Establishing an online presence has become a necessity in today’s world. All businesses whether online or offline fall under the category of either B2B – business to business or B2C- business to consumer. Every business’s audience can be reached through various social media channels such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. 89% of B2B marketers have been reported to have used LinkedIn for lead generation as a B2B social media strategy. It is essential for every business to know the different B2B vs B2C social media strategies that exist.
Knowing what social media strategy to use for your b2b and b2c businesses will help you reach the right audience, which is why we have written this article. Here, you will also know what social media marketing strategy is best for B2B marketing and what social media marketing strategy is best for B2C marketing. This article explains in practical detail the various social media strategy for B2B and B2C businesses.
What is a Social Media Strategy?
A social media strategy is the laid out plan that details all you will be doing to achieve your social media marketing goals.
A social media plan contains well-thought-out actions to be taken on social media for your B2C or B2B market. This plan answers the questions to what goal you plan to achieve with every B2B or B2C social media marketing activity including campaigns, creating an offer, promoting content among others, when you plan to achieve it, how you plan to achieve your B2C or B2B social media marketing goals, and why you choose to achieve your goal.
A social media strategy carefully guides your social media marketing plans and lets you know if, and when you are achieving your goal or not. The more specific and clear your social media strategy is, the more effective and measurable your goal is.
A social media strategy set in place also helps you to measure your B2B and B2C market growth using the required metrics or Key Performance Index (KPI).
What is B2B social media strategy?
B2B social media strategy is the use of social media channels or platforms in marketing products or services to other businesses or companies.
What is B2C social media strategy?
B2C social media strategy uses social media channels to reach consumers who make personal decisions on purchase.
Types of Social Media Strategy and Channels
There are different types of social media goals and hence different types of social media strategies you can use to achieve each one of them for your B2C and B2B businesses.
Various social media goals include increasing brand awareness, generating new leads, driving traffic to your website, boosting brand engagement, growing revenue, building a community around your business, increasing mentions in the press, and other goals targeted towards connecting your B2C market and B2B market to consumers and conversion into sales.
In the same way, these social media goals can be achieved using various social media platforms. E.G Facebook can be used for lead generation and YouTube for sharing informational video content.
A Quick One:
See why small businesses should utilize social media
How do you determine the best B2B and B2C Social Media Strategy? – What is the best B2B and B2c Social Media Strategy?
Next thing, how do you determine the best social media marketing strategy best for your business? Before deciding this, first, you must find out which category of the market your business falls into? B2B or B2C?
If you still don’t know how to differentiate between B2B vs B2C, check out our resource on B2B marketing vs B2c marketing. You would also find examples of B2B business and B2C business. This article on B2B vs B2C social media strategy will also highlight the difference between B2C and B2B marketing as you read on.
Now, that we understand what B2B and B2C businesses are all about, let’s go on to the best social media strategy for each of them is.
Difference between B2B and B2C Social Media Marketing: B2B Vs B2C Social Media Strategy
How does B2B social media marketing strategy differ from B2C social media strategy? Business to business B2B and business to consumer B2B marketing differ in many ways including the social media strategy approach used. Hence there are various social media strategies each peculiar to B2B and B2C businesses.
B2B vs B2C social media strategy generally depends on:
- Who your audience is?
- The kind of content you want to post
- The social media platform or channel you will be using
- The social media goals you want to achieve.
- How do you want your brand to be seen or perceived?
Answering these questions will help you know the best social media strategy and differentiate between B2B vs B2C Social Media Strategy.
Now, let us dive into the best social media strategy for B2B and B2c as we compare them with each other.
1. Audience:
The audience is a major highlighting factor for B2b vs B2C Social media strategy. As the name implies, marketing for B2B means business marketing to another business while marketing for B2C means business marketing to a customer.
The audience for B2B business is another business.
The audience for B2C business is the consumer.
B2B Audience: B2B companies and businesses do social media strategies with their audience in mind. The B2B marketers focus their B2B social media strategy on reaching targeted companies, businesses, and industries.
B2C Audience: B2C businesses target final consumers instead of professional buyers. The B2C social media strategy is targeted towards meeting the needs, interests and solving everyday challenges of individuals.
However, because B2C businesses have many audiences involved in social media, there is so much competition. B2C marketers who can be creative enough with their content will get past this stage and stand out from the competition.
2. B2B vs B2C Social Media Marketing Goals
The goal is another factor that determines what B2B vs B2c social media strategy to be used.
The major goal of the B2B social media strategy is for brand development and lead generation.
B2B types of businesses also take advantage of several opportunities various social media platforms have to offer to promote their businesses.
In a 2018 survey by Social Media Examiner, it was discovered that more than half of B2B marketers are more likely to use social media to increase their business and gain competitor insights when compared to B2C businesses. Also, a report by Content Marketing Institute showed that B2B brands and businesses are focused on providing their audience with informational needs that help them make an informed decision on their product or service.
Another goal/purpose of the B2B social media strategy is serving their audience with informational content that establishes them as a thought-leader in their niche.
An example can be seen with HubSpot, a b2b marketer of software products for inbound marketing, sales, and customer service, sharing information on inbound marketing.
The goal of the B2C social media strategy is to drive traffic, increase sales and increase awareness through social media.
This B2B vs B2C social media marketing goals show a clear difference in B2B vs B2C social media strategy. This takes us to the next determining factor that distinguishes B2B vs B2c social media strategy
3. B2B vs B2C Social Media Channel/ Platform
Social Media Channel for B2B Businesses
There are three known social media marketing platforms for B2B: LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. The most widely used social media channel for B2B marketers and companies is LinkedIn and Facebook.
- LinkedIn is a common professional social media platform where several businesses can connect and interact. More than 80% of B2 marketers use LinkedIn and more than 90% of B2B marketers use Facebook. This is backed up by HubSpot which reported a 277% effectiveness when compared to Facebook and Twitter.
In recent times, LinkedIn has recorded a high success rate as a B2B social media marketing platform. This is because, via LinkedIn, your business has a high chance of coming face to face with another business. In B2B marketing, retailers and small businesses can find wholesalers for their products. LinkedIn when used effectively can help increase brand.
There are several LinkedIn marketing strategies you can choose to start using depending on what art your business decides to start using.
- Facebook: Facebook can be used for both B2B and B2C social media strategy. However, knowing how to use Facebook for marketing purposes will differentiate business accounts from personal accounts.
When using Facebook for B2B and B2C, social media marketing, the best time of the day for posting content is between the hours of 3 pm to 4 pm. Knowing this social media strategy will help businesses reach their targeted audience.
Social Media Channel for B2C Business
- Facebook is the most common social media platform used by B2C marketers. B2C businesses can use Facebook for community engagement, customer support and promotion.
- Instagram: Pictures! Pictures!! Pictures!!! and more. Instagram is a very effective tool for B2C social media strategy. Small business owners such as food vendors, beauty and makeovers, photographers, boutiques can successfully leverage on Instagram to reach a wide audience. A good quality image will quickly catch the attention of anyone who wouldn’t think twice before contacting your business.
- YouTube: YouTube is another platform to capture the attention of your audience as a B2C marketer. Creating fun-filled videos using animations and cartoon characters will help create a lasting impression on the mind of your consumers.
- LinkedIn: Although LinkedIn is mainly used for B2B businesses, B2C businesses can still take advantage of this social media channel because a small percentage about 27% of people with age range 26-35 years old can be found on LinkedIn.
4. B2B vs B2C Social Media Content:
Generally, if you are using a social media channel that is all about visuals- photos and videos- Instagram and YouTube, then you should focus on the type of content.
B2B Social Media Strategy for Content:
It includes:
1. Blogs and Reviews:
Although the contents B2B marketers make use of on LinkedIn and Facebook are information-driven and professional in nature, they don’t have to be boring. B2B social media strategy can also involve creating content that is engaging and fun.
In the image above, HubSpot used Facebook to share their free e-book “Inbound Marketing told Through Cartoons”
Engaging elements like visuals, graphics, cartoons, storytelling, compelling headlines, empathy can be used as part of the B2B social media strategy.
B2B social media marketing strategy can include providing social media content that helps their audience be more productive with their businesses and in engaging ways.
2. Case Studies:
B2B businesses and marketers can leverage case studies as it helps prove to the audience that your product or service is an effective one. The marketing result becomes better when the case study is focused on a well-known brand.
3. Infographics:
Infographics allow you to summarize large data and analytics in a simple graphical form. Infographics can be great too for B2B social media strategy. B2B companies can easily summarize data into a graphical form allowing easy comprehension and having fun while at it. Your audience doesn’t have to get bored and all serious while consuming your content.
Other content B2B marketers can use to attract their audience includes:
- Webinars
- Videos
- Podcasts
B2C Social Media Strategy for Content:
When comparing contents in B2B vs B2c social media strategy, the best content marketing for b2C social media strategy is visual content. If you’re a B2C marketer or business owner, you should focus on creating engaging and sharable video content as a B2C social media strategy. Including share buttons on your social media pages and blogs will help your content reach a wide audience.
Moreover, focus on creating relatable experiences. Due to the nature of the targeted audience for B2C businesses, content should include humour and if possible risqué banters.
In addition to this, active engagement such as asking questions on your social media pages, the use of emotions, telling stories, and funny jokes will help increase your brand awareness.
Another B2B vs B2C social media strategy is using trending stories to engage your audience. This is particularly great for the Twitter channel, however, make sure to research hashtags, follow as many targeted audiences as you can, and engage them regularly.
What are the benefits of Social Media Marketing Strategy for B2B Businesses?
With the increasing use of social media over the world, without doubt, social media is a strategic space to reach your target audience. Nowadays, having an online presence is no longer an option! You either have a space or you don’t exist at all. Besides, no one who knows the importance of social media to B2B and b2C business would throw away the idea of existing on various social media platforms.
See how to make social media work for your business.
Let’s get into the benefits of social media strategies for B2B Businesses
- Driving Traffic: B2B social media marketing can help drive traffic to your websites as they click the referral links you provide. This ultimately helps you generate leads which may lead to conversion.
- Increased Brand Awareness: Social media marketing can also help increase you brand awareness as a large percentage of your audience mostly visit social media platforms.
- Audience Retargeting: One great benefit of B2B social media strategy is audience retargeting. Using social media platforms will help get visitors back to your website, stay connected until they are ready to make sales.
- Reduced cost of content Promotion: Social media channels for B2B and B2C businesses permits free to low content promotion- organic posts.
Others include
- More inbound traffic
- Improved search engine ranking on the business website
- Higher conversion rates
- Better customer satisfaction
- Improved brand loyalty.
B2B vs B2C Social Media Strategy Tips
1. Audience
B2B: Interact with your Audience:
It’s high time your audience knows there is a real person behind your handle who they can relate with. Marketing to B2B audience requires you to consistently interact with them to understand their pain points. Put a human face behind your brand, reply to all messages on social media platforms as quickly as you can, and ask questions that will help the B2B audience reveal their thoughts concerning your brand. When you do this, your audience feels connected to you and they can easily trust you and your brand.
B2C: Focus on your Audience:
As a B2C marketer, focus on your customer, not your company. This shows that you care about them.
2. Content:
B2B: B2B marketers should spice up social media content with humour. Use of infographics, videos, webinars, case studies, and podcasts.
B2C: B2C marketers can engage the audience with shareable videos, relatable experiences, and high-quality images.
In addition, research hashtags for your brands. Spend time to research hashtags for your brands, as they help showcase your content to followers already engaged with a topic.
Moreover, be authentic. Authenticity contributes a whole lot to B2B social media strategies, so don’t be afraid to show unpolished content.
Key Takeaways
It’s a wrap! Let’s quickly go over what we discussed:
First, understanding the importance of social media presence will help you know the goals you want to achieve and the best social media channel you will choose.
Also, identifying and engaging your audience with the right content is an important B2B vs B2C social media strategy. Content is beyond words! Take a step up by using infographics, videos, and eye-catching images. Moreover, do not forget to get consistent with posting on your social media channel.
