B2B buyers aren't some corporate workhorse that slave away meeting KPIs and internal targets - well, actually, they're not far from that. They're data and knowledge-driven groups of six to ten people that strive to connect with the best vendors based on months, sometimes a year or more, worth of research. But they're human. They have needs just like the average consumers do - in fact, the modern B2B buyer wants to be viewed as a consumer rather than a corporate buyer.
The result? A rise in demand for personalization and human experience. Let's explore how to achieve that.
We all have needs, especially emotional ones. At the core of both B2C and B2B sales is an emotional connection. Buyers don't want to understand a product that meets their needs; they want to connect with it, connect with the seller, and latch on with emotions. Numerous studies by neuroscientists support the theory that emotion drives all purchases. They also found that emotional connections influence 77% of human behaviors.
Combine meeting emotional needs with personalization, and you'll come to ideas like B2B loyalty programs. Aimed to deepen the connection between sellers and buyers, a customer incentive platform that allows complete personalization of a reward program will help brands effectively communicate values and engage with audiences.
82% of buyers think the way to their hearts is to treat them like human beings - understanding that they're an individual rather than a buying team for a wider organization. Despite that figure, only one in five B2B organizations have a personalization strategy plan in place, Forrester reports. That means only 20% of B2B organizations understand what their buyers need and are perhaps focusing on the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, as it were.
Still, there are no excuses considering the tremendous lunges forward in artificial intelligence (AI) software specifically designed to facilitate personalization. Whether you understand the buyer or not, businesses can encourage personalization based on AI technology that scores data to track a buyer's every move. For example, it might see that a buyer spends all their time mooching through your social media pages - therefore, brands should focus on personalized social media adverts.
The Harvard Business Review published an article that said 23% of deals get left in the dark because there's a lack of engagement, and by engagement, we mean meaningful engagement. Buyer engagement should solve problems, support buyers, and create a frictionless buying cycle. It should be about promoting a product or service, which may come across as a pushy sales technique.
Circling back to B2B reward programs - they're a great way to foster better buyer engagement with a brand. A point-based reward system allows brands to reward positive buyer behaviors and communicate values to an engaged audience. Communicating values also links to the need for an emotional connection.
It's not just rewarding plans. A structured buyer engagement plan should use emails, video calls, and social media interactions to all serve as a way of increasing buyer engagement.
Buyers aren't complex; it's the buying cycle. They're the same as any consumer looking to buy a product to meet their needs, except they're meeting the needs of the organization they work for simultaneously. There are other great concepts about why buyers want personalized human experiences and how a brand can facilitate them online.