Posted by Content marketing is arguably the most important pillar of a successful digital marketing campaign. It’s an impactful tool for helping brands build trust and credibility. It can showcase their experience and expertise in an organic, non-sales oriented manner.
Only 7% of marketers in the B2B space don’t plan on developing a content marketing strategy for 2024. It’s high time you leveled up your game, too, and started considering new tactics for the year.
Here are eight crucial B2B content marketing strategies to deploy in 2024:
Publish In-Depth Content That Creates a Market for Your Products
An often underrated and forgotten aspect of content marketing is that it can create genuine interest in a product or service. By raising awareness about its benefits among decision-makers and buyers, you can generate more engagement and, ultimately, more sales.
Start by assuming your audience is unaware of your solution. They are, however, acutely aware of the pain point. How can you bridge the gap with a piece of content?
Let’s look at a couple of examples to demonstrate. We can assume that companies working with hazardous materials understand that their employees need OSHA Hazwoper training. They may not know that they can get certified online, at their own pace and from the comfort of their home.
eTraining has taken the time to create an in-depth blog post that creates a market for their course. Their content is exceptionally informational. It covers all the main points:
- What does the training encompass?
- Why is it important?
- What is considered a hazardous material?
- Who needs to get certified and how?
They aren’t overtly promotional in the post, either. They reference their product but without insisting that it’s the best or only solution. It’s a great way to raise awareness and interest.
You can adopt this strategy to raise awareness around an entire market segment, not only a specific product or service. This post on the reasons to invest in Dubai properties is a great example.
It works better than an advert, as its purpose is not to push a sale. The promotional links in the text are very subtle, and the key purpose of the article is to educate and inform. After the reader has become interested in Dubai real estate, they will naturally browse the website.
Display External Credibility Signals on Blog Pages
One of the main purposes of content marketing is to boost a brand’s credibility. Traditionally, this is achieved by writing in-depth, quality articles that genuinely help readers.
While this still holds in 2024, it’s also time to raise the bar a bit and add some trust and credibility signals to blog pages.
Look at this post on conducting probation review meetings. At first glance, it looks like a regular, well-written post. It’s packed with information, easy to read, and well-formatted.
What makes it stand out are the subtle signals. Note the product rating widgets on the right, just above the newsletter signup form. They are there to remind the reader that the brand’s product has been rated very highly and that numerous users have found it helpful.
The same information is displayed at the bottom of the page, yet again gently reminding the reader that this brand can be trusted. They are truly experts at what they do.
There’s also a testimonial segment above the footer, which serves the same purpose. It’s a very subtle and gentle tactic that nevertheless serves its purpose — triggering product-related thoughts.
Also note how the brand never mentions their product in the post. They don’t want to push a sale. They leave it up to the reader to click on a sales-oriented page.
You can choose different trust signals as well, like product reviews, case studies, or awards and accolades.
Offer Genuinely Helpful Evergreen Content
Evergreen content is another staple of quality B2B content strategies. Creating articles that will continue to drive traffic and engagement over years is a sensible, worthwhile marketing investment.
This type of content can take the format of a how-to article, an in-depth guide, or a case study. It can be used for all kinds of sales and marketing purposes: published on social media, featured in a newsletter, used for link building, etc. As long as you keep updating it, it can work for years.
However, numerous businesses fail to create genuinely helpful content. They write a decent piece about a topic that sees constant search volume, but they don’t stop to consider what their buyers truly need.
There is a simple way to level up this tactic in 2024: create content with the customer’s point of view in mind. Don’t merely do keyword research or competitor analysis. Truly think about the pain points of your audience and offer genuine, actionable help.
Here’s an example that can show you how this is done. This capsule size overview is 100% helpful to the company’s buyers. It explains when different capsule sizes are used. It demonstrates which ingredients can be used for which size. It comes with an interactive chart that can help customers choose the ideal one for their needs.
This is the kind of content that is of tangible benefit. Had the brand just written a post about the different sizes and what they are used for, the effect wouldn’t be as meaningful. This is how you can put the customer’s needs center stage.
Develop Partnerships with Complementary Content Sites
There’s no reason why you should reserve the benefits of content marketing for your website alone. Of course, regularly publishing content on your blog is the cornerstone of your strategy. However, by partnering with other websites, you can attract more leads and further raise brand awareness.
For example, by getting yourself featured in roundup posts, such as this list of the top B2B SEO agencies, you can easily tap into an entirely new audience. As long as you make sure that you only work with websites whose readers would be interested in your products or services, this tactic can significantly increase quality lead influx.
To get featured, you first need to choose the list you would like to be mentioned in. Do a simple Google search and see who has covered this topic and whose listings you would like to appear on. Then, reach out to the website and ask for a mention. Clearly explain why you deserve it: what is it that sets you apart, what are you good at, and how can their readers benefit from getting to know about you?
You should also strive to acquire some in-depth product reviews on reputable websites as well. Think of articles like this Karta review. It is very detailed, strikingly informative, and highly reader-centric.
Posts like this will again drive quality traffic your way, and they can also significantly raise your credibility. Partnerships like this are not necessarily hard to come buy, as long as your product is actually a good one. Offering free trials or discounts to bloggers who do quality product reviews is a good place to start.
Seize Your Target Audience’s Attention with Hyper-Niche Content
Another type of content you should be creating in 2024 to level up your content marketing game is the hyper-niche, super-specific, highly valuable kind.
Brands sometimes shy away from this tactic because the keywords these topics sometimes target don’t see a lot of monthly search volume. What they fail to take into account is that these topics can drive exceptionally qualified traffic if you choose your topic correctly.
It will again come down to how well you understand your target audience and their needs. Start by brainstorming some ideas. Then, take to the web and look at Reddit, social media, Quora, and the People Also Ask section of search.
You can also use a keyword research tool like Ahrefs or SEMRush. Hone down on the ultra-specific searches and try to ignore the search volume. Check how much traffic the top-ranking pages are seeing. If it’s at all decent, the topic is a good one.
This post on the top 5s audits checklists and templates is a good example of this kind of topic. It’s niche and unique. It’s highly specific and very useful to the brand’s target audience. They cover the topic well, provide lots of useful information, and put the reader first.
Explore Multiple Content Formats
Content marketing is an incredibly effective marketing tool because it can take on so many forms. From blog posts and videos to images and augmented reality, you can find a format that will deliver your message effectively and successfully.
Brands in the B2B space sometimes get stuck with one or two content formats because they are told this is what works. However, there is no reason why you shouldn’t experiment, and with great success.
The only thing you truly need to take into account is whether your audience will find and engage with this new content. If they don’t watch short-form videos on TikTok, there is no point in making them, for example. But they might be interested in short-form product demos on LinkedIn, so don’t write the format off out of hand. Just find the right marketplace for it.
Note that you can also use these new formats to step out of what is usually expected from a B2B business. Major brands have been doing it for a long time.
Cisco for example has a series of comic books that center around security and data, the brand’s core products. Their latest one tells a cybersecurity story. It organically promotes their solutions, and it’s certainly a lot more appealing than what other brands in their niche have come up with.
Cat has also done a great job with their excavators playing Jenga video. It’s not what you’d expect from them, you’ve got to admit, and it’s a great way to make a memorable impact. Note how they cleverly highlight the capabilities of each machine in the video.
Pay It Forward by Offering Free Education
Technically, all of the content you publish on your blog can be considered free education. However, you can amplify the impact further by creating courses or offering certifications for your target audience.
They can be directly tied to your product or they can be more general and offer insight into a specific area of doing, managing, or growing a business.
You can use this educational platform to generate more leads whom you can then nurture into customers. You can also use it to generate more organic backlinks, and it’s also a great PR resource. It will also naturally add to your brand’s credibility, and you will massively showcase your expertise.
Hubspot’s courses are a great example of this content format in the B2B space. They are of genuine use to businesses of all sizes and across all industries. They address a very specific need: most business owners or managers aren’t experts in marketing and sales. With the help of these courses, they can better understand how successful campaigns are run. Even if they end up outsourcing them to someone else, this knowledge can significantly impact their growth.
Foster Collaboration and Community
Let’s not forget another content type that you should utilize in your B2B content marketing strategy in 2024 and beyond: user-generated content. And we’re not talking about testimonials.
By creating a community where your leads and clients can congregate and exchange ideas and opinions, you will significantly better their businesses. You’ll essentially be providing access to information and experiences you yourself don’t have, but take some of the credit for this introduction.
This can be a great way to both attract new leads and to organically promote your own products and services. Not to mention how much good you can do.
The Salesforce Trailblazer Community is an excellent example of this strategy. It provides access to new skill sets, and it’s a prime networking tool with a global impact. The company understands how important these real-life connections are, so it’s made the effort to make them possible.
This effort raises their profile among their target audience, and it also gives them insight into their pain points and common concerns. They can turn this knowledge into other types of content: guides, videos, blog posts. They can also use it to further improve and develop their product, directly meeting market demand.
Wrapping Up
Before you decide which of these content marketing strategies you will rely on in 2024, take some time to consider the pain points of your target audience. Which of these content formats and promotion tactics will serve them best?
Make sure to also consider how you can put a personal stamp on each of them. Making them your own will help you make a lasting impression on your leads.