If you’ve worked in digital marketing, you are familiar with B2B and B2C business types. But you may not be familiar with B2C and B2B marketing strategies. Most of the time, B2B marketing focuses on logical process-driven purchasing decisions. At the same time, B2C (also known as business-to-consumer) Marketing focuses on emotion-driven purchasing decisions.
While B2B and B2C marketing have many similarities, the difference between the two is even deeper.
How marketers of the two camps engage their target audience, the level of emotion involved, and how they craft their content is profoundly different.
But that’s not all. In this article, we will discuss the six significant differences between B2C and B2B marketing.
What are B2B and B2C Marketing?
To begin with, the marketing side of B2B and B2C, let’s quickly identify B2B and B2C definitions.
The term business-to-business (B2B) is used to describe business relationships between two companies, at least. These can be small businesses, medium-sized businesses, or large corporations. An example of B2B would be a processor manufacturer that sells its products to other companies.
Business-to-consumer (B2C) is a term used to describe a business relationship between a company and at least one individual consumer. An example of B2C would be an online shopping agency that sells goods to individual consumers.
1. Audience
The primary difference between B2C and B2B marketing is who you are targeting, i.e., an individual consumer or a business that can target itself to other businesses or consumers alike.
As such, the target audience for B2C is a single decision-maker most likely to purchase a product for their own use and focus on features and benefits that fit their needs.
On the other hand, B2B can target anything from a single C-level executive to an entire committee overseeing business decisions. This comes under a larger audience that’s more focused on how the organization can benefit; an audience that wants products or services that can help the business improve.
2. Group vs. Individual Decision Making
Most B2B orders are placed through a committee or a team. It is rare to work with a single decision-maker when selling B2B. Usually, you will have many people who need to approve the sale. One way to improve your chances of landing a sale is to provide the decision-maker with all the relevant material needed to make an educated decision.
With B2B, you usually can create multiple customer accounts within a single business. Therefore, you will have a management account that can review orders before it’s placed, along with a purchaser account to actually choose the products from your store.
The approval process for purchasing with B2C is not something you have to worry about. You are dealing with a one-to-one customer decision that can significantly speed up the B2C sales process, as you will need a single person to pull out their credit card to make the sale.
This is why in B2C, you insist on persuasion tactics and are getting people to investigate directly to “not miss more.” For example, in eCommerce businesses, B2C retailers in fashion or electronics tend to take instantaneous triggers and have multiple cycles with new collections every year.
3. Relationship Building
B2B buyers require more hands-on relationships than B2C buyers. B2B prospects may need to convince many internal stakeholders that your solution is not only necessary but worth the price tag.
Guess you need to spend more time to get B2B buyers, but possibly more money to acquire B2C customers. B2C customers are affected by advertisements, so it takes enough time, effort, and expense to make your product stand out from the crowd. When you attract the attention of a consumer, you are more likely to get a quick sale.
B2B: Make Them a Hero
When you are targeting B2B customers, remember that they want to look like an expert. It helps buyers get credit for purchasing a tool that saves their team money and time – it should be among your goals. Start developing a relationship with a Business-to-business buyer by serving relevant thought leadership content. Focus on logic and education. B2B marketing rarely runs on people’s emotions, but instead, B2B marketing focuses on deepening customer knowledge. Empower your customers to talk intelligently about the value of your product.
Make the most of the long B2B buying cycle to know where your buyer sits in their organization. What do they need to explain? What is important to them? Create pointy marketing content that speaks to who your buyers are and what they care about. In doing so, B2B marketers make sure that prospects can persuade their owners with the ROI of purchase. Not only that, your potential customers will remember you as a helpful resource every time a contractor renewal period comes up.
B2C: You Care about Them as much as They Do
While B2C customers may be loyal to some brands, they also prioritize quality and price, wanting to meet their needs at a reasonable price. As such, customers often want to find a solution to their problem immediately. It translates to you needing to ensure a seamless customer experience — the minute something doesn’t work on your site, potential customers will give up and leave.
Also, do not overwhelm your B2C customers with blog posts and newspapers. B2C buyers are accustomed to a more transactional relationship. That said, consumers must feel that you understand their issues or desires and will live up to their expectations.
Personalize your marketing so that it helps you understand customers’ preferences, then push them to visit your website and convert. You can suggest related products and services using search results and recommend relevant services and products based on customer’s past interactions with your site. To do this, you can encourage buyers to write reviews by giving them discount codes or store credits. Not only do genuine reviews attract more prospects to your site, but they also give you valuable feedback.
4. Buyer Motivation
Suppose you have bought a pair of Nikes because you have felt inspired by the idea that anyone can be an athlete, or create an outline for McDonald’s because those golden arches have meant pure joy for you since childhood. In that case, you are one of the countless consumers who have decided to buy based on emotions.
Such an appeal primarily motivates individuals to get out of their wallets or hit the “checkout” button. Accordingly, B2C marketing primarily focuses on the human side of sales, with marketers wooing potential customers in favor of their brand and its product or service.
On the other hand, B2B marketing is about defining value for revenue-focused businesses that prioritize growth and profitability. Decision-makers focus on ROI (return on investment) from purchase. Their motivation to shop is far more rational than an impulsive consumer buys a pair of shoes or sunglasses. Unlike emotionally driven B2C marketing, B2B marketing makes logical arguments for the functional benefits of a product based on performance and economics.
5. Broad Description vs. Detailed Information
In B2B, you need to create long and detailed texts for your customers. Example: Think of a company that needs to buy a specific fabric.
In B2C, you create short and comprehensive texts. Example: Think of a person looking for new shoes.
6. Branding
B2B: Focuses on relationships
People are familiar with the fact that branding is a part of B2B marketing, but it comes through relationship building more often than in the B2C world. Branding begins with the consistency of the product presentation and delivery of your products or services.
In relation to B2B search marketing, being able to portray how you position yourself in the competetive market and have your personality shine can drive brand recognition and lead generation.
Talking about relationship development, you must have a keen vision for the personality within the market. Adjusting your brand towards your target audience will help ramp up your lead generation and drive brand recognition .
B2C: Prioritize Your Message
Branding is essential in online marketing because it allows the market to deliver a message, build loyalty with the customer, affirm credibility, emotionally connect with the customer, and motivate the buyer to make a purchase.
It’s also the number one priority of B2C marketing. Why? The relationship between the customer and the company is minimally interactive, so you have to create a lasting memory and good quality experience for the customer to give them a reason to come back.
If you have the urge to learn more about B2B and B2C secret ROI-driven tactics for 2021, you can contact us. Our marketing experts will clear your doubts and give you a free consultation regarding the same. Call Now!