Many B2B marketers still view social media as a tactic instead of a strategy, and that’s a big mistake, says Heather Wadlinger, director of research and strategy at Sacunas Inc.
Wadlinger will be leading the session “Reaching the Next Generation of B2B With Social Media” at B2B LeadsCon, Aug. 22-24 at the New York Hilton. Along with Tracie McLaughlin of TE Connectivity, she’ll explore how B2B marketers start the social conversation with Millennials; ideas for choosing the right content and messaging to engage younger B2B professionals; and the tech needed to make it happen.
“Millennials buy differently than Gen Xers or Boomers,” she says. “They don’t want to talk to sales reps and they’re very visual. Video is huge for them.”
“I don’t think a lot of B2B marketers have a good handle on what kinds of content really resonate in B2B social,” says Wadlinger. “They need to figure out a strategic plan for social—it gets complicated very quickly.”
Measurement is particularly tricky in B2B social, she says. After all, the sales cycle for many B2B companies is six months to a year. “How does your social strategy play out over that time period? There’s a lot of factors to consider.”
Companies that have a foot in B2C as well as B2B sometimes fare better in social, because they may have more resources to devote to social, she notes. “Social becomes embedded in their bigger [marketing] context, so thye’re not just throwing things out there [into social].”
TE Connectivity, which manufactures sensor solutions, has a couple of teams across multiple business units focused on social, and they think of social across a global context, Wadlinger says.
“They’ve put though and investment into knowing engineers’ needs and how they use social across the sales cycle,” she says.
To learn more, join us at B2B LeadsCon in New York, Aug. 22-24.
Network
