lead generation machine.

Use your header image to show off what you do. Include engaging content like testimonials or even advertise that you have case studies in your profile.

Follow through with your company description. Use this space to pitch what your B2B business has to offer. Remember, only about the first two lines are displayed until a lead clicks, so make them count.

2. Use Content to Gain Social Proof

Content marketing isn’t just for your B2B company’s blog. You can also share those posts on LinkedIn. In fact, you should be sharing them and even creating unique posts on LinkedIn as much as possible.

There are two reasons for this.

First, if your post resonates with a lead, that may be all it takes to have them visit your website and reach out about possibly becoming a client.

Second, the more your posts generate interests from your LinkedIn following, the more likes, comments, and shares you’re likely to receive. Not only will that feedback help to increase the exposure of your piece, but it will also go a long way toward building up your social proof.

When it becomes clear to prospects on LinkedIn that your company is viewed as an authority, LinkedIn B2B lead generation will become much easier.

Also, keep in mind that you don’t have to limit your efforts only to content you’ve actually created. Unlike your actual blog, you can share others’ content on your LinkedIn account and simply offer a few sentences of commentary.

3. Create Separate Showcases for Each Segment

Another tragically overlooked opportunity for LinkedIn B2B lead generation is their showcase pages. Even though they’ve been around since 2013, most companies don’t take advantage of them.

In short, these are subpages you can add to your company’s profile to promote any subsidiaries. However, even if your business doesn’t have any official subsidiaries, you can still use showcase pages to market your company’s different initiatives and business units.

For example, if your accounting-software company serves the needs of small businesses, medium businesses, and enterprises, you could create a showcase page for each. This specificity will draw more interest and automatically segments your audience right from LinkedIn.

LinkedIn B2B Lead Generation

LinkedIn B2B lead generation could become one of your company’s highest ROI investments, especially because all of the above tips are free. So, even if you’re still not ready to dedicate any amount of your budget to LinkedIn ads, this social-media platform could still be a goldmine.

For best results, add Hushly to the mix. Use LinkedIn to drive traffic to your site and then let our software turn those visitors into qualified leads. We’re so confident in what we’ve built that we actually guarantee lead generation and ABM conversions will increase by at least 51%.

Contact us today to see how.

How to Use Engagement for Improved B2B Lead Generation

hushly blog

Effective lead generation techniques have changed a lot even in just the past five years. Building a simple funnel and hoping SEO will attract the leads you need is no longer a realistic strategy.

Instead, you need to update your arsenal with what works best today.

3 Effective Lead Generation Techniques for Your B2B Company

Although there is a long list of effective lead generation techniques that have been successful across different industries, the three below will work no matter what field of B2B your company operates in.

1. Use Social Shares to Build Your Email List

For years, e-commerce gurus and consultants have all used the same simple trick to build massive email lists of followers to leverage whenever they want for any number of different reasons.

Unfortunately, most B2B marketers have never used this method to build their own lists, even though they’ve probably been exposed to it numerous times.

The secret is simple. Which of the following introductions to a newsletter sounds more enticing to you?

  • Sign Up for Our Newsletter
  • Sign Up for Our Newsletter to Receive Weekly Updates About [Industry}
  • Join 5,000+ [Industry Subscribers] by Joining Our Email List

The first one is clearly the least-enticing. Do you feel any excitement about the prospect of joining that list?

The second one is a little better. It at least gives someinsight into what the list will be covering, but it was probably also safe to assume that topic would be the focus anyway.

With the third option, you’re leveraging the power of social proof. You’re not just showing a lead that a lot of people already enjoy your newsletter, you’re almost making them feel left out if they don’t join. After all, many of those recipients are probably their competitors.

2. Build a Network of Authority

Another great way to build social proof that can turn into leads is through – no surprise here – social media.

Though it probably doesn’t come as a shock, the truth is that most B2B marketers don’t know how to make the most out of this incredible opportunity.

They may tweet regularly and even respond to comments – which is important – but that’s about it. Unfortunately, with so many of their competitors doing the same thing, that’s also not enough.

Instead, you should also be actively building a network on social media. Reach out to noncompetitors in your market by commenting on their posts and even messaging them to start conversations. Eventually, the goal is to begin partnering with other accounts for social-media campaigns that build authority and attract engagement (similar to using online influencers to do the same).

Another great way to build your network is through backlinks. Most B2B marketers see these solely in terms of SEO potential. Once again, though, the secret is to work with noncompetitors in your market, so you’re constantly posting on each other’s sites.

When you’re consistently doing that and holding conversations on social media, your leads will find it very easy to engage with you.

3. Personalize Your Lead Magnets

Anyone in B2B marketing knows that HubSpot is usually at the forefront when it comes to the most effective lead generation techniques.

However, they still seemed to outdo themselves when they introduced their Website Grader tool. This was no ordinary lead magnet. It asked for leads’ email addresses as part of running a test on their website’s effectiveness. Once Website Grader had compiled its results, it would email the lead its findings.

This kind of interactive tool is fantastic for generating leads because it utilizes personalization. The content provided is 100% unique to the lead.

Now, obviously, creating that kind of lead magnet is probably not something your B2B company can do every week. That’s fine. You don’t need to create them with the same regularity as blog posts. Instead, spend the time building one, highly-interactive lead magnet that will benefit your prospects so much that they can’t wait to provide you with their information.

Then, you can use your regular blog posts to drive traffic to that lead magnet to keep your lead-nurturing funnel full.

One of the MostEffective Lead Generation Techniques

At Hushly, we are always keeping our eye on new, developing, and, most importantly, effective lead generation techniques.

Of course, we are also very proud to offer one of the best solutions out there. While the techniques above are extremely effective, our platform will begin working the moment you install it. Contact us to schedule a demo and see for yourself.