Every business wants to find the most cost-effective and efficient strategies to market to their target audience on platforms where their target audience spends time. Things can seem more complex when you are a B2B business. When your target customers aren’t necessarily scrolling on Facebook or Instagram looking for the service that you offer like they might be if you sold clothing or a B2C service, that doesn’t mean there is no digital marketing hope for you! Pay per click (PPC) marketing targets your audience where they already are—on search platforms. Here are some of the best PPC strategies for businesses like yours.
PPC Reminders for B2B Businesses
Before we dive into the best strategies, it’s important to review a few quick reminders about the B2B market:
- The B2B audience is smaller than the B2C audience, so the keyword search volumes that you will encounter will be lower than comparable keywords targeted at the B2C space. Over the course of the year, far more consumers will be interested in shopping for sweatshirts than businesses will be interested in purchasing ground-penetrating radar services. Keep this in mind when searching.
- B2B buyers are not one-size-fits-all. At some companies, the CEO might be the purchaser. In others, it could be someone from the IT department, the end user or even an accountant.
- B2B buyers often do more comparison shopping than traditional B2C consumers. This is particularly true when you are selling a costly product, your service has a long-term contract or there might be an ongoing relationship.
- The sales cycle in B2B is often much longer than a B2C purchasing cycle. It is not uncommon for the process to stretch on for 3-6 months! The PPC strategies detailed here are designed to help you through the process, but they do not guarantee overnight success.
The Best PPC Strategies for Your Business
- Research First: Just like we mentioned above, you should start your PPC campaign with plenty of research (or by partnering with an experienced company like Gauge Digital Media that can do the research for you!). Start by researching other competitors and think critically about the true audience you are trying to target. While keyword-only strategies can bring success in both the short and long term, adding audiences into your targeting can fine-tune it further for powerful results. Don’t be afraid to play around with target audiences and even explore marketing to some long-shot audiences just to see what happens.
- Use Dynamic Search Ads: These are one of the newer PPC strategies that many businesses are exploring. Dynamic search ads take your website content and use it to target your ads and hone the keywords in your keyword-based campaigns. When you use dynamic search ads, you can select the landing pages or webpages that you want Google to use when generating these ads. These PPC strategies are very effective for businesses looking to explore the world of PPC campaigns with less of a time investment.
- Bumper Ads: Another one of the many newer PPC strategies available for B2B businesses is bumper ads. Bumper ads are brief, six-second videos that are placed before another video. While they are only six seconds long, they cannot be skipped, which means that the viewer will get the complete advertisement. Bumper ads are most effective when used in conjunction with other PPC strategies and combined with other ad formats. These are also an awesome way to explore the world of video marketing at your business or utilize existing video assets elsewhere.
- Get Great Creative Help: It’s important to know that all of the most effective PPC strategies are backed up by one thing—great content. Working with an experienced creative digital marketing firm like Gauge Digital Media can ensure that you have high-quality content for all of your campaigns. Headlines, descriptions, captions and ad copy should all be crafted carefully. It’s easy to think that customers might overlook your ads, but B2B consumers that are particularly discerning will place a great deal of worth on the first impression that you make. Make it a good one!
- Measure Better: Finally, all PPC strategies should go hand-in-hand with an effective system to gauge the success of your campaigns. Because the sales cycle for B2B businesses can be so long, results are not immediate and can seem abstract. The prospect who saw your advertisement once six months ago and again four months ago who eventually makes a purchase will have multiple exposures before signing on the dotted line. You can explore remarketing to target these B2B customers and make sure that they don’t forget about you, but you should also ensure that you have a system in place to track those results. Gauge Digital Media can help you to determine your key performance indicators (KPIs) and find the best methods to track whether or not your PPC strategies are effective. If you are ready to take your business to the next level, PPC strategies are one of the best ways to do so online.
Get Ready for a Great Year with the Best B2B PPC Strategies of 2021
Working with a professional digital marketing company is the best way to make the most of your website and all that search engine optimization trends have to offer. To learn more about the best digital marketing strategies for your company and reach a bigger audience than ever before, work with Gauge Digital Media. For a quote or to schedule a call, contact us at 410-376-7709.
