What is B2B demand generation? Generating demand for your B2B business

Demand generation is important when it comes to generating a need for your product with your target market. If you’re interested in B2B demand generation for your own business, this article will explain what B2B demand generation is, as well as the difference between demand generation and lead generation. 

So, what is B2B demand generation? Let’s take a look. 

What is B2B demand generation?

B2B demand generation might sound complicated, but it’s simple. It’s exactly as its name implies - it’s generating demand (aka interest) in your business or services.

However, it’s generating demand for your business within an identified target market. Most marketers will begin B2B demand generation once they’ve already established a reliable target audience, after carrying out lead generation. B2B demand generation involves marketing your services directly at these selected groups, trying to generate further interest and eventually land some sales conversions. 

In layman’s terms, B2B demand generation simply involves identifying your target audience, advertising to them via a targeted marketing campaign in order to drive sales.

How do B2B marketers create demand? 

A typical generation-demand process might look a little something like this:

Step 1: While this is technically part of the “lead generation” step of the marketing process, it’s important that you’re identifying your target audience for your services. It’s also important to identify the problem or ‘need’ that the business may be facing, as this will aid in finding more promising leads.

Step 2: Once you’ve established some solid leads, you’ll begin working on the general awareness of your business or brand within this aforementioned identified market, demonstrating how and why your product or services would be useful. Remember - your marketing needs to demonstrate why your services would be good at solving the problem you’ve identified. Your leads should all share something in common - one of their problems could be fixed by your services.

Step 3: Reinforcement - Once the brand awareness has been established within the target market, it’s time to attempt to nurture the relationship to a point of action. This can be achieved through effective marketing and advertising strategies, trust indicators and social proof. You’re not spamming or harassing your leads - simply proving consistently that your services would help their business. 

Step 4: Sales Conversion - The business finally makes a purchase of your services and you begin the process of keeping them on as a returning client. During this time, you might want to offer initiatives such as referral codes, loyalty schemes and VIP memberships to increase client retention. 

What do you need for a B2B demand generation campaign? 

The most important tool in any B2B demand generation campaign is information: you need data. You need to look at social media insights, competitors and general data about your niche. You’ll also need a CRM and CMS, as well as professional social media accounts where you’ll have access to various analytics.

How do you create a demand generation strategy? 

If you want to create an efficient, high-conversion demand generation campaign, there are a couple of key things to bear in mind:

1. Produce high-quality content

As Bill Gates once said, content is king. You cannot conduct an effective and successful marketing campaign if you aren’t producing high-quality content that will be able to engage your target audience. 

To make things simple, imagine that the first hundred or so interactions that your service or business might have with your leads will be sales-free. This means that you need to make it worthwhile to engage with your content: you need to demonstrate your value to your leads by creating content of a high caliber. 

Whether you’re creating useful Instagram posts or engaging video ads, give people a reason to pay attention.

2. Never spam your leads

Nothing can put a stop to a great ad campaign than overdoing it. In general, spamming your leads or going overboard with sponsored advertisements is likely to have the opposite effect to the one you’re intending.

You want to ensure that your leads maintain a positive image of your business and services during the ‘interest’ phase of the marketing campaign. Spamming ads, emails or cold-calls is the quickest way to be seen as a pest, not a problem-solver.

3. Familiarise yourself with your audience

One of the most important tasks for any marketing campaign is going to be the process of familarisation with the target audience. You need to know what your target audience likes, what they buy, what they hate, what they’re currently using (aka your competitors). As always, you need solid data.

Having a thorough and detailed client profile will also enhance the quality of your marketing content. You’ll be able to market directly to your target audiences using effective language to identify their problems and promote your solutions. 

What’s the difference between B2B Demand Generation vs. Lead Generation?

B2B demand generation and lead generation are both linked, as B2B demand generation relies on the data sourced from lead generation. Lead generation describes a process where a marketing team searches to identify the target audience and find promising leads (aka clients or customers) to whom they can market their products.

B2B demand generation is the first step in the lead generation process. As it includes top of the funnel type activities that are responsible for creating buzz, interest and brand awareness within the target audience. 

Getting started with B2B lead generation

If you’re looking to create a B2B lead generation strategy to generate interest and a buzz around your product or service, get in touch with the B2B marketing experts Tiga today.