How to Create Valuable Content for B2B Companies

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Content Marketing Tips For B2B Companies

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Do you know content marketing generates over 3x as many leads as outbound marketing and costs 62% less?

However, B2B marketers have been writing blog posts since the early 2000s. It wasn’t until recently that they started thinking about content marketing as more than just a way to drive traffic to their websites.

But the content itself can be a challenge. You need to know what works and how to execute it. 

1. Do What Others Are Not Doing 

One of the most common challenges that B2B companies face is to make their content stand out. And yet, they often mimic or simply copy other industry experts and add to the noise. 

If you want your B2B content to stand out, you need to take the unconventional route. Do what others are afraid to do! 

Here's how to make B2B content stand out:

• Look for The Gaps. Do you feel some topics in your industry are less spoken about, or is there nothing valuable written about them online? If yes, then use this as an opportunity to stand out. 
• Take the Content That Experts Are Talking About And Explore A Unique Angle. For example, instead of talking about how the supply chain industry can improve optimization, you can take a unique angle like 10 things holding the supply chain industry back. 

You can use this tool to generate blog topic ideas:

2. Simplify an Idea 

THE B2B industry is full of complex issues that most average readers have no idea about. 

And what do people do when they don't understand what they read? They leave! 

Using insider words or big, complex words to show your authority might be tempting. However, if you want to retain the audience, you will have to simplify it for them. 

Readers are not sitting with a dictionary to find out the meaning of every second word they read on your site. Make it easy for them, and respect their time. 

Here's how to simplify ideas:

• Break the Content into Bite-Sized Pieces. Instead of writing one 6000-word article, break it down into three 2000-word articles. 
• Present Information in An Intuitive Manner. For example, if you are creating video content, are you following the time constraints that your audience might be used to?
• Keep the Readability Score Below 10. This means avoiding insider terms and complex words.

You can use the Hemingway app to assess your content’s readability score:

3. Listen to Your Employees

Unless you're a one-person army, you will have a team or employee who handles most customer-centric work. Employees get to interact with your customers daily. This means they are acquainted with your brand day in and day out. That’s where your opportunity lies.

By having regular interaction with your customers, your employees gather hidden insights into your business's trends, innovations, and challenges. These amazing insights can be turned into amazing content, which you will never get from external sources.

Here’s how to turn your employees' insights into valuable content:

• Interview your employees or talk with your team. Ask them to share their views or tips on a particular challenge or subject in your business or industry. You will be surprised at just how much inspiration is around you.

You can share an employee survey form to listen to your employees:

4. Leverage the Power of LinkedIn

If there’s one platform that every B2B brand should be on, it’s LinkedIn. With over 810 million professionals using LinkedIn, it’s a literal goldmine of B2B leads. B2B marketers say 80% of their leads come from LinkedIn.

So, how do you leverage LinkedIn? Here are some helpful tips

• Leverage LinkedIn posts to share updates, stories, and short tips for your B2B niche. These short posts are valuable in getting your audience's attention and prompting them to act.
• Publish long-form posts on LinkedIn Pulse: Although Pulse has a limited reach on LinkedIn, it’s SEO friendly. So, when people search about your topics on Google, your Pulse post can rank higher. When they click on your post, they can access your LinkedIn profile directly. According to Buzzsumo, content between 2000 and 3000 is the most popular on LinkedIn.

Here’s a screenshot of a LinkedIn post:

Read: Tips to Optimize Your LinkedIn Profile For SEO

5. Leverage Gated Content to Generate Quality Leads

As a B2B firm, chances are you will have tons of content and intellectual property that you can use to attract audiences and convert them.

You can leverage existing content like white papers, webinars, tools, and templates to generate organic traffic and boost customer trust. One of the best ways to use this content is through gated content.

What’s gated content? 

Gated content is when you share high-value resources like white papers, case studies, tools, and templates in exchange for customer information. It helps you capture high-quality leads that you can later nurture to turn into paying customers.

Another benefit of gated content is that people feel that your content is high quality and valuable since it’s locked behind a wall.

Here’s how to leverage gated content to generate leads:

• Write ungated content, like blog posts. Connect the ungated content with the gated content. For example, you are a B2B marketing agency. You just created a deeply researched case study. You can give some facts or information from this case study in your blog. And if your audience wants to learn more about this case study, they can sign up and get access.

Here’s a screenshot of gated and ungated content in a blog post:

6. Incorporate Storytelling

“Your customers feel before they think” – Dan Hill

Just imagine the scale of your customer’s responsibility. Any B2B purchase they make will affect them and their entire business. As a result, more effort goes into B2B decision-making.

So, as B2B sellers, tap into your audience’s emotions. Ask yourself, how will this purchase affect your target customer? 

Will your product improve its business efficiency? 

Or bring more lead?

So, how to incorporate stories in your B2B content?

• Listen. Luckily for you, the internet has made available several resources to help you listen to your customers. Listening is an essential component of B2B storytelling. You can use various channels such as telephone, social media, surveys, and emails to listen to your customers. By doing this, you will get insight into their mind. After all, nobody knows your customer better than themselves.
• Actively Search for Stories. Maybe you are a start-up at the beginning of your journey. You can share your failures as well as your successes along the way. Ask your employees what they like the most when working with your company. Turn these insights into stories.
• Add Some Drama to The Story. An interesting story has a hero, a problem, and a goal. If your story’s hero achieves the goal without facing challenges, there’s no story to tell. Your job is to present this conflict so your audience can relate to it, thus building a critical human connection.

You can use infographics to tell your company’s story:

7. Repurpose Your Most Popular Content

There are times when you will hit the pot of gold with your content. Sometimes it might go viral and explode in popularity. 

While in other times, it may generate engagement for years.

These are the content pieces that your readers love the most. So, it makes sense to keep adding value to this content.

Here’s how to repurpose your popular content:

• Turn your most read blog posts into an e-book, which you can use as a lead magnet. Since your readers love these blog posts, binding them together in an e-book will help them get all the information in one place. And you get a lead.
• Turn a video into a series. For example, a video on your social media might have the most engagement. Your viewers loved the concept. So, you can turn this short video into an in-depth video series and explore the topic in detail.
• Gather insights from your blog, eBooks, and experts and mix them to create valuable social media posts. These short bites of your content will engage readers consistently. 

Here’s an example of a tweet that contains a small excerpt from a video and a link to the media:

Content Marketing for B2B Companies - FAQs

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1. What's the Biggest Misconception About Content Marketing?

Ans. The biggest misconception about content marketing is that it is only for B2C companies.

2. What's the Worst Thing About Content Marketing?

Ans. The worst thing about content marketing is that it takes time. Be consistent with your content and your frequency of publishing.

3. Is It True That You Have to Write an Article A Day to Succeed?

Ans. You don't have to write an article a day to be successful. It depends on how much time you have to devote to content creation.

4. What's the Best Way to Get Started with Content Marketing?

Ans. The best way to get started with content marketing is to look at what your competitors are doing.

Key Takeaways

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• Incorporate storytelling in your content
• Leverage gated content to collect leads 
• Repurpose your most popular content to add more value.
• Leverage the power of LinkedIn. 
• Simplify your content.
• Gain insider insights from your employees.
• Do what others are afraid to do.