Drafting a marketing analysis is already challenging in itself. This fact, however, is made even more challenging when you’re creating a market analysis for a B2B company. But the reason why you need it is simple. Companies that are in the B2B industry need to assess the marketing dynamics of other businesses to be able to come up with effective strategies.
Given that the world of B2B marketing is consistently expanding, this carries the necessity to be more thorough with your marketing analysis. There’s no easy way to speed through this process. The margin of mistakes should be narrow, so as not to miss out on the marketing opportunities available for a B2B company.
Today, this article gives you some of the top expert tips for an effective B2B marketing analysis.
1. Understand What B2B Marketing Means
Before proceeding with the analytical part of the marketing equation, it’s a sound idea to go back to basics. Give yourself a full grasp of what B2B marketing means. This will make it easier for your team to check whether or not the marketing plan you have adheres to the definition of B2B marketing. Otherwise, no sound analysis can be made in the first place.
By definition, B2B marketing refers to any type of strategy which aims to work on a business or an organization. Any company that sells goods and services to another company or organization is one that typically uses B2B marketing strategies.
To understand what your B2B market analysis should have, here are the key metrics you need to remember:
The goal: In a B2B business, the goal is often to meet the target customers’ demand for expertise and efficiency.
The motivation to purchase: Customers from B2B organizations are usually driven by any financial incentive they may receive from making any purchase.
The purchase process: Customers in a B2B organization prefer to work with salespeople and account managers.
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2. Research
The bedrock of your B2B marketing analysis is always thorough research. There’s no substitute
to study and research to back up any analytical decision you’re going to make. This begins with researching scientific and detailed studies to help you make informed decisions. That way, you’re certain that whatever comes up, you have the means to measure the results of your effort.
Without performing research, even your marketing analysis could be wrong. Or, perhaps you could still get stuck with obsolete marketing strategies, all because you jumped right into performing it, without using any backup information.
For instance, with thorough research, you’ll know what points in your analysis to focus on. Are there any weak points that need to be worked on? What are the recurring customer complaints that arose in the previous quarters despite the marketing strategies you applied?
The impact of sound research isn’t to be ignored. When you do it systematically, the chances of increasing each of your market strategies profitability are potentially higher than what you can get without backing it up with research.
3. Conduct A Situation Analysis Of Understanding Your Customers
Before you aim to start and complete your B2B marketing analysis, the first step first is to come up with a situation analysis. This is geared towards understanding your customers—who these businesses or organizations really are.
Ask yourself, ‘Where are we now?’ The answers to this question can provide a sense of direction to your B2B marketing analysis. It gives you a better grasp of your current market position from your customers’ perspective. This further ensures that your marketing analysis decisions are sound and data-driven.
4. Identify Your Specific Goals
Like any other documentation or research process you’re doing in business, it’s a must also to have a full understanding of what your specific goals are. This means enumerating your goals and objectives for your marketing analysis. Otherwise, your B2B marketing analysis may not have a sense of direction when there aren’t any goals or objectives set to keep it driven.
Be as specific as you can when coming up with your goals. Some of it may include the following:
Improve your business strategy: Whatever business strategy you choose to apply after your B2B marketing analysis, all of those should be supported by trustworthy data.
Identify what your least and most valuable markets are: You can move forward with understanding what markets are worth pursuing and what aren’t.
Find new markets: This is to expand your scope and get a hold of more organizations and businesses which can then become new customers.
5. Assess Whether Your Marketing Plan Is Niche-Driven
Another important factor you have to assess in creating a B2B marketing analysis is checking whether or not the marketing plan you have is niche-driven. It means most, if not all, of your marketing campaigns, are centered only on the specific niche your business belongs to. Otherwise, when it’s not in the same niche, your marketing strategies could be misaligned.
It’s the job of your B2B marketing analysis to identify, therefore, what those lapses are. Specializing in your specific business niche will make your marketing efforts easier and more simplified. So, if that’s not achieved at the moment, then your marketing analysis should show that fact as well. That way, the necessary changes can be made in a timely manner.
6. Go Through A Marketing Audit
Going through a marketing audit is like having a sense of accountability for your B2B marketing strategies. It helps answer the question of where your business currently stands. It also ensures you’re able to maintain a competitive position, through studying statistical data and analytics which is readily available for you.
The valuable information you gain from a marketing audit can help set your B2B market analysis in the right direction. You’ll have information on market potentials and opportunities as well as highlighting what your marketing values are.
Need help to get started with a marketing audit? Here’s a bonus tip for you. You can begin by undertaking what’s known as competitor benchmarking. This means getting an in-depth insight as to what your competitors are offering.
The more you can understand your competitors’ movements, the more you’ll be able to predict what their next move will be. With that in mind, your B2B marketing analysis becomes more effective. You don’t have to be one of those companies who failed to understand what their competitors are doing.
Recommended; Run A Marketing Audit
7. Be Sure To Include All The Must-Have Points In A Marketing Analysis
There are certain items identified as non-negotiables in a B2B marketing analysis. If you want those to be effective, then you have to be certain you’re able to incorporate them accordingly. Otherwise, your B2B marketing analysis may cease to become effective.
Generally, the must-have points are:
Industry description and outlook. This means identifying as much detailed information
as you can about your B2B company and the specific industry it’s operating in. That information includes statistics, trends, and the overall outlook of your business.
Competitive analysis. In creating this competitive analysis, you have to identify who your competing businesses are. Assess what they’re doing to successfully reach the audience they’re targeting. Then, create a specific analysis on how your company can outperform your competitors.
Target market. This refers to the specific demographic, organization or company you’re trying to reach out to. To have detailed information on who your target market is, identifying these factors is key: income capacity of the corporation, geographical location, and business or supplier preferences of the business.
Lead time. This pertains to the time it takes for your business to complete another business’s order. The timeframe here starts from the moment the order is placed, shipped, and until it reaches the warehouse of your customer.
Market test results. From time to time, it’s recommended for businesses to go through a market test. The results of which should form a significant portion of your B2B marketing analysis. The information you gather from the market testing is crucial in giving insights about how your target market responds to your products and services.
8. Control Your Marketing Plan
Lastly comes the element of control. This refers to the process of monitoring, managing, and improving your B2B marketing analysis, periodically. If you keep failing because you use the same marketing analysis strategies from a year ago, you might need to create a new and much more effective plan.
There are steps you can take in controlling your marketing plan:
Start your B2B marketing analysis as soon as possible—don’t wait until tomorrow or next month, when it may already be too late.
Hold regular meetings to review your B2B marketing analysis plan.
Stick to the recommendations you’re able to come up with through your B2B marketing analysis.
Conclusion
A B2B marketing analysis should serve as the foundation of every B2B marketing plan or effort. This document ensures whatever strategies your B2B company decides to employ are all founded on sound research. It’s not merely decided at random, and there’s no second-guessing the effectiveness of each strategy. With your B2B marketing analysis, you can also come to terms with those which aren’t effective for your business. You can focus your efforts instead on those that work to avoid any risk of failure. The competition in the B2B industry is high and challenging. The tips above should set you out in the right direction of creating an effective marketing analysis for your business.