When most B2B companies launch their websites, they do so in the hope that it will play a major role in generating leads.
This is why they invest so heavily into B2B search marketing strategies designed to funnel prospects to their site where their lead-conversion strategy will take over.
Unfortunately, this often doesn’t happen. Simple mistakes keep websites just out of reach, where prospects never find them.
4 All-Too-Common B2B Search Marketing Mistakes
This predicament isn’t inevitable, though.
Obviously, many B2B companies’ websites aren’t lacking for traffic. Their funnels are full of leads ready to be converted.
If you’re not enjoying the same, be sure it’s not because of one of these common B2B search marketing mistakes.
1. Relying Solely on Search Marketing
Ideally, search marketing is a high-ROI investment that will continue to pay off for years to come. Many companies still attract new leads every week from a single blog post written years ago.
Still, search marketing shouldn’t be your only online lead-generation strategy. Don’t forget about PPC and the amazing potential of retargeting.
These tactics are especially important for B2B companies that are new to search marketing and probably won’t see results for some time. Don’t wait around. Spend some money and start generating leads.
2. Only Focusing on Keywords Directly Related to What They Sell
The companies that do best with B2B content marketing understand they can’t simply post about topics tied directly to what they sell. It’s not a bad idea to cover these topics, but only covering them severely limits the scope of your marketing.
For example, if you sell supply-chain software, posting about that topic will only generate leads from people who are currently looking for those platforms. That makes sense, but you can also address other topics relevant to this market. Talk about best practices for hiring supply-chain managers, tax efficiency, or just cover compelling trends.
This will introduce your business to prospects who aren’t necessarily looking at the moment, but either will be soon or might decide to stick around and see what you have to offer after such a helpful post.
3. Skipping Conversion Tracking
The best possible B2B search marketing strategy will still never meet its full potential if you don’t have some kind of conversion tracking in place.
Simply monitoring how much traffic your website is attracting isn’t enough. Even if you’re happy with conversions, you won’t know how to improve them by modifying your strategy. In reality, you’re doing little more than casting a wide net and hoping for the best.
Fortunately, the solution is simple.
Use Google Analytics to track conversions and you’ll literally see the common paths leads are taking before they decide to contact your company. Then, optimize those paths to make it even easier for more leads to do the same.
This tactic is crucial when you quit making the last mistake, as you’ll see which topics – unrelated to your offer – are actually attracting leads who turn into clients.
4. Using the B2C Inbound Approach
It’s no secret that B2B buyer cycles usually take much longer than that of B2C companies.
However, you wouldn’t know this was such a well-known fact based on the common approach to B2B search marketing that most companies take.
In short, B2C companies often convert off of just one blog post. Someone does a search, finds the company’s site, gets the information they need, and makes a purchase.
That is not remotely commonplace in the B2B world. Instead, it might take months, even a year or more, between an initial site visit and when a company is finally ready to become a client.
This leads to two important distinctions about B2B search marketing.
The first is that top-of-funnel content is vital for earning traffic. The second is that you need to get their email address during that visit.
In the months that follow, your competition may have numerous opportunities to win your prospect’s business. With their email address, you stand a much better chance of keeping them in your funnel.
How to Improve the ROI of Your B2B Search Marketing Strategy
As we just touched on, a successful B2B search marketing strategy will do a lot more for your ROI if you’re able to capture your visitors’ email addresses.
This is why so many companies are turning to Hushly. Our user-friendly platform will offer visitors a preview of your content before requesting their email addresses to see the rest. Visitors are happy to hand this information over once they know your content is worth it. Nonetheless, we still verify it right away – just in case.
If you want to see this powerful platform in action, just request a free demo today.
