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Improve B2B Customer Experience With These 2022 Trends

March 21, 2022
12:24 PM

With the ongoing Covid 19 pandemic the digitization of B2B has become inevitable. And since customer experience plays the most vital role in nurturing prospective customers, many B2B brands have started embracing marketing strategies, communication, customer service, and online user experience, just to provide their target audience with the best customer experience (CX).

Unlike B2C, B2B is lagging when it comes to providing their leads with an easy, simple and convenient shopping experience. However, B2B companies across all industries, from manufacturing to services to high tech, have started taking CX very seriously. In today’s customer-driven economy, B2B companies must get to know their clients at a personal level and build a trustful relationship with them.

According to a study by Salesforce, over 80% of respondents say their customer experience is as important as the company’s products and services.

Every B2B client wants a more relevant and insightful experience while making business purchases. Remember that in the post-pandemic world there will be no industry in which customer experiences aren’t important.

In this blog, we will talk about

What a B2B customer experience is?

Difference Between B2B and B2C customer experience

Its importance and how you can implement it in your very own business

Top strategies to improve your B2B customer experience

So, let’s take a look at the B2B customer experience trends that will drive growth for your B2B company.

Understand a B2B customers journey to set up an outstanding customer experience

What is B2B Customer Experience?

Customer experience (CX) in simple words is the process of businesses engaging with their customers at every point of their buying journey.

According to Forbes, customer experience is the cumulative impact of multiple touchpoints, throughout a customer’s interaction with an organization.

B2B customer experience is the experience of B2B buyers and decision-makers as they interact with providers of B2B goods and services.

It encompasses every interaction a customer has with your brand whether digital or in-person.

Difference Between B2B and B2C Customer Experience

B2B Customer Experience

B2C customer Experience

B2B customer experience

While making purchases, many stakeholders play a crucial role in the client’s decision-making for renewal or expansion.

B2C customer experience

Whereas B2C buying decisions are individual or those who represent small groups such as families.

B2B customer experience

All the touchpoints in the customer journey have to be tailored to the experiences and preferences of your client.

B2C customer experience

All the touchpoints are tailored to the majority instead of the individual client.

B2B customer experience

B2B customer experience is built over time with more interactions.

B2C customer experience

B2C leads have quick and convenient interactions.

B2B customer experience

It has multiple added touchpoints.

B2C customer experience

It has lesser touchpoints than compared to the B2B customer journey.

B2B customer experience

B2B company’s sales cycle is usually very long.

B2C customer experience

For B2C vendors, sales cycles can be very short/fast.

Why is B2B Customer Experience Important?

B2B customer experience has become a big market over the years because they are more than 86% of B2B companies that consider CX important now compared to it being at 3% back in 2015. The customer experience management market is projected to grow over $14.9 billion by 2025. These B2B customer experience statistics prove that B2B companies have to start using CX, to help leads find the information they seek and interact with them across all channels.

B2B clients now want the same transactional ease as B2C clients. Once they start tailoring all the aspects of the business such as advertising, marketing, sales-offers, and communications based on their target audience, they will see a steady increase in sales, ROI, and revenue. With CX a B2B client will be able to interact across all channels and have more direct access to the company.

Over three-quarters B2B buyers are ‘significantly influenced by social media. This is why it is extremely important to be accessible on numerous social media platforms. The B2B companies with omnichannel facilities will have a competitive edge over the others in their industry. In order to deliver experiences that go beyond what they expect, B2B must be ready to put in the time to research and understands the needs and expectations.

How can customer service improve B2B?

Not many people know that B2B customer service professionals go through extra pressure on response time and first contact resolution because B2B leads often rely on a company’s product for their business’s health. So, customer service can improve B2B sales as:

Lowers your support costs
Reduce your customer churn rate
Deliver a better overall customer experience (CX)

What Are B2B Customers Looking For?

Speed

You can speed up your customer journey and buying process by offering instant responses, real-time updates, same-day and even next-hour delivery etc. Offering a fast customer journey will help your brand engage in meaningful and relationship-building interactions.

Ease

By keeping your buying process easy and simple, you can provide an optimal customer experience. The B2B customers nowadays look for a straightforward and accurate shopping experience and if you simplify their journey, then you stay one step ahead of competitors.

Consistency

It is important to be consistent throughout the customer journey. Every touchpoint should provide a consistent experience. Make sure the B2B experience is seamless when they switch between channels.

Relevancy

Content should be relevant to your target audience. Whatever you offer your customer base has to be appealing. So, get to know what customers in your market or industry are looking for.

Transparency

When communicating with customers you have to be transparent about what you offer, its process and results. Because if you promise something and don’t deliver it, then your clients will no longer trust your brand.

Personal touch

Many companies tend to forget that the B2B decision-makers are also humans, hence feelings and emotions will always play a role in their decisions. This is why you must add a personal touch in every way you approach your audience.

Get first hand access to tested marketing techniques that actually work and know more on upcoming trend that might just lead to your success

Top B2B customer experience trends in 2022

Voice of the customers (VoC)

The voice of the customers refers to the feedback you receive from your customers about their specific experiences with your company or its products and services. It can also include their expectations from your company in the near future.

VoC usually comes in the form of user behaviour data, recorded phone conversations between your employees and your clients, direct customer feedback, discussions on social media and others depending on your industry.

B2C companies have been sending out customer surveys and gathering vast amounts of user behavioural data that can help their company get an idea of what customers want to expect.

Whereas B2B companies have started to VoC and are also seeing positive results. B2B companies dedicate time and revenue to gather customer insights and are also conducting frequent data analysis. But remember that once you generate enough feedback you also have to analyse it and act on the insights.

Add a personal touch

When it comes to offering the best B2B customer experience you need to offer a personalized experience. The customer experience should be top-notch with personalized elements, as it is the most important pillar of B2B customer experience.

Personalization can be easy if you research the needs, motivations, and behaviour patterns of your prospective clients. According to B2B customer experience case study, the process of B2B marketing is much longer and usually involves direct communication, this means that the feeling and emotions will always play a vital role.

You have to listen and show that you understand them. Another reason why personalization is important is that B2B clients expect you to know their preferences and want relevant experiences just like B2C customers. Remember that every touchpoint throughout the buyer’s journey can be personalized.

Personalization elements can be added in the form of a proactive call or message, a friendly greeting on the website, handwritten notes, personalized gifts, among others. You can also add personalized elements in the types of content you offer like blog posts, vlogs, PDFs, surveys, etc. With the ongoing Covid 19 pandemic, companies have also started personalizing virtual product demos which help clients visualize how they will use products and services within their businesses.

Offer Omnichannels

If you don’t know, “What are the best practices in B2B services?”, then omnichannel is an absolute must-have in the customer experience sphere. Offering many channels will help in providing your B2B clients with a consistent and personalized experience.

The main aim of a good customer experience is to make the buying process as smooth and easy as possible with an Omnichannel that will help make an online purchases with ease and functionally.

In a study done by Forrester, “Building the B2B omnichannel commerce platform of the future”, over three-quarters of B2B customers look up the product information across different channels before making professional purchases.

B2B customers do a lot of online research before investing in your products and services, you have to make it more accessible for them to reach you. B2B purchases have many decision-makers behind them, all with their considerations, concerns, and preferences. This is why offering omnichannel can work in your favour, as your clients can engage with your products in their own time.

Implement marketing automation

Technology for marketing automation has increased over the years, which is also being implemented into B2B marketing. Automation increases efficiency and helps save the time of your marketing team. By automating simpler tasks, your employees will also be able to concentrate on other more important tasks.

This is among the B2B customer portal best practices, as it is easier to attract new prospects and keep regular contact with leads and customers.

Automating is also an easy process to set up, all you have to do is add triggers to send automated messages or a series of messages in response to email subscriber actions. It also plays a vital role in monitoring performance and managing your marketing expenditure throughout different channels. You can automate conversations and nurture your leads with help of educational content.

Many B2B marketers tend to overlook the role of marketing automation after getting customers, but it must be used for customer retention. Make sure to implement automation in the distribution of lead materials like checklists, webinars, competitions, eBooks, blog posts.

Get an overview of the new marketing era with marketing automation. Innovate your marketing techniques and learn the art of automation.

Be customer-centric

A B2B company needs to make its business model customer-centric because many companies are now in the race to find out whose CX is the latest and greatest. Making a B2B customer-centric brand required a lot of research and planned preparation, but it is rewarding when done well.

B2B clients have become more demanding over the years, which is why it is very important to have a functional team and consistent focus on the needs of customers.

But before you make a B2B customer-centric brand, you need to start with a vision and identify the challenges that you may face in future. In order to provide the best B2B experiences, you have to be present on various channels, provide personalized and vital personalization.

Plan your communication

Every company whether B2B or B2C understands the importance of good communication. Communication is the one thing that can make or break a company and determine the number of leads it receives. Having bad communication with your target audience can lead to customers moving away from you and the reputation of the company getting tarnished.

B2B companies communicate with both “company-to-company” and “individual-to-individual” all at once, which makes it even more important to have good communication. B2B relationships are usually built on their recurring sales and interactions, so make sure to have a friendly attitude with them.

You can make your communication stronger by sending consistent follow-ups, understanding their problems, clear explanations, and being responsive. Most companies already have their communication style which may work for them, but there is always room for improvement. So, if your company still doesn’t have a time to develop one.

Conclusion

The new emerging technologies in the post-pandemic era have made the B2B experience become highly influential in buying decisions. Over 56% of B2B buyers have said they would pay more for a better customer experience. So, if you want to see good results remember to act responsively, respond quickly and add real value to better CX.

Happy marketing!

B2B customer experience will excel if done for the right target audience. DataCaptive offers the most authentic database to serve your need.

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FAQs

How can I improve my customer's experience?

Here are a few ways to improve your customer’s experience (CX):

Build an Omni channel plan for better CX
Implement customer feedback to enhance the client experience
Take social proof seriously to improve CX
Implement customer loyalty programs
Leverage the power of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

What key factors would make a good customer experience?

A satisfied customer acts as the foundation of any business. And since customers can only get satisfied with a good customer experience if it includes factors such as:

Personalized customer interaction
Have a quick response time
Convenience at fingertips
Understanding customer pain points
Helping customers to make informed decisions

How important is customer experience in B2B?

B2B customer experiences continue to grow in importance for companies after the covid 19 pandemic, which led to more and more processes being managed online. In 2020, customer experience overtook price and product as the key brand differentiator. B2B companies are now adopting user-friendly interfaces, such as personalized portals and fast experiences often seen in the B2C market. A good customer experience helps B2B company improve and refine its online presence.

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Julie Williams

Julie writes to motivate, inform, and educate people. Her major interests are marketing, artificial intelligence, and related areas. She is passionate about poetry on nature and human psychology. When not writing, she's found dancing or exploring new tourist places around!

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