Content marketing is an oft bandied-about word, but the truth is that few B2B marketers actually understand how content marketing works, much less how to do it properly. As much as 60% of B2B marketing sources post at least one piece of content per day, keeping their blogs and pages updated regularly and driving valuable, convertible traffic. However, according to CMI, as little as 30% of content marketers prove to be competent in converting , which raises some pertinent questions as to how a company can do content marketing better. Promotion via industry influencers can have a remarkable impact on the spread of your content and the resultant traffic. SAP uses influencers to drive its content and that has led to massive growth and adoption from other businesses, simply by tapping into the ready market that these influencers already have.
Niche Influencer Marketing
The most succinct way to describe SAP’s marketing is Niche Influencer Marketing. Instead of focusing on the established industry leaders that already have their own things to say, SAP instead looks at the interim, for niche leaders with specific audiences that could benefit SAP through adoption. It’s through these non-standard industry influencers that SAP makes their voice heard above the din. The reach is as good, probably even better than tapping into established influencers and they get to control the audiences that their message gets to, ensuring a higher B2B audience.
Working Hand in Hand with Influencers
In traditional influencer marketing, you usually find that creative freedom falls to either the company or the marketer. By involving the influencer in content creation, SAP builds on what the content creator already knows, keeps their message as they want it seen, and focuses on the audience they want to be moved by their content. SAP’s marketing targets both customers that are already using their products as well as prospects that are looking for a solution like the one they offer. SAP’s influencers already focus on users with these existing mindsets, distilling their message so that it falls on the most fertile soil it can, allowing it to take root.
Building and Growing with Influencers
SAP sees their influencers as much more than just another arm of their marketing department. We already mentioned how SAP focuses on having their influencers work side by side with them to develop content that fits their ideals, but additionally SAP sets up strategic seminars where their influencers can connect with industry executives and grow their audience. The Sapphire conference is a massive networking coup for both SAP and the influencers associated with them and whichever executives are invited to view the latest developments in SAP technology. In this, both the influencers and SAP win, showing how SAP helps its influencers to grow while promoting its own message to a wider audience.
Reaching Across Business Lines
SAP, being a global entity, has a lot of different industries to deal with. Because of the spectrum of their reach, SAP needs to be able to reach out to each one of these lines of business and target them to get the most coverage from their influencers. This comes from identifying which influencers fit their profile in each one of those lines of business (LOB) and inviting them to become one of SAP’s “chosen few”. By getting the right influencers for each LOB, SAP distils the information they distribute, helping them to be more precise in targeting potential customers.
Making Strides into the Future
CAB Global contends that as much as 57% of B2B buyers already make their decision about purchases before they even talk to a salesperson, and in the case of SAP, this could be truly detrimental if those companies weren’t given the right information about their product. B2B marketing is a very intense world, far more competitive than B2C marketing and strategies like the one SAP has adopted can show a lot of promise going into the future. SAP’s spread over the last few years are testament to how well their B2B marketing strategy using influencers works for them.
Original Article:
https://blogs.sap.com/2020/03/15/sap-can-drive-b2b-demand-using-influencers/