How to Create an Online Marketing Strategy (Part I)

Online marketing is an essential component to many industrial businesses’ marketing mix. A Thomas Industrial Network survey conducted in January, 2012 Industrial Marketing Trends, finds that 36% of industrial companies dedicate 50% or more of their budget to online marketing.

The key to effective online marketing is to build a comprehensive online marketing strategy that supports the goals of your total marketing endeavors. In Part I of this four-part series, we will look at the most commonly used tactics that support an online marketing strategy. Each tactic is useful in different stages of the buying cycle, and can be used to influence buyers in different ways. Understanding each tactic is the first step to building an effective online marketing strategy:

• Websites. This is the crux of any online marketing strategy. Every single tactic listed above can and should link back to the company website. This constant back-linking—along with targeted messaging and branding techniques—is part of what makes an online marketing strategy so effective. But in order for it to lead to sales, the website must contain the information that the buyer is looking for. One survey reveals that 82% of industrial buyers need detailed product information and 74% need specializations/expertise information.
• Search engine optimization (SEO). This is a complex science of improving or maintaining the position that a website appears in relevant search engine results. General search engines, particularly Google, make SEO difficult for many businesses, as they regularly change the methods by which they rank pages within search results. Seasoned SEO professionals work tirelessly to keep up with these changes. Many other online marketing tactics have SEO efforts, including search engine marketing, press release/news distribution, social media and vertical search sites.
• Vertical search sites. These are search sites that are much more targeted than general search engines. ThomasNet.com is one of the most well-known. A listing on a vertical search site offers basic contact information, details about the products/services offered, links back to the website and more. In the case of ThomasNet.com, companies can upload documents and videos, include links to any existing social media presence, post links to product catalogs and downloadable CAD drawings, and more.
• Social media. Yes, this is a marketing tactic as well. In fact, 68% of industrial businesses have a social media presence, and 56% of industrial buyers recommend suppliers use social media if they want to do business with them. Social media supports branding, can be used to build lists of potential customers, boosts SEO and can also be used for customer service purposes.
• E-mail marketing. This can constitute e-newsletters, promotional e-mails, or a combination. E-mail marketing can be used to promote branding messages, as well as build relationships with existing or past customers. It can also be used to forge new relationships—in fact, 61% of industrial buyers say they have made a purchase from a supplier they first learned about via e-mail. Links in e-mail messages bring potential customers back to the company website for more information.
• News releases. Also an effective branding tactic, these help spread the word about your company throughout the Internet, which serves three purposes:
  

  1. They increase the likelihood that a buyer will think of your company first when they are in the market for a product/service you sell, and;
  2. They support SEO (see above).
  3. They can link back to your website.

• Online display advertising. This works like traditional print advertising, but has the key advantage of only appearing when a buyer is looking for information relevant to the advertisement. This ensures that only buyers looking for the products/services you sell will see those ads. The result is more targeted, better qualified leads. These ads are typically linked back to the company website.
• Search engine marketing (SEM). Sometimes called pay-per-click (PPC), these ads appear alongside organic search results. The advertiser can choose the terms and phrases that cause the ads to appear, ensuring that only buyers looking for the products/services you sell see these ads. Like online display advertising, this ensures more qualified leads. SEM ads can and should link back to the company website.

Now that we’ve discussed the basic tactics that can comprise an online marketing strategy, the next step is to identify your marketing goals, and associate those tactics that can help you achieve them. In the three parts of this series to follow, we will use specific goals to illustrate this process:

1. Gaining new customers and generating high-quality leads.
2. Retaining and expanding business with current customers.
3. Introducing new products/services to new markets.




Why Do Industrial Businesses Need an Online Marketing Strategy? One reason is that it is the most effective way to communicate the information potential buyers of your products/services are looking for. More so than that, an online marketing strategy is better aligned with the way industrial buyers search for the products/services they buy. For example: Buyers do not pick up a magazine to thumb through ads looking for advertisements of potential suppliers. They do, however, go to the Internet and conduct searches. Direct mail and telemarketing is limited to a list of known potential customers. It is extremely challenging for industrial suppliers to break into new markets and new geographies this way. The Internet is a global medium, though. Having an online marketing strategy allows industrial buyers to reach suppliers all over the world if they so desire. Industrial suppliers cannot time offline marketing efforts to exactly when buyers are ready to buy. An online marketing strategy, however, creates a pervasive presence on the Internet so that buyers can find suppliers when they begin to source products/services.