As a B2B marketer, you know the game is way different from B2C.
With complicated products, long sales cycles, and lots of decision-makers, launching a successful campaign is an uphill battle.
From generating quality leads to justifying your work's value, the struggles are constant.
Here's a look at some of the biggest roadblocks B2B marketers face, along with battle-tested tips for conquering them.
The Lead Gen Grind
You live and breathe by the leads you generate.
But getting a steady stream of high-quality prospects is tough.
Take the example of a B2B software company.
Their marketing team runs paid search campaigns, hosts webinars, sponsors events, and pushes out tons of content.
Yet, only a fraction of the leads that come in are a good fit based on firmographics and buying criteria.
Sound familiar?
With buyers doing tons of research before engaging Sales, it's fundamental to get your content in front of the right prospects at the right time.
The Solutions
Account-Based Marketing (ABM)
Laser-focus your efforts on specific high-value accounts.
Use tools like Demandbase to identify key contacts and decision-makers, then surround them with hyper-targeted ads, emails, direct mail, and sales outreach.
For more on ABM, see my Best B2B Marketing Advice for New Marketers.
Paid Advertising + SEO
Increase visibility in the channels your buyers frequent.
For paid ads, use negative keywords, targeting, and audience exclusions to weed out unqualified clicks.
On the SEO front, map content to specific search intents throughout the buyer's journey.
Learn more about optimizing your digital presence in my Mastering GA4: Tips for Marketers.
Gated Premium Content
Capture lead information by offering guides, templates, or tools your audience finds valuable.
Use marketing automation to score leads based on their content consumption.
For more tips on content strategies, check out my Marketing Beyond Advertising: Comprehensive Guide.
But getting leads is only half the battle.
You also need sales to properly nurture and convert those hard-earned prospects.
The Legendary Marketing-Sales Disconnect
Arguably the oldest struggle in B2B: marketing and sales aren't aligned.
Marketing sends over "hot" leads that sales doesn't follow up on.
Sales claims the leads aren't any good.
The finger-pointing is endless.
If this sounds like your organization, it's time to break down those silos once and for all:
Define Qualification Criteria Together
Get marketing and sales leadership in a room to hash out the specific demographics and behaviors that define an ideal prospect.
Agree on lead scoring rules and what qualifies a lead for sales acceptance.
Share Goals and KPIs
Instead of optimizing for different metrics, agree on shared goals like number of sales-qualified leads, opportunities, and revenue generated.
Review performance as a unified revenue team.
Implement Lead Management
Map out criteria for routing leads to sales based on demographic and behavioral scoring.
Use a CRM with marketing automation to automatically assign leads to reps and alert them to follow-up.
For more on aligning marketing and sales, read my First 90 Days as a VP of Marketing in SaaS Guide.
With marketing and sales operating from the same playbook, you'll maximize your lead generation ROI.
Cutting Through the Content Clutter
With so much content flooding every channel, it's incredibly difficult to capture attention and differentiate your brand.
Every B2B buyer is bombarded with ebooks, webinars, emails, and more from a multitude of vendors.
To rise above the noise:
Focus on Customer Insights
Don't just push product info and features.
Deeply understand your audience's challenges, questions, and priorities through research, interviews, and mining sales conversations.
Create Thought-Leading Content
Use those customer insights to develop high-quality, thought-provoking content that provides new perspectives and solutions to their problems.
Prioritize depth and usefulness over surface-level promotion.
Build an Emotional Connection
B2B buyers are human.
So tap into emotions through compelling brand storytelling.
Share customer success stories, focus on vision and purpose, and highlight your company's unique personality.
As you deliver a truly differentiated content experience, you'll earn trust and mindshare with your target audience.
For more insights about customer success, subscribe to this weekly newsletter.
Proving Marketing's Business Impact
For B2B marketers, it's always been a challenge to directly show marketing's impact on pipeline and revenue.
You run all these campaigns, but how much credit does marketing deserve for closed-won deals?
This makes it tough to justify the budget and optimize future spending.
To solve this attribution nightmare:
Implement Closed-Loop Analytics
Connect marketing automation and CRM to track leads and opportunities from the first touchpoint through closed-won.
Analyze the channels, campaigns, and content driving real revenue.
Use Marketing Attribution Tools
Platforms like BrightFunnel, Bizible, and LeanData use advanced modeling to calculate marketing's influence and proportionally assign revenue credit across touchpoints.
Align Metrics Across Departments
In addition to shared lead goals, agree on KPIs like the number of sales opportunities, deal value, and customer lifetime value that show marketing's impact.
For more on data-driven decision-making, see my Best B2B Marketing Advice for New Marketers.
With data to quantify your contribution to the bottom line, you can optimize future budgets and strategies for maximum ROI.
Navigating the Enterprise World
When selling to large enterprises, you're not just dealing with one or two decision-makers.
You face a web of stakeholders across different teams, roles, and business units—all with their own priorities and agendas.
To navigate these complex organizations with success:
Map the Buying Committee
Work with sales to identify all personas involved in the buying process, from executives to end-users. Understand their roles, motivations, questions, and objections.
Develop Tailored Content Streams
With those buyer personas defined, create separate content tracks that speak to each stakeholder's unique needs and interests.
Use personalization and automation to deliver the right message at the right time.
Find Internal Champions
Identify people within the company who are excited about your solution.
Equip those champions with content and messaging to help them evangelize and drive the deal forward internally.
As you understand the many players involved and deliver a cohesive yet personalized experience, you'll maximize your chances of success.
And That’s It
Driving sustainable growth as a B2B marketer requires you to overcome these ever-present challenges.
It's not easy, but it's attainable if you put in the work.
The key is to align closely with sales, focus on the right audiences, and optimize your activities based on performance data on a regular basis.
With those pillars in place, you'll be equipped to run impactful campaigns that deliver measurable business results and prove marketing's value.
For more insights, check out our B2B Marketing Challenges & How to Overcome Them guide.
Looking for your next opportunity? Check out our weekly roundup of remote marketing jobs.
I hope that helps,
-Hakan.