B2B vs B2C Marketing: 9 Key Differences

Marketing influences customer decision-making.

A person’s decision-making process for purchasing a car, holiday or a new Ice Cream brand will differ from how they make a business decision such as what printer to buy.

Therefore, the way businesses market consumer or business products or services is quite different.

This article explores these differences between B2B and B2C marketing.

Defining B2B and B2C Marketing

Before exploring the differences between B2B and B2C marketing, we must first define marketing.

According to Rėklaitis & Pilelienė (2019) marketing comprises of six promotional mix elements: advertising, public relations (publicity), sales promotions, personal selling, digital marketing, and direct marketing; managed from an integrated marketing approach.

B2B stands for ‘Business to Business’, and B2C for ‘Business to Consumer’.

Therefore, they differ primarily in terms of the customer and audience. B2B sell products and services directly to other businesses and B2C sell products and services to consumers for personal use.

Examples of B2B are businesses selling the raw product to manufacturers such as timber or steel, Accountants’ customers are typically other businesses, or a company offering website building or digital marketing.

Examples of B2C businesses are the local corner store/convenience store, a website where you can buy fitness and health supplements or any store in the local shopping centre/mall.
“…Seeking to successfully plan and implement marketing communication strategies, it is important to understand the differences of business-to-consumer vs. business-to-business communication processes.” (Rėklaitis & Pilelienė, 2019)

There is some overlap between the two, and many of the practices and processes stay the same. However, some differences separate them.

Differences between B2B and B2C Marketing

In B2B, marketing communications are far more professional, rational, and less emotive than B2C.

B2B is about building relationships and educating prospects; where B2C marketing uses enjoyable content and focuses on quick solutions to trigger an emotional response to a need, interest, or challenges of people in their everyday lives.

Rėklaitis & Pilelienė (2019) identify numerous differences between B2B and B2C markets.

I have identified nine of the most significant differences between marketing for B2B and B2C, which are:

• The decision-maker
• The decision-making and sales process
• The motivation
• Customer relationship
• Marketing strategy
• Target audience
• Communication tools
• Language
• Purchase value and complexity

The following chapters will discuss these differences individually.

The decision-maker

Multiple staff can influence the decisions in organisations, whereas B2C often involves one decision-maker.

“In B2C, there is always a particular person who is making a decision to pur­chase an item. Considering B2B sales, in most cases, will be more than one person to decide; therefore, knowing the decision-makers and decision-making process in B2B is very important.” Rėklaitis & Pilelienė (2019)

B2B — Multiple decision-makers or influences

We are not marketing to one just one person in B2B. Organisational processes confine purchases, and there is a chain of command to deal with in B2B, with owners, managers or other decision-makers purchasing on behalf of their organisation.

The needs of the company and/or the employees drive decisions. A worker in a particular factory area might report that they need new equipment, but a manager might decide what to purchase.

Work out who the right person is to target with marketing or have a conversation with is, as marketing must reach this small group of individuals within the business, which can be easier said than done.

B2C — Decision-maker is often the customer

The decision-maker for B2C is often the customer or another family member. The decision is based on what benefits it brings to them personally or to their family member. Communication to consumers should focus on the problem you solve or help your brand provides.

Marketing can reach any potential consumer for a product in a household, even if they are not necessarily the purchaser.

Reach the household decision-maker for significant items such as a new vehicle. For smaller items such as cereal for the household or cleaning products, the kids or wife could be the decision-maker or consumer, and the husband/father the customer that makes the purchase.

The decision-making and sales process

The decision-making and sales process for B2B is usually highly planned, process-driven and logical, where a B2C is often more emotional than rational.

“…Based on the rationality of B2B customers and the emotionality in B2C markets, the messages of marketing communications also have to emphasise different aspects of an offering: starting with general product characteristics in B2B market and ending with pursued delight and impalpability in B2C situations.” (Rėklaitis & Pilelienė, 2019)

 

B2B — Slow decision-making process, highly planned and logical

The purchasing process for B2B focuses on the logic of the product/service, its features, and financial incentives. Rationality drives choices, which are less pleasure-driven than B2C, with little personal emotion involved.

B2B customers expect the business to look after them. Sales take a consultative approach, focusing on customer service before a transaction occurs, maintaining open communication.

Provide custom solutions to customers to best fit their needs, as they are often investigating alternative solutions from competi­tors

B2B customers spend longer researching before purchasing than B2C.

The length of sales cycles has increased as the more significant number of decision‐makers in the B2B buying process has increased. The buyer decision process illustrated in the AIDA model.

 

Customer progress in the Buyer Decision Process can be tracked through CRM, to understand their needs best and offer the best solution.

“B2B sector there are planned activities involved in a sales process: a purchaser has to follow the budget frames and time limitations.” (Rėklaitis & Pilelienė, 2019)

B2C — Decisions more emotional than rational

Decisions made by B2C customers are often more emotional, impulsive, less rational and vary in length and importance. Advertising often influences these decisions and customers can decide on a purchase instantly.

The purchase process, therefore, should be as easy and as convenient as possible.

This shortened research, decision and sales process means social proof on social media or reviews has more influence on decision-making than B2B.

Often, when a consumer realises they have a need, they already know what kind of solution (product or service) they need. They have seen the advertising, or there is a brand they trust above others.

The Motivation

Business purchasing decisions are typically motivated by business needs, in contrast to consumer decisions often motivated by individual desire.

B2B — Improve business performance

The goal of improving their business its profitability is a significant motivation for B2B customers. These customers seek efficiency and/or expertise, thinking about the impact of their business decisions. Decisions are well thought out, with little influence of emotions.

Emotion is in B2B does exist, just not at the same level. You are still selling to human beings with fears, needs, and wants, and marketers should try to appeal to this. Tie emotion appeal back to improving their business performance and a return on investment.

“B2C marketing communication campaign in most cases will be based on capturing the customer’s attention immediately. Consumers’ decision will be more emotional.” (Rėklaitis & Pilelienė, 2019)

B2C — Fulfilling consumer desire

The motivation for B2C customers is the desire to improve their lives in a particular way.

They could be seeking deals, entertainment, or pleasure. Purchasing a new shirt, or a holiday probably will not have the same decision-making process than choosing an accountant for their business.

Consumers do not have to think on behalf of an organisation, although they might decide for their family. Often instant gratification is the primary motivating factor.

Customer Relationships

B2B marketing focuses on forming long-term personal relationships with its target customers, whereas B2C marketing focuses on creating short-term value and efficiency.

B2B — Build personal relationships

Repeat and referral business is critical is advertising is not as effective as it is for B2C, instead of forming and developing personal relationships drives B2B sales and marketing goals.

“Generally speaking, building trust between seller and buyer will be the main prerequisite for a successful (B2B) deal.” (Rėklaitis & Pilelienė, 2019)

Having conversations with people you know and meeting new people can be very successful for generating leads (potential customers; a reason why networking is an excellent tool for B2B businesses.

More nurturing of leads is required than B2C, paying close attention to customer needs. Good communication is needed and other customer service aspects of creating positive (or negative) associations with your brand by your practices helping separate you from competitors.

“B2B purchasing is more likely to involve more intense direct relationships and richness of pre-purchase information.” (Jussila, Kärkkäinen, & Aramo-Immonen, 2014)

 

B2C — Transactional relationship

The aim of B2C marketing is drive as many sales as possible in an efficient manner. The effort spent getting to know the customer is far less than B2B, as relationships are more short-term and transactional.

Because of the larger markets and customer potential, instead of focusing on building close relationships with customers, the emphasis is on creating value and process efficiency.

The investment into you from B2C customers is unlikely not as deep as your investment in them. Do not bombard them with too much content outside their buying cycle. Try to make the customer experience with your website or other contact points, a positive experience to encourage their loyalty.

Focus on selling the product, one way of doing this is by using a call to action and offer incentives.

Marketing strategy

The focus of B2B marketing strategy is on lead generation through relationship building. For B2C, the emphasis is instead on branding to create an identity that attracts customers.

B2B — Lead generation

Lead generation is a priority of B2B businesses. B2B purchasers rely on personal sales relatively more than advertising as a source of product information. Salespeople are integral marketing tools.

Because decision-making often involves a group of people, the salesperson can talk with and negotiate with all the relevant parties at once.

Being consistent in the presentation of information, and a good reputation for delivering on promises goes a long way to drive repeat business and referrals.

Networking with other businesspeople increases your chances of bumping into past clients and acquaintances, where a conversation and introduction be your next warm sales lead. You already have built credibility through the association and introduction.

B2C — Branding

Branding is a priority for B2C marketing. Marketing should put the brand front and centre to create a lasting memory. When it comes time for customers to make a purchase, you automatically want them to think of your brand.

Keep your brand in front of target consumers with email marketing and remarketing on Google. Invest in SEO or Google Ads, and identify keywords that consumers are likely to search for online when looking for products/services you offer, to rank for those keywords and improve your online search result.

Encourage happy customers to leave positive reviews. Offer them a discount on their next purchase if they leave a review, which will help create social proof for consumers in their decision-making process.

Target Audience

B2B marketing targets the multiple decision-makers of a business, where B2C is targeted directly to end-users.

B2B — Multiple decision-makers/managers

In B2B marketing, it is essential to understand our target audience’s characteristics: businesses’ decision-makers. They may not be the product or service user but make decisions on behalf of staff who do.

“The larger number of decision-makers/influencers in B2B means that B2B marketers must consider different media and different messages for each person involved.” (Habibi, Hamilton, Valos, & Callaghan, 2015)

Salespeople need to know who to have a conversation with — the chain of command.

With digital marketing, the more we understand these people’s demographic and behaviours, the better we can target them with smart digital advertising. It is easy to compile and then analyse data about customers through CRM.

B2C — End users

Products or services are marketed directly to end-users in a B2C market. Because of this, consumers must recognise the brand and the value you provide. Consumer markets are usually much more extensive, with much more diverse customer demographics.

Create influential advertisements for mass media that give the consumer the desire for your products or services. Lead generation through social media is another effective way to reach consumers. Focus on after-sales activities rather than pre-sale to enhance the customer’s chances of retaining your brand’s favourable opinion.

Communication tools

B2B communication uses integration between digital tools and salespeople, whereas B2C commonly uses mass media such as TV or Facebook to reach audiences.

“B2C companies with limited budgets often choose to rely on two or even fewer media channels, thus amplifying the risk of wasting time and resources on activities that would not lead to pursued goals and objectives. As opposed, B2B companies often use several channels for communication with their targets.” (Rėklaitis & Pilelienė, 2019)

 

B2B — Integration between digital tools and salespeople

Using diverse social media and other digital tools enhances a firm’s ability to communicate a large amount of information. Social media can perform some of the functions previously carried out by salespeople, by sharing educational information about products or services, such as how you save time, money, and resources.

However, salespeople are still essential to B2B marketing to address different decision-makers’ emotional needs.

Social media’s coordination between the sales department, operations, and marketing should ensure consistency. Content marketing through social media helps business satisfy the rational needs of the multiple decision‐makers involved in a company. Ensure consistent messages to keep a consistent brand image over time, in different contexts.

The effectiveness of social media platforms for B2C, and B2B varies. Many B2C firms have experienced great success acquired customers through Facebook or Instagram, where LinkedIn generates the most leads for B2B.

“B2B companies place a higher value on educational formats such as blogging and webinars; consumer businesses are slightly more willing to experiment with advanced digital formats…” (Habibi, Hamilton, Valos, & Callaghan, 2015)

 

B2C — Mass media

Facebook is a powerhouse in B2C marketing, and Instagram and Pinterest are also popular platforms for B2C. A robust visual component can help create an emotional response.

B2C does not usually require a sales team (apart from retail). Instead, firms should choose the most relevant marketing channels to communicate with their target audience.

Mass marketing tools such as product placements or television advertising is far more effective for B2C than B2B.

Language

B2B marketing and sales should use industry terminology to enhance professionalism and credibility, but B2C communication should be simple, in customers’ voice and emotive.

B2B — Speak the lingo

Marketing in B2B should be professional; you could lose credibility with language that is too informal.

B2B customers need a salesperson or an expert in their industry terminology and knowledgeable about their business processes. They need a constructive conversation with knowledge provided about exactly what they are purchasing. Marketers must speak their language and provide detailed content.

“B2B marketers must ensure that social media messages for consumer products, which often are informal, casual and humorous, do not send a signal that the company is not technically competent.” (Habibi, Hamilton, Valos, & Callaghan, 2015).

B2C — Use emotional triggers

Marketing to consumers should use straightforward language, in the customer’s voice, so it is relatable. It should also aim to evoke the emotions of the audience to create a desire.

Get right to the point with marketing and point out the benefits clearly, so it is easy to understand. The more straightforward your message is, the better. Do not use industry jargon.

It is also okay to be informal and humorous.

Consumers often purchase with the hearts over their minds and will go with their gut. Emotion often influences this ‘gut’ feeling.

We aim to entertain the audience rather than strictly educating them. B2C customers are highly motivated by personal gratification, so marketing that tells an uplifting story about someone who benefited from consuming your brand provides excellent marketing content.

“B2B products or services are often more complex than consumer products and services. Greater product complexity means that B2B purchasers tend to rely on more information.” (Habibi, Hamilton, Valos, & Callaghan, 2015)

Purchase value and complexity

The B2B the purchasing process is more complicated than B2C, taking more consideration from decision-makers, as purchases are usually of higher cost and importance.

B2B — High value and complexity

Because of the higher-order values and longer sales cycles of B2B, the potential risk is heightened compared to B2C.

Purchases can become quite complicated, with multiple influences on decisions. Decisions are typically long-term investments; decisions can be a complicated process with pressure to get decisions right. B2B clients often need to prove a return-on-investment for their purchase.

B2B marketers should use social media to provide informational and valuable content to reduce risk perception.

B2C — low value and complexity

Purchase values in B2C can vary greatly. Low-cost consumables from the supermarket, for example, are low cost and low risk. Do not have to educate purchasers but instead entice them.

Marketing should aim to create an emotional response — food looks eye-watering tasty, clothing makes a model look more fashionable or a phone that takes better photos to create better memories. A decision is usually not complicated, often made in a split second to fulfil instant gratification motivation.



Thank you for reading.

I hope you enjoyed the content about B2C and B2B Marketing’s differences and learned something new!

In summary, there are different motivations for making business decisions and making personal decisions. Choices on what to purchase for a business is a longer process more logical and rational than the sometimes emotional decision to buy something for ourselves or our families.

Therefore, the way marketing communicates to these two customers groups will be different.

This article was originally posted on the BYB Marketing Blog: https://brandyourselfbetter.com/blog/post/223490/the-differences-between-b2b-and-b2c-marketing

The Ultimate Guide to Facebook Marketing: 2021 Edition

A business page on Facebook is a valuable tool for any marketer, whether you are a consultant, SME or corporation. 

Ever since Facebook launched in 2004, it has continued to grow inactive users. It is the most popular social media platform across the globe and the second most visited website. 

Literally, billions of people are using Facebook every week. So it’s an excellent opportunity to put your brand in front of your target market and grow an audience with people who could become customers.

However, Facebook is not static. It is always updating the algorithm and including new features for users.

Luckily, I have created this guide to marketing on Facebook in 2021 with up to date information about setting up your account and the tools available for you to use.

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Social media for marketing

Social media networks are online platforms for exchanging information, communication, and connecting to maintain and form relationships.

Social media plays a vital role in modern culture, with one-third of the total time online across the globe spent on social media.

According to Boyd and Ellison (2010), social media can is a “web-based services that allow individuals to

(1) Construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system,

(2) Articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection, and

(3) View and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system.”

From a marketing point, social media offers several advantages to businesses.

People use social media to express their identity, but they also use it to learn about products, brands, and topics that interest them. Therefore, social media is an excellent opportunity to showcase a brand and learn more about the target market’s preferences and consumer behaviour.

“The Internet environment and its increasing significance started to play a vital role in motivating customers in their decision whether to buy a product or not. The great advantage of social media (apart from others) is the fact that they are available for all sorts of businesses — no matter their size and specialization.” (Copuš, & Čarnogurský, 2017)

Social media is a low-cost marketing tool — it can even cost nothing (besides your time). Access to social media is readily available to any business that wants to set up an account, anytime they want.

Usage level by potential customers is large, meaning it is easy to be noticed by your target audience. There is the ability to go ‘viral’ with content seen by many people for little effort or investment.

The ease of linking content to your website to potentially convert leads into paying customers is another significant benefit.

Social media has become essential for any businesses’ marketing strategy to engage with their target consumers to generate brand awareness and create a loyal following.

“Two-thirds of Facebook users say they visit a local business Facebook Page at least once a week.” (Kawaf, & Istanbulluoglu, 2019)

 

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Why is Facebook so crucial to marketers?

Facebook is a useful tool for marketers wanting to use social media for social selling as part of their broader marketing strategy.

According to Facebook, by 2018, they had over 2 billion monthly active users, along with 60 million business pages.

This high number of active users that makes Facebook such an appealing digital marketing platform.

Another drawcard of Facebook is the ability to facilitate mutual communication and interaction to build relationships with a high number of potential customers.

“Facebook allows companies to connect with many more people and much more often than the companies would be able to approach through phone calls, emails, or meetings.” (Ramsaran-Fowdar, & Fowdar, 2013)

 

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Setting up your Facebook business page

Do not make the mistake of setting up a personal profile for your business! Make a business page, to receive all the benefits such as analytics and paid advertising.

It is a good idea to set up Facebook Business Manager to organise and manage all your Facebook marketing and advertising activities from a central location after you set up your business page.

To set up a business account, log into your personal account and go to facebook.com/pages/create.

Before we get into it, it is essential to say that if you want to be successful on Facebook, you need to know a lot about Facebook and how things work. Facebook continuously updates the platform, so things change. Learn about Facebook and how it operates. Use the help section on the Facebook website and Google any queries.

Complete your Page info

Complete every component of your profile to get the most out of your Facebook business account. Under manage page, edit page info.

Add a username — it can be up to 50 characters long. It makes sense for it to be your business/brand name, consistently named with other social media. Essential to your branding, this will become your personalised URL — e.g., facebook.com/yourbusinessname.

The name you want may already be in use by someone else. If so, create a username as close and relevant as possible to your brand name.

Fill out your ‘About’ section with necessary information such as a brief but descriptive summary of who you are and what value you bring, your contact details and website, operating hours, and price range (if relevant).

Search engines use this information to ensure you use relevant keywords and ensure it is consistent with your other information on the web.

Make sure your profile aligns with your brand’s overall marketing strategy. It should reflect your brand’s unique identity, so people know what your page is about and what you do when visiting it.

Business page template

Customise the look of your Business page through one of their templates. There is a variety available to help businesses showcase content to fit their business needs best, prioritising your business type’s most critical information or content.

To change your template, select the Page Settings tab of your Facebook business profile and then click on templates. Templates available are:

• Services
• Business
• Venues
• Non-profits
• Politician
• Public figures
• Restaurants & Cafes
• Shopping
• Video page
• Standard

Profile images

Your profile picture should be easy for your target audience to recognise — either the company logo for a brand or your headshot if you are a freelancer or consultant.

Make it high-quality and engaging to your visitors. Same with your cover photo — this is an excellent opportunity to capture your target audience’s attention.

It needs to be clear what you do and the value you bring. Facebook allows you to upload a video for your cover also — this can be an opportunity to showcase your business via video.

Currently, profile pictures display at 170 × 170 pixels on desktop, and 128 × 128 on smartphones. 170 x 170 is the recommended size

Cover photos display on desktop at 820 x 312 pixels and smartphones at 640 x 360. Facebook recommends 851 x 315 to work best on both.

Call to action

Make sure you enable your call-to-action button. The call-to-action button has several options such as “Sign Up,” “Send Message,” or “Learn more”, which directs to a destination URL (webpage) of your choice.

A call to action makes it easier for customers to take the desired action, and it can help drive more traffic to your website (if that is where the URL sends them).

Define your audience

An essential component of any marketing strategy is knowing your target audience and planning how best to communicate with those people with the right content.

Knowing this will also help target in paid advertising when you set up your audience. Ads are covered later in this article.

Some of the questions you need to answer are:

• What is the age of your target audience?
• Where do they live?
• What are their occupations?
• What are their interests?
• What are their goals?
• How do they use Facebook?
• When do they use Facebook?
• How often?
• Are they educated?
• Are they Married?
• What language/s do they speak?
• What is their purchasing activity online?

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Messenger

Facebook Messenger is the second most downloaded app after Facebook, with over 1.3 billion people using Facebook Messenger each month.

Many users open their Messenger messages. According to Mobile Monkey, email typically has around a 5–10% open-rates and a 1% clickthrough rate. However, Messenger can have open-rates over 50% and a 20% clickthrough rate.

With so many people with the messenger app installed, they receive a notification instantly to their smartphones. In contrast, a message may sit in an email inbox for several days before someone checks their email and notices it.

If you respond to customers instantly, there is more chance of converting a sale.

To ensure your response time on your Facebook business page is as quick as possible, you can set up a Messenger Bot. After all, most businesses do not have time to answers monitor their messages. You must work and sleep, right?

Messenger bots are a type of Chatbot. Chatbots are a tool with artificial intelligence to simulates human conversations with internet users.

Chatbots communicate with your audience naturally, whether it be to answer a customer’s query or inform them what is going on in the business, such as promoting a new product or service, or upcoming sales.

Bots can be highly-tailored to answer almost anything a customer wants to know about your business — without needing a human being’s time. They can even be programmed to have information about your entire product catalogue to recommend the best solution to their needs.

They are more simple than you probably think to set up — there are multiple tools available to help create your bot. Read this guide from Hootsuite to on how to set up a messenger bot.

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What do I post on Facebook?

Facebook as a marketing tool allows businesses to control the type of content they share when they share it and how often.

But what type of content should your business post? Motivations for people who engage with Facebook pages include socialising, entertainment, self-status seeking and information seeking.

Post content authentic to who you are and your expertise and aim to encourage meaningful conversations.

For example, a real estate agent could post content with tips for sellers when putting their house on the market, and a plumber or handyman could post DIY guides on how to fix common household problems.

The Facebook algorithm prioritises the content people see based on what they usually interact with and popularity of the post.

Think from your target customers’ perspective and what content they would find valuable, informational, thought-provoking, emotional, or entertaining. Creating this type of content will boost your credibility with your audience.

Desist from posting clickbait and too much spammy content.

A good rule of thumb is posting original material 70 percent of the time, share other content relevant to your audience’s interest 20 percent of the time and 10 percent of your content self-promotional or sales orientated.

Do not be limited to one or two types of content and embrace the opportunity to experiment with different content formats to see what works best for engaging your audience.

If you post content using Facebook Business Suite, it also goes on your Instagram account.

Photos & videos

Visual content such as photos, infographics, and video, is more likely to get shared on social media than other content. Including a photo means more of your followers will notice your post as they mindlessly scroll through their feed.

Facebook users are far more likely to engage than with a post with text alone.

It pays to invest a reasonable amount of time and other resources into creating video for your social media. Many people casually scroll and watch videos during downtime at home or work.

According to WordStream, 45% of people watch more than an hour of video on Facebook or YouTube a week.

Some of these people prefer to scroll in silence as to not interrupt people around them. Some studies have indicated that up to 85% of users watch Facebook videos on silent. Therefore, including captions in your videos to videos is a no-brainer.

Research carried out by Facebook found that adding subtitles increases view times by 12% on average.

Use different orientations for creating videos.

Facebook Stories are in Portrait mode; you should shoot some video content in this orientation. Many people watch a video in landscape view. Still, a study from Buffer found that square videos perform best and receive up to 35% more views than landscape videos. Users can watch square videos easily whilst scrolling through the feed without turning the mobile sideways.

Facebook live

Give Facebook live a try. As you would expect, this is when a video is recorded and broadcasted simultaneously.

Going ‘live’ can create a buzz as it gives an ‘in the moment’ look of a business and what you do. Doing video life and unedited can seem more personal and authentic, as there is no chance to edit or perfect the footage. Viewers can also comment and ask questions that the creator can respond to in real-time.

Some people are more likely to watch live streams than pre-recorded videos. Figures indicate people spend more than three times longer watching a Facebook Live video than video that is no longer live.

Your followers receive a notification when you go live and promote the fact you will go live 1–2 weeks beforehand if you feel the video will add value to your audience. You want to ensure people know it is happening and are available to watch.

Facebook Stories

Over 500 million people view Facebook Stories every day. Stories are photo or short video posts in a vertical format (for mobile phones) that appear in vertical format and disappear 24 hours. Photos last for five seconds, videos up to 20 seconds before it skips to the next story.

Stories from your friends or pages you follow are arranged based on an algorithm based on your engagement. Found at the top of the News Feed, meaning Stories are quite prominent to the platform.

Snapchat originally popularised the concept which has now spread to other platforms, including LinkedIn.

Post ‘stories’ of your workday, special projects, locations you visit or the products you sell. Give viewers a snapshot of your business.

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Post frequency

When and how frequently to post is an important consideration. Posting too often or not often enough will reduce your organic reach. Organic reach is the number of people who see your post in their feed.

Your marketing patterns can also impact how your audience views your business. If you post occasionally, your audience will stop looking for your content and will be less engaged.

Consumers might think you are unreliable compared to another business who posts consistently.

Would you trust a business who has not updated their Facebook Page for months? Posting consistency is essential to building a strong brand.

On the flip side, posting too frequently means your audience may get sick of being bombarded with your content and may unfollow you. It is also hard to keep the quality high if you post too frequently as it takes time and effort to create quality content.

Research has indicated a stark difference between business pages and media pages with post frequency. Media-focused pages have an allowance of a lot more content before being penalised by the algorithm. For brands, aim for post per day (5–10 posts a week); and for a media company, up to seven posts a day (approx. 50 posts a week).

The timing of when you post on social media can impact your engagement. The highest traffic on Facebook occurs around mid-day Wednesday and Thursday. Try and post in this window and vary the other times you post, to see what works for you and your audience.

To help optimise your strategy, try creating a content calendar with a plan for what types of content you will post and when to ensure variety and keep you accountable to a schedule.

Make most holidays, popular shopping dates and seasons such as Easter, Valentine’s Day, Black Friday, and winter.

Is your product mostly consumed at certain times of the year? If so, you will need focused marketing on the lead up to these dates.

Engage with your audience

Take time to respond to peoples’ comments on your posts and reply messages. Engagement encourages engagement, and socialising with your followers creates a community.

Engaging with your audience keeps you top of mind and your followers will feel more valued and validated that you care what they had to say. Regular engagement should be a positive influence on whether they become a customer, or you retain their business.

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Facebook Ads

Facebook has led the way in terms of hyper-personalised advertising.

As annoying as it sounds, if you want to use Facebook to its full potential, you will need to pay for advertising. Organic reach (unpaid) has been declining for several years.

Ads help your content to reach a broad but targeted audience and use the platform to its full potential.

There are 7 million advertisers on Facebook, which means newsfeed space is highly competitive and therefore, organic reach has reduced, and the algorithm favours paid content.

Cost-per-click varies, but it will probably cost you around 50 cents to $2 per click.

“The time spent on Facebook by individuals and the accessibility of Facebook using mobile phones, Facebook represents a highly familiar tool for many individuals and one of the easiest sources from which to find information online.” (Önder, Gunter, & Gindl, 2020)

It is vital to set up a Facebook pixel if you are sending traffic to your website. This pixel is a piece of code placed on your website that track who visits and their behaviour. You can then remarket to people who have already visited your website.

The power of remarketing is that you know these people are interested in what you do because of their behaviour, so your advertising spends very targeted.

For example, you could target people who put an item from your store in their cart but did not purchase. Advertise to these people a special offer which hopefully they cannot refuse.

Types of ads

Facebook offers a lot of ad types. Majority of Facebook Ad revenue is from mobile, so make sure your ads are in mobile-first format. Before getting into the different types of ads, you can ‘boost’ an existing post. If you create a post that you think would work well as an ad, you can boost that content to reach a larger audience that you chose.

First, ads need a goal. Goals can include generating leads, receive messages or to increase website traffic. Facebook offers three broad Ad Objectives.

Awareness is about putting your brand out there, so potential customers know you exist. Tell your story and showcase your knowledge and expertise to connect with potential customers. This phase targets the top of a sales funnel.

Consideration is when people start seriously thinking about your brand and what you offer. These consumers consider purchase options and begin to do their research and want more information about what you offer. This phase targets the middle of the funnel.

Conversion is when people carry out a specific action such as purchasing a product or service. The goal is to encourage this action to convert customers, targeting the bottom of the funnel.

The Individual ads that you can create for different goals are:

• image or video ads
• carousel ads
• slideshow ads
• collection ads
• instant experiences ads
• dynamic ads
• Messenger ads
• Stories ads
• augmented reality ads
• playable ads.

Facebook has recently introduced Augmented Reality tools for advertisers. Augmented reality ads can help demonstrate what a specific product looks like on a consumer, such as trying on makeup or clothing.

Try out different types of ads and run two to three ads at a time for testing.

Change only one element in each ad, such as an image, the copy, or the call to action; then measure the performance. Called single variable testing, this helps you to improve your ads based on their performance.

If you do not test your ads’ different components, they could be under-performing, and you do not know why.

Use automation tools that Facebook provides, such as:

Automatic Placements, which is when Facebook chooses your ad placements. Facebook can also run ads on Instagram, Messenger, and other relevant apps or webpages.

Campaign Budget Optimization is setting your budget at the campaign level, instead of at an ad level. It may not spend your budget equally, but instead, it gives the flexibility to spend in the best way it seems fit. Underperforming ads receive less allocation, and well-performing ads receive a higher ratio of spending.

Dynamic ads are versions of your ads personalised to each person who views them, depending on their behaviour and what types of content they are likely to engage. Several images, videos and text are supplied by the user, used as the basis for each unique ad.

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Facebook analytics

Track and measure how your performance of organic posts — will help you know what types of content do well and what does not. Observe popular times to post, for example, and other variables, refine your content strategy accordingly to yield better results.

Use Facebook’s free internal analytics tool ‘Insights’ to provide you with a clear picture of how your business page is doing. Key metrics to monitor are:

• Post Reach (how many people saw your posts)
• Engagement (how many people liked, clicked, shared, or commented)
• Posts that result in people unliking your Page
• Follower growth
• Audience insight such as the audience demographics engaging with your content

Analytics can also help you build targeted custom audiences for future ads based on what you learn about your content engagement.

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Facebook Groups

As of April 1999, there are more than 10 million Facebook groups, with 1.4 billion people using them every month. Consumer behaviour on Facebook has started to move away from engaging on public pages to private groups, focusing more on business owners moving forward.

Facebook Groups are like a forum — a discussion platform and communication space for people with similar interests.

Groups are often hyper-focused on a specific topic. They tend to bring high engagement, as group members are passionate about and interested in the topics discussed. Group members get to know each other, and it becomes a community.

Members often openly discuss topics related to the group and trade information and tips with each other. Groups become a trusted source of information for consumers.

Therefore, groups are an excellent opportunity for businesses to create content for Facebook groups in their niche, to showcase their expertise and provide value. 

Using this strategy in groups builds trust and develops long-term relationships with potential customers or people who may refer to customers.

“Thanks to social media, business can build such emotional relations with their customers based on the mutual interaction in the online community.” (Copuš, & Čarnogurský, 2017)

Discussions in groups can be quite casual and even personal. People are opinionated as groups are typically private and away from family and friends, so they are considered safe.

Consider creating your own Facebook group, around the topic of your business.

You could also join existing groups relevant to your business/industry.

Moderators facilitate what happens in the group. Everyone in the group can be invited or usually approved, and admin can remove people for behaviour against the group’s rules or spirit.

There are no paid ads in groups, but because the audience already in a segment, e.g., fans of basketball or a TV show, which can be just as powerful as targeted ads.

Some may allow you to post about your business or products. However, often groups with no limits on promotional posts become full of SPAM.

Every single group will not be suitable, but the great thing is there are usually many appropriate options that you can choose.

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Summary

In sum, Facebook offers a massive opportunity for businesses to grow brand awareness and have conversations with their target audience.

If you remember to create value for your target audience and engage with your audience, you really cannot go wrong with your strategy.

Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoyed the content.

How Sponsorship Increases Brand Awareness and Generates Good Will

 

Do you have a local sports club that you support? Sponsors help them operate through providing funding or support in other ways. Some of the events you attend probably also receive sponsorship.

The biggest sports teams in the world have sponsorship splashed across the uniforms. The NBA has even succumbed to the lure of extra money after decades of refusing to have sponsor branding on the uniforms.

This blog explores what sponsorship is, how it works and its benefits to businesses.

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What is Sponsorship?

Sponsorship involves a business relationship between two parties, where one party (sponsor) provides support in the form of funding, resources, or services to the other party (beneficiary), who in return provide access to the sponsor for rights and associations to be used for commercial advantage.

“(Sponsorship is) the provision of assistance either financial or in-kind to an activity by a commercial organisation, for the purpose of achieving commercial objectives.” (Meenaghan, 1983)

The sponsored party could be an event, organisation, or an individual; the involvement of this second party, distinguishing sponsorship from advertising.

Initial examples of sponsorship can be found over 100 years ago, but they are rare and on a small scale. Its use has exploded since the 1970s. 

According to Meenaghan (2001), in the UK, spending on sponsorship increased from £4 million to $1075 million between 1970 and 1997. In the US, spending increased from $850 million in 1985 to $8.7 billion in 2000.

“Sponsorship involves two main activities: (1) an exchange between a sponsor and a sponsee, whereby the latter receives a fee and the former obtains the right to associate itself with the activity sponsored and (2) the marketing of the association by the sponsor.” (Cornwell & Maignan, 1998)

A common form of sponsorship is of sports clubs. 

Your favourite sports teams are likely to have the logo of their key sponsor/s on their uniforms. This exposure on television, social media or other media holds value to the sponsor. 

The sponsor could also be provided access to players for their own events or PR and corporate hospitality at their events or games.

How does sponsorship work?

Through the affiliation with an entity people care about, sponsorship helps to enhance the public perception of the sponsors’ brand. This affiliation creates a ‘halo effect’ of goodwill, where positive associations with the beneficiary of the sponsorship are reflected onto the sponsor.

Because sponsorship provides a positive benefit to society through empowering the existence of entities consumers care about, sponsorship is typically more positively perceived than advertising’s sole focus on commercial goals.

Advertising’s only interest is the profitability of the firm, thereby having no obvious benefit to the greater society. Advertising can also be coercive, resulting in alerting consumers’ defence mechanisms. Sponsorship’s commercial intent is more subtle and indirect, lowering consumer defence mechanisms. 

Read more about persuasion knowledge for a better understanding of this process.

The table below shows a comparison between sponsorship and advertising characteristics.

Comparison between advertising and sponsorship (Meenaghan, 2001)

“Sponsorship works differently in relation to the consumer than do other forms of advertising and promotions in that it engages the consumer differently by bestowing benefit on an activity (e.g., sports or the arts) with which the consumer has an intense emotional relationship.” (Meenaghan, 2001)

 

Leveraging the partnership

To maximise the commercial result of their sponsorship, sponsors should focus their branding and marketing communications efforts on leveraging the association.

For example, along with displaying their branding on flags or banners at a sponsored event, social media posts promoting the event and the businesses’ role as sponsor.

Consumers can hold positive associations and deep loyalty towards sponsors of the sport, events, causes or other entities that they care deeply about. Sponsors proactively promoting their relationship enables these brands to leverage this emotional connection these consumers hold. The values of the sponsored activity or entity are then associated with the sponsor’s brand.

“Sponsorship appears to be another area of marketing, along with source effects, store atmospherics, brand extension, and brand alliances, where the consumer’s ability to see an association between marketing assets enhances the effectiveness of these assets.” (Cornwell, 1995)

 

Sponsorship fit

Sponsors invest in sponsorship to establish their credibility with their target market. For this practice to be effective, there needs to be an organic link in terms of similar goals, values, and vision, between the sponsor and the beneficiary of the sponsorship. One that makes sense to the public.

The sponsor’s target market should match the target market of the beneficiary they are sponsoring. Therefore, the right consumers have subjected the affiliation and the response is likely to be better if there is perceived to be a good fit between the two parties.

Also, passionate followers, fans or consumers of the sponsored entity judge the fit of the relationship and respond more (or less) positively than the typical consumer if the sponsor fits the same values. 

If there is a fit, the sponsorship is perceived to be more sincere. This is seen as more authentic.

“Events, activities, and venues have been fully recognized for their ability to target a particular demographic or psychographic segment.” (Cornwell, & Maignan, 1998)

 

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What are the benefits of sponsorship?

Sponsorship works in a way that it provides mutual benefits for the sponsor and the beneficiary. The beneficiary of the sponsorship receives funding or resources to operate. 

Sponsorship has replaced other forms of funding such as government support in some countries to the extent that some sponsored activities rely on corporate funding to exist.

For a business, some of the key motivations for investing in sponsorship are improving goodwill, enhancing public relations, increasing brand awareness, improving brand image. 

Improving profitability is obviously the end goal for any businesses’ strategic planning — these motivations contribute to enhancing the probability of this.

“The sponsor’s investment benefits the activity generates a goodwill effect among activity fans, which in turn influences their attitude and behaviour toward the sponsor’s brand.” (Meenaghan, 2001)

 

Goodwill

One of the key factors distinguishing sponsorship from advertising is the presence of goodwill. Goodwill from the sponsor in supporting the beneficiary and gratitude from consumers to the sponsor, grateful to them for helping out a favourite event, sport or organisation.

According to Meenaghan (2001), goodwill effects are mediated by the intensity of an individual’s involvement or connection with the sponsored entity. 

Highly involved fans/consumers connection with a sports team for example can be deeply felt, and their awareness of the sponsor’s brand is likely to be higher than a casual fan/consumer.

Therefore, the goodwill affects for the sponsor are likely to be greater and they are more likely to develop a favourable opinion of the sponsor. This can trigger a strong preference for a sponsor’s products or service, increasing their purchase intention.

Goodwill also exists at different levels depending on the type of entity being supported by the sponsor. For example, the sponsorship of social causes typically generating more goodwill toward the sponsor than sponsorship of the arts or a building.

Enhancing public relations

Through sponsoring entities such as sports clubs that consumers care for, this fosters a socially responsible reputation. Improving community relations is a common sponsorship objective for corporations, especially banks, as they often do not have the best reputation. 

As well as sponsoring well-known sports clubs, the organisation also sponsor local events or not for profit groups that benefit the local community where they are based. Other ways to benefit the community might be providing computers to a local school.

Sponsorship can be a relationship marketing tool. 

Relationship marketing is the marketing activities that attract, develop, maintain, and enhance customer satisfaction and fostering customer retention. This was discussed in week 14.

Sponsorship can be a vehicle for developing relationships with the target market through signalling to them that our business shares similar interests and supports the same causes.

In B2B, It also helps create bonds with businesses partners who share a common sponsorship or strengthen their relationship with current and potential clients, through the use perks of sponsorship such as a corporate box at events.

Increasing brand awareness

Awareness of the sponsor’s brand is increased through the publicity of the entity they are supporting. It could be through advertising, TV coverage or other media such as social media or news articles, or people attending and seeing branding of sponsors.

Local businesses can increase awareness of what they are doing in the local community through an article in a local newspaper, whereas large corporations or consumer brands can put their brand in front of thousands or even millions of people through sponsoring a high-profile sports team with an audience on a global scale. 

The All Blacks, Los Angeles Lakers or Manchester United, for example.

Sponsorship can provide a broader reach than advertising which will only reach a finite audience, depending on the platform.

“Activity followers, being most knowledgeable of the image values embodied in the activity, transfer these specific image values to the sponsor.” (Meenaghan, 2001)

 

Improving brand image

Cultivating positive and favourable brand associations (traits consumers attribute to a brand) and enhancing credibility is a benefit of sponsorship. Because of the goodwill factor, sponsors are viewed more favourably. This positively influences their brand equity.

Brand equity is the influence brand knowledge has on the consumer response to marketing. Brand equity strengthened when the consumer is familiar with the brand and holds strong and favourable associations with it. 

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Types of sponsorship

Sponsorship is typically associated with a sports team or event, but there are multiple forms of sponsorship. It can include concerts or the performing arts, and sports stars such as LeBron James are commonly sponsored by clothing companies such as Nike because of their global appeal.

Other sponsored entities include not for profit groups, charity or business events, associations, social media influencers and celebrities, buildings (often banks sponsor skyscrapers), and local government-funded venues such as stadiums.

One event could have multiple sponsors. Those sponsors might all contribute an equal amount for equal benefits, or there might be different tiers of sponsors. These have different levels of investment and sponsors receive individual benefits based on the value of their investment.

For an example of a business event — I run a networking event called Linkedin Local Hamilton, funded through sponsorship. It’s probably not what you expect — I wanted it to have an atmosphere more like a cocktail party.

Sponsors pay for the food and beverages of the people attending the event — usually around 150 people. Venues are offered for free, which is an in-kind sponsorship (discussed shortly). 

Tickets to attend the event are free or donation-based, which means there is little income. The events rely on sponsorship to exist. The benefit to sponsors is the exposure of their brand as a sponsor in social media promotion and with the people attending the event. 

It has worked well — I have run 13 events and counting.

Financial sponsor

There are two main types of sponsorship. Financial and in-kind sponsors.

A financial sponsor is also known as a cash sponsor and it is the most popular form of sponsorship. It is pretty simple — they give money to an entity in return for a promotion or other benefits outlined in their sponsorship agreement.

Some different types or levels of financial sponsorship are:

• Series sponsor — the highest status of sponsorship. the name and the logo of the sponsor are incorporated into the title of the series and other promotion, the rights to use teams, team members, players, coaches, and the series body in conducting joint promotions, right of presence at all official events.
• Title sponsor — similar to series sponsor, but for a one-off event. Many of the same benefits of a series sponsor mentioned above, another being branding placed around the stadium.
• General sponsor — also a large contributor (usually exist in the absence of a title sponsor), they receive the right to promote their association as a sponsor and often receive media coverage.
• Team sponsor — fund individual teams. They receive mention in media coverage of a team and often has on the uniforms and at their stadium. Special access to the team often provided.
• Official sponsor — is a sponsor that makes a certain part of raised funds (within 20–25%). Typically, the given status may be granted by category — for example, ‘official insurance partner’.
• Participating sponsor — is often one of the numerous sponsors and the benefits are not as extensive as the other sponsors. The size of their fee usually does not exceed 10% of total raised funds.

In-kind Sponsors

• Venue Partners — allows events to be hosted at their venue for a discounted or free rate. This allows the venue to gain exposure to a certain demographic.
• Prize Sponsors — donate items to be used as prizes at events such as spot prizes for doing activities or items to be included in a charity auction.
• Food Sponsors — at events, food sponsors offer free food to attendees. Catering can be a big expense for the organiser.
• Digital Sponsors — might provide a custom app for an event or live stream it to social media or a webpage.
• Media Sponsorship — marketing is provided on multiple communication platforms and PR, which can be valuable for not for profit/small businesses who do not have the budget or expertise themselves.
• Technical sponsor — provides goods or services, to a sports team for example in terms of medical skills or equipment or perhaps supplements.

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Summary

In sum, sponsorship is a marketing tactic involving a business relationship between two parties — one being the sponsor who provides support in the form of funding, resources, or services to the other party (beneficiary); who in return provide access to the sponsor for rights and associations to be used for commercial advantage.

This article has discussed how sponsorship works and its benefits, different types of sponsorship, and what needs happen in order for sponsorship to be an effective marketing tool.

Thank you for reading. 

I hope you enjoyed the content and learnt something new that you can apply to your business.

This article was originally posted on the BYB Marketing Blog: https://brandyourselfbetter.com/blog/post/208450/how-does-sponsorship-work