7 Successful Marketing Strategies for Tech, Software, and SaaS Companies (2023)

The company on the waytechnology and software companyThe need to approach marketing is evolving and it is imperative to use tactics that produce real results.

With increasing competition for attention on digital channels, B2B technology companies are struggling to reach the right decision makers on the right channels to increase their awareness.sales funnel. The ability to engage with these decision makers on an issue, goal, or challenge important to your business can have a dramatic impact on the success of most enterprise technology organizations.

So what's a tech company to do? To maximize their investments in marketing initiatives, companies should look for strategies and tools that have the greatest potential to engage decision makers by demonstrating that they understand the challenges facing their target industry, are thought leaders, and have a unique solution. that can provide significant ROI.

To that end, we're going to look at some of the best ways tech companies can do just that. Here are seven key marketing strategies that enterprise technology companies can use to transform the way they market.

Chapter 1

original video content

Video content as a marketing tool is becoming increasingly popular among technology companies to showcase their solutions. While someone may not have time to review a product or company data sheet, almost everyone has time to watch an entertaining and engaging 2-3 minute video about a solution that could be valuable to them.

Here are the main areas to focus on when producing video content to market your product or solution:

great stories

While your technology is likely to be complex, robust, and overall impressive, when you use video to market your solution, your focus should be on telling a compelling story. Show the viewer how your product helped a particular customer go from "A to Z," how your business got started, or how a team developed a particular feature. Start people off with a good, easy-to-understand story first, and then dig into the details later on sales calls with them.

Funny videos

Just because you're in the B2B business space doesn't mean your videos need to be dry and technical. Rather, you should aim to create engaging and entertaining content. using avideo editorCreating content that is particularly funny, humorous, or entertaining will help you stand out from the crowd. Take New Relic for example. The most popular video on New Relic's YouTube channel isn't a webinar or tutorial, it's a hilarious coding rap video created by one of their employees.

useful content

Your video content strategy should also make room for educational content. This can include things like tutorials on how to use your solution, product demos, webinars on industry trends and best practices, or "how-to" style videos. Webinars are particularly useful because by asking you to share your contact information for registration, you can build your contact database and engage in future marketing or sales activities with those contacts.

Customer Reviews

From a tech marketing perspective, there's nothing as powerful as your target buyer saying to themselves, "This solution worked for another company like us, so maybe it will work for us." And if your solution serves multiple industries, you should collect testimonials for each individual sector if possible. ThisMortgage's trialDunkin' Donuts' customer video hits the spot as it targets potential retail customers and has a well-known brand name in the industry.

Create animated infographics

Most B2B companies have been producing infographics for a while. They are a simple and colorful way to present facts and information about your business or industry to potential buyers. However, marketing-savvy tech companies go a step further by creating animated infographics. These short 1-2 minute clips contain all the information you would normally present in a traditional infographic, but in a more slide-by-slide format, accompanied by music. Animations are then added to bring the stats to life.

For example, this animated video marketing statistics infographic from Insivia contains much of the same data and visuals as a regular infographic. What makes it stand out is that it can guide the viewer through the details in a more engaging and entertaining way. Animated infographics are great for this, not just to present numbers, but to tell a story with them.

Create animated explanations

Animated explainer videos illustrate the product, service, or solution you offer to B2B buyers in a fun, easy-to-understand format. Take a look at the animated explanation we made for Binary Defense.

Instead of spending time scrolling through a data sheet to find out what it is, what problem it solves, and how it works, viewers get a clear picture of what your vision product is in less than two minutes. And because the video is light and engaging, viewers are more likely to see it through to the end and retain more important information to remember.

As a general guide, you should aim for your videos to be between 2 and 15 minutes in length. Testimonials and product overviews are obviously shorter, around 2 minutes, while demos and tutorials should be longer.

1. 1. Using the word "video" in the subject line of an email increases open rates by 19%.
   2. 54% of executives share work-related videos with coworkers on a weekly basis.
   3. Including videos on a landing page can increase conversions by 80%.
   4. Four times as many customers would rather watch a video about a product than read about it.

the point withvideos and animationsis this: Give prospects fun, bite-sized snacks they can consume to learn about your business, your technology, and your customers. Once they begin to understand (and trust) all three, they'll be more willing to embark on a sales cycle.

hubspot

73 % B2B marketerreport positive ROI results from video content.

Ascend2 Message 2015

The three most effective types of video content: customer testimonials (51%); Explanatory/instructional videos (50%); Demonstrative videos (49%).

Episode 2

Influencer-Marketing

Business executives and decision makers often turn to other experts in their fields when evaluating new technologies for purchase and implementation. Tech companies are increasingly working with influencers to increase their credibility and reach on social media.

But today, businesses struggle to be seen or heard amidst the constant noise of others trying to market their product or service. Tech buyers are also becoming wiser and more desensitized to the marketing they receive every day.

As such, they increasingly rely on others they trust or admire to share their experience with a business solution, platform, product, or service before considering it in their own organizations. This opens up an incredible opportunity for companies to take advantage of influencers who have built a loyal following and credibility within an industry to market to business decision makers.

Here are four steps to start building your influencer marketing program:

Identify target buyers

If you haven't already, the first step is to develop multiple buyers for your solution. Chances are you have one for the CEO and one for IT and maybe one for sales and marketing. Learn what their goals and challenges are, what types of content they prefer, and who they are likely to follow and engage with online.

Determine industry influencers.

Next, you need to identify the peers, bloggers, publications, and industry experts that your target buyers follow. The easiest way to get started is to connect with some of your target prospects (and existing customers) on LinkedIn to see who they follow and what groups they participate in. Also, follow some of your target buyers on Twitter and see who they follow and retweet.

Build social credibility

A crucial part of influencer marketing in the business tech space is establishing yourself as an independent thought leader. Influencers will not be willing to contact you if they feel you are just looking for free visibility on social media. For this reason, the development of high-quality content such as white papers,blog postsand webinars are critical in laying the groundwork for onboarding influencers.

Once you've developed this content, share it (along with other useful content you can find) on social media and within groups and message boards that influencers frequent. Knowledge, added value and perspective are important.

Bridging the gap to be personal

The great thing about influencers is that they are typically sought after in connection with live events, talks, and conference appearances. This puts them in a unique position to bridge the gap between your digital marketing efforts and live physical interactions.

For example, if you can collaborate with an influencer on a presentation at a live event, you can give people post-presentation access to those slides in exchange for their contact information (known as "private content") . You can then use this information to place these leads into a marketing automation system for ongoing nurturing campaigns.

The Fastest Growing Online Customer Acquisition Methods

Que: Tomoson Influencer-Marketing-Studie

Follow Wonk

FollowerWonk allows you to search by term to find Twitter profiles sorted by number of followers and tweets. This is a quick way to find influential people on Twitter to follow and connect with. Once you're a little busy, don't be afraid to pick up the phone.

BuzzStream

A great tool to find influencers, connect and manage your network of influencers. BuzzStream is a solid influencer marketing tool and can help you create a real strategy to make the right connections count.

Analyst

Upload any piece of content and Onalytica's algorithm will find the most influential people for that content. Identify key influencers, engage them, and measure the results and impact of your influencer marketing efforts.

HighGroup

GroupHigh helps you find bloggers and other social media influencers, manage those relationships, and even measure the value of your content.

MuckRack

MuckRack helps marketers find relevant journalists and bloggers, receive notifications, and build media lists. It also helps journalists, bloggers, and publishers to showcase their work, track shares, and grow their following. A great tool for better reach that is a powerful influencer strategy.

PitchBox

Discover influencers, including contact information and social profiles, create custom outreach messages, automate follow-up, and track results.

BlogDash

BlogDash is the most efficient and effective platform that allows you to reach more than 200,000 bloggers and grow every day. These bloggers have specifically chosen to connect with brands like yours and help them gain recognition across the web.

Track

Traackr's IRM platform is your system of record for managing, growing, validating, and scaling your global influencer marketing.

Building your network of influencers and leveraging it can be a full-time job, but it's worth both the effort and the investment.

Demand Generation Content Preference Survey

"72% of technology buyers look to their industry peers when looking for relevant content for B2B buying decisions."

Brittany Rothnem, Director ofRothem Integrated Marketing

"People naturally give more credibility when someone else has a crush on you than when you promote yourself."

Chapter 3

quality content

The amount of digital content being generated today is incredible. And that ranges from unique, high-quality content to content mills and clickbait that people don't necessarily know much about. The same goes for B2B tech marketing content.

Regardless of your industry, there are likely to be a multitude of competitors vying for eyeballs, some of whom are unlikely to spend much time and effort on your content. What the smart enterprise technology companies of the future will do is move away from this type of short-term thinking to simply drive clicks, and instead develop a consistent program of quality content that builds long-term trust among their target buyers. and your brand.

It's a struggle for companies to bite the bullet and invest in delivering content that doesn't always have their name on it or allow for "quick fixes." Content creation can be very expensive. But there are two things tech marketers need to recognize when it comes to quality content: the rule of reciprocity and the growing struggle for companies to be heard.

“The rule of reciprocity states that when you provide something of value, the recipient feels the need to return it. This cannot happen immediately. But the more value you offer, the more prospects will trust you for quality content and give you their time in return.”

Brittany Rothnem, Director of Integrated Marketing for Rothnem

And with so many other companies vying for attention, breaking that barrier to entry makes quality content even more necessary. But once you've passed that point and earned the trust of your target buyers, you'll be in a better position to close sales than competitors who have taken the cheap, low-value approach.

Whether you develop content in-house or decide to outsource to a content agency or platform, here are five characteristics that all of your quality content should have in common:

tell better stories

Every article, blog or piece of content tells a story (even clickbait). The key is to tell better stories than your competitors. Take the time to analyze what others are doing in the room, and work to create more unique (and useful) stories than there are now. Remember that helping your audience is more important than helping yourself.

Some of today's biggest brands tell great stories about how their solutions solve customer problems, impact customers' lives, or just provide a fun insight into their business and culture. Think about how you want to consume the information. A B2B tech company can engage the people it sells to through powerful and even emotional content.

Rethink how you tell your current stories, and whether they could be redefined as a customer journey documentary, a powerful interview, or a day in the life of an employee helping customers solve challenges.

Customize for each stakeholder

Again, your quality content strategy should be dependent on your buyers. They might come up with some great stories to start with, but they'll probably resonate with some roles more than others. Not everyone will accept all of your content, and that's okay. What you're trying to do is build credibility and thought leadership for each individual stakeholder so that they end up coming together and agreeing on your solution based on their own intrinsic motivations.

When creating strategies and an editorial calendar, it is important that you have aaudience matrixwhich defines anyone from a company who might be involved in the research or decision to use its product. For each of these stakeholders, you can define their pain, goals, and motivating factors:building a personalityfor every target customer it is an indispensable first step.

Centralize your content experience

While individual pieces of content need to be personalized, they all need to come together in a centralized digital experience connected to your brand. For example, if you have a "Resources" page on your site, everyone will be guided to one experience, but people will be able to find the stories and information that are most useful to them. This also applies to your social media accounts and video channels like YouTube.

Building a connected platform for content delivery will increase prospects' trust with each new story they engage with and improve their insight along the way.sales process. Done right, these platforms can generate leads for conversion and throughout your marketing ecosystem.

Deliver real value

The most important thing with any tactic is to offer real value. First, if the audience doesn't get value, they won't move on to the next phase of your marketing process, be it a signup, a download, or a purchase. Even if you can get a lot of people to find your content, the lack of value will discourage them from moving forward, which is the end goal.

Second, when you offer real value, you create a positive brand impression. Your audience will remember that you are the subject matter expert and when they need help, you are the best resource. A positive brand impression can last if it reaches them through other marketing channels, increasing the likelihood of a conversion there.

So what is "real value"? It is not just the superficial information that a visitor can get anywhere. The challenge here is overcoming the fear of giving away too much, something many companies fear. Wouldn't you rather share some secrets to getting new customers than keep them and get no new leads?

The best place to look for these resources and areas of expertise is within your own organization. What tools do you use, what questions do your customers have, and what secret tactics or methods do you covet? Giving away more than the competition can give your business an edge and greatly increase the trust of potential customers.

Make the content extremely unique

And finally, make it unique in some way. Today, people are inundated with information and content because the tactic has gained significant popularity. Whether the information or delivery is unique, it needs to stand out.

Consider different media like videos, animations, or apps; maybe even consider older tactics like direct mail. If you can make information valuable and unique while delivering it in unexpected ways, the rewards will be enormous.

“In our weekly editorial meetings, story pitches must pass a basic litmus test: Has this story been done before? If so, is it done right? If the answer to both questions is affirmative, it will be rejected.

Joe Lazauskas,happy editor in chief

Chapter 4

Live event integration

It may seem counterintuitive in a post-pandemic world, but with so much emphasis on digital marketing, face-to-face interactions become even more important.

While business solutions can only be asserted through digital channels in most cases, many technology buyers want to meet their partners in person to separate the competitors from the pretenders.

Depending on where your solution and business are in the market, you will likely have a different approach when you attend live events.

Here are four reasons to incorporate live events into your digital marketing efforts, based on your top marketing needs at any given time:

brand and reputation

Especially for start-ups and early-stage technology companies, their biggest challenge may be getting noticed in the marketplace. Use live events as an opportunity to highlight one wow factor or another in your solution and share the story behind you and your company. The goal is simple, to get the word out so that when potential customers finally review solutions like yours, you're in the running.

leading generation

For more mature businesses, generating face-to-face leads may be more important. Planning is key, so make sure you reach key leads early to increase attendance at the event (and at your booth). Put systems in place to collect leads, qualify leads, and set up follow-up sales appointments during or after the event.

client retention

Live events are a great way to meet and greet current customers in a more fun, low-pressure format. Since they're already customers, you can get to know them on a more personal level, talk informally about their success with your solution, and see if there are any potential upsell opportunities.

Training

Some of the most effective live event marketing efforts from enterprise technology companies come in the form of educational content and workshops. This is great for engaging both existing customers and new prospects, especially decision makers on the tech side. Again, be sure to collect and follow up on contact information before each training session to see what they got and if you might be a sales-qualified lead.

Be sure to stay active and engaged on social media before and after the event. Encourage your reps (especially your sales team) to spread the word on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn to maximize the chances of active prospects engaging, meeting, and moving further in the sales cycle.

The most effective online and offline channels to market events

Source: State of B2B Event Marketing Report

Live events can put you in touch with a ton of leads quickly, but since you may not have a lot of 1-on-1 time, it's imperative that you develop a smart strategy to nurture and convert those leads. First, let's start collecting leads:

Ideas to capture leads at events

1. If you have a booth, hold a raffle to collect tickets, whether it's a contest, offer discount services, or sign up for an upcoming webinar.
2. Make sure your sales team doesn't have chairs, cell phones, or excuses to stand behind a table. Get them to meet people and ask for business cards.
3. If you're having a workshop or presentation, offer slides and other related content on a landing page that requires attendees to enter their contact information.
4. Host a happy hour and invite your VIP prospects, just make sure you don't interrupt the event.
5. Reciprocate: Tell attendees about other good booths or offer to introduce yourself to a speaker (make sure you meet early). If you send people to other booths, they will often do the same.
6. Partner: Run joint follow-ups with other booth companies or work with a speaker to sponsor a slide or follow-up.

Nurture those leads

Collecting leads is important, but too many companies don't use them properly after the event. It's a waste of time and money if you don't follow through with the process.

During your event (if possible) or soon after, leads should be entered into your marketing automation (the next chapter of this eBook) orCRM-Software. You need to differentiate between leads that want direct follow-ups and leads that are collected. If attendees who sent a card or attended a workshop are followed up too closely, they will simply be turned away.

Set up a sequence of follow-up emails and event direct mails that aren't too intrusive – any leads from a “slide download” page can be inserted into this segment right away. This process is called nurturing, and it should provide value to the potential customer while delivering the most important brand messages.

Some ideas for smooth follow-ups right after your event are:

• Send a summary of the highlights of the event with quotes from speakers and resources that the recipients may not have received.
• Record a video at the event and provide a similar but more engaging synopsis.
• Provide relevant articles, videos, or tools (checklists, calculators) that follow the theme of the event or keynote speeches.
• Collect all of the speaker slides, domains, and some of your key content, and send out a series of emails to dig deeper.

The key here is not to launch yourself into a sale, but rather to show your prospects that you are knowledgeable, dedicated, and care about providing value. Doing this first and then preparing for a demo or call will open the door rather than quick rejection of a hard sell approach.

Regalix B2B Event Status

“91% of B2B marketers are investing in event marketing today”

Lisa Gerber, propietaria y fundadora de Big Leap Creative Integrated Communications

“Plan some attractive (rather than intimidating) ways to attract people to your position that go beyond just collecting business cards. I've seen photo booths and other fun activities to get people to stop and see what's going on."

Chapter 5

Marketing Automation Tools

A crucial part of staying on top of, contacting, and nurturing leads for tech companies is using a marketing automation tool. To build a sustainable and predictable revenue model, you need automated systems to collect leads, build a marketing pipeline, segment leads, and market consistently (and smartly).

Marketing automation helps B2B companies nurture, qualify, and route leads to sales when they are finally ready. This is critical in the tech space, as both pre-sales and sales cycles can last weeks, months, and even years. The tool you use depends on the size of your business, the nature of your solution, and the target buyer.

Here are three of the most popular and effective marketing automation tools that you should consider implementing in your business (if you haven't already):

mercado

One of the most powerful and popular marketing automation systems on the market. If you currently use SalesForce.com for customer relationship management (CRM), thenmercadoit's almost a breeze due to its seamless integration. Marketo is great for managing and segmenting lists and delivering quick email content. However, Marketo reaches its limits and starts to slow down when your website has high web traffic or the leads in the database exceed 750,000.

Talk

Recently acquired by Oracle and now under its Marketing Cloud umbrella,Talkis a robust B2B marketing automation platform that outperforms Marketo with big databases. Eloqua also features the best customer and prospect insights engine, providing marketers with detailed and granular analytics on how users respond to the marketing emails they receive. The main disadvantage of Eloqua is that it has so many features that the user interface is often unintuitive and difficult to execute. Eloqua can run over 99% of available marketing automation systems, but the learning curve can be steep.

SilverPop

Now part of the IBM Marketing Cloud,SilverPopis a competitive enterprise marketing automation solution that sets itself apart from the competition with more SMS, text and mobile marketing capabilities. It has an intuitive user interface (user interface), a user-friendly database structure, and allows for relatively easy email creation. On the other hand, Silverpop does not have as many native integrations as Marketo and Eloqua and tends to be slower when processing large amounts of data.

There are many other marketing automation systems available, and many are now part of a platform that also includes CRM, customer service, and a wide range of other features.

If you're a business looking to generate leads for sales teams, marketing automation combined with lead scoring can greatly improve your overall marketing approach.

Here are some general points about marketing automation to help you understand the value.

automation

A process for automating follow-ups with prospects. Email sequences can be scheduled to be automatically sent to contacts based on rules collected through your website or other marketing tactics.

prospect assessment

Every interaction you have with a lead can earn you points, and the more points a lead earns, the more "qualified" they become for a lead in the system. Open an email, you get 5; Click on a link, you get 10; they visit a page, they get 20.

Combined with automation, we are able to consistently reach many people and rank the most engaged prospects.

segmentation

Organize prospects into similar groups or use data to target prospects with the information most relevant to them. Segmentation is one of the most important topics in marketing and is at the heart of marketing automation.

These three aspects only scratch the surface of marketing automation, but they should be enough to get you interested in learning a lot more about what platforms like this can do for your marketing, especially for technology and software companies.

ACT-ON y Gleanster Research

"Of the best in B2B, 69% use marketing automation to acquire customers and 50% to retain them."

Forster

"80% of B2B marketers consider understanding and using marketing technology a fundamental requirement of their job."

Chapter 6

Remarketing to existing customers

One of the best, and often most overlooked, ways that enterprise technology companies can increase sales through marketing is by targeting their existing customers. By having systems, processes, and programs in place to remarket to active customers, you can create an infrastructure that facilitates ongoing retention, upselling, and cross-selling of additional products, features, and services.

Efforts and investments can pay off many times over here. Not only can you increase spending from existing customers, but by staying in touch with them, you build an army of advocates who generate referrals. Most companies miss an opportunity by not implementing a serious and comprehensive plan specifically for customer remarketing.

Here are three of the top ways to remarket to increase the lifetime value of existing customers:

customer portals

If your customers are having great success with your solution, chances are they're checking in daily, if not more often. like youCreate your customer portalYou can contribute to ongoing marketing efforts towards your existing customers.

Once a user signs up, you can design the portal as an "information hub" that acts as a central place where you can, for example, announce new products, alert users to live events, or ask for suggestions on how to improve your solution. . These are all "top of the funnel" marketing activities that can ultimately be successful.lead to cross or upwind.

care programs

The last thing you want to do after onboarding a new customer is remove them from your marketing automation program. However, it is a common mistake that many B2B corporate technology organizations make. You want to develop separate maintenance programs for existing customers.

The number of touches could be rarer and the messages will be much more advisory. Your current customer support program should include things like webinars, customer success workshops, and live events in your space. For example, by viewing the topics of webinars customers are attending, you can gain insight into their current needs and whether there are additional features or services they may be interested in purchasing.

customer communities

Creating customer forums and communities is another great way to keep existing customers engaged with your brand. In general, people participate in communities to spread new information about their industry, to “talk business” with their peers, or to collaborate with other professionals.

As customers (and your employees) work together to maximize the value they get from your solution, use communities to continually lead thought through quality content.

When you publish a new whitepaper or eBook, customer communities are a great place to announce it, start the conversation, and see which customers are interested in that particular topic.

Any customer marketing program must take advantage of multiple channels and tactics, and be measured and tuned over time to work best for your specific customer base. Below are two graphs showing what marketers who focus on customer retention and marketing are doing, and which channels have proven to be the most effective.

If you don't already have a customer marketing program, these facts can help you decide where to start:

Marketing activities for existing customers.

Source: Demand Impact Survey

The most effective marketing channels for existing customers

Source: gigaom

Marketing existing customers for SAAS companies

Whether it's enterprise technology, enterprise software, or SaaS, customer marketing works. For SaaS companies, especially when MMR (Monthly Recurring Revenue) occurs with higher numbers of users, the stakes can be even higher when churn rates are high.

If a typical SaaS company loses 2-3% of its customers each month due to churn, the company needs to grow at least 27-43% per year to maintain the same revenue.
Adrift relationship marketing

Churn can be deadly for a SaaS, and high churn is often a sign of problems, whether in terms of marketability, features, user interface, or support.

The challenge here is that if you lose a percentage of customers each month, it will require significant new customer acquisition just to sustain growth. This puts a lot of pressure on marketing efforts to spread awareness and drive conversions at often unsustainable rates.

However, when a SaaS company focuses on existing customer and marketing programs, it can minimize churn and reduce the need for often hectic processes.Tactics to acquire new customers.

Daniel Marotta, Community Strategist at Vanilla Forums

“Instantly reduce costs by searching your community for user-generated content that can be used in marketing materials. Every marketing message you can get from the community is a direct savings to your marketing budget.”

Vanilla Forums, White Paper on the 3 Pillars of the Customer Community

“Once a potential customer has spent money, a customer community gives them the opportunity to talk about it, incorporate it into their own personal brand, and build connections with other customers based on their purchase. As you release more products in the future or offer upsells and post-sale updates, those connections will continue."

Chapter 7

Interactive experiences and tools

Interactive content has been an emerging trend in corporate tech marketing for the past few years, and it's evolving in many exciting ways. Things like calculators, ratings, and other tools lead to deeper engagement and higher quality lead generation as leads invest more in the outcome.

Here's a breakdown of some of the different types of engagement content to consider:

calculator

Calculators help potential customers run the numbers on things like cost, ROI, or any other metric they might find interesting. These are great for understanding and estimating the direct ROI impact of your solution based on your specific situation. Calculators range from simple to complex, depending on how much customer information you want to include. The more data you ask prospects for, the more confident they will be in the accuracy of the results.

Also consider the outputs. For enterprise software, in addition to ROI, you may want to include things like total cost of ownership (TCO) and break-even. Whatever the key metrics of your solution are (revenue, customer satisfaction, etc.) should also be included in your calculator.

interactive infographics

Like static infographics, interactive content brings interesting statistics to life in a visually appealing way. Try to compile statistics that are relevant to clients' industries and add visual elements that really "stand out". Not only combine your existing data into interactive infographics, but also audit the research you've done. Interesting data, facts, and ideas that you haven't previously used in marketing materials can also be used in an interactive infographic.

Plan to use them in the early and mid-stages of the marketing and sales cycle, as their primary goal is to build awareness of your product or the big industry challenges your solution is designed to address.

Proof

If you've been to sites like Buzzfeed, you're familiar with online quizzes. They're great because prospects feel like they're getting personalized information from you and they're easy to share on social media. Consider turning some statistics and numbers from your white papers into quizzes to give prospects an incentive to test their knowledge after they've finished reading.

Another option is to use quizzes at live events. Bring sales reps to your booth with an interactive quiz available on your iPad and have customers fill it out right there on site. After they complete the questionnaire, discuss the results (and your potential business needs) on the spot.

reviews

They're like questionnaires, but they dig deeper into the business needs of a potential customer. They help your prospects monitor the current state of your business, what needs to be improved, and how your solution might fit.

Ratings can also be used for peer benchmarking to show where you stand in relation to the industry as a whole. Prospects will see that they need to gain ground or they will see that the competition is after them. Either way, it's a powerful incentive for them to learn more about your solution and how it could help them become more competitive.

solution developer

Just like with a free demo, with Solution Builders you give users access to a basic version of your product and walk them through building a solution based on their specific goals and needs. This method is great for tactile learners who need to "play" with technology to get a real sense of the value it might offer.

If you need help getting started with a solution builder, a good place to start is by looking at your existing product descriptions. Solution Builders are ideal for mid- to late-stage prospects who have already identified great value but need the buyer to see and feel exactly how you will solve their problem.

product tours

Interactive product tours help bridge the gap between tutorials or overview videos and product demos. The problem with videos is that while the product is explained in detail, the user is forced to sit and watch. The demos are great, but users often miss out on key features because they don't have instructions.

Product tours are guided tours of your product that allow prospects to experiment and complete tasks within your platform, but with guidance in the form of pop-ups and prompts. For business technology companiesAccompanyis one of the best tools available for creating engaging and personalized product tours.

Interactive content represents the future of B2B business technology marketing for many. While you don't necessarily need to invest heavily in it right now, it's wise to add things like ROI calculators, quizzes, and interactive infographics to your digital marketing mix, to lead the way and keep up with the competition.

Addition of a real time factor

One of the best tactics to make interactive tools effective is to add real-time feedback on usage.

• For a calculator, you can see budgets, comparison costs, or other data that adjusts as the visitor changes the values.
• A grade can provide a score when questions are completed.
• Solution developers can change the configuration and price of products when visitors select parameters.

The key here is to offer real value directly on the page, but then engage with deeper information when they provide contact information. Real-time feedback tools are frequently shared and linked, greatly increasing visibility and search rank. With the right tool, you have the opportunity to attract masses of highly targeted leads.

The final main benefit of the tools is that shipping can give you valuable insight into the sales process that would otherwise be difficult to capture from other types of conversions. While the investment in these tools can cost a lot, over time they can generate significant ROI.

Ion Interactive, Whitepaper: Interactive Content Marketing

"88% of marketers say interactive content is effective in differentiating their brand."

Adam Frankel, CEO of Frankel Interactive

“Interactive content will continue to be relevant to the B2B segment. More media will emerge in the near future, allowing marketers to make better use of digital channels and explore new formats for B2B marketing collateral."

Diploma

The central theses

1. Video marketing isn't just for consumers, and just because you're B2B doesn't mean you can't be creative, fun, and engaging.
2. Tech buyers trust influencers more than ever, so have a strategy for finding and partnering with the right ones.
3. Quality content often doesn't come cheap, but blocking out the noise is worth it in the long run.
4. There's still no substitute for human interaction, so have a live event strategy that integrates with digital media to create valuable face-to-face conversations with prospects.
5. To consistently generate revenue and keep all your prospects informed, you need to implement a marketing automation tool. Now.
6. Existing customers are prospects waiting to be marketed. Treat each customer as if you need a new up-sell or cross-sell.
7. It seems that interactive content is the wave of the future. If you haven't already, start with some ROI calculators, interactive infographics, or quizzes/assessments.