5 ‘awares’ of brand awareness in B2B marketing
Brand awareness. It seems to be as hot a topic as AI at the moment (no, really) and on the minds of many clients. From current clients to prospective ones, it keeps coming up in conversation time and time again.
Whether it’s a sign of the times or a result of the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute for Marketing Science and LinkedIn spruiking the 95-5 rule – that 95% of your potential customers aren’t in market right now – or the need to build brand memories; more and more B2B marketing leaders are coming around to the notion that simply chasing leads for the quarter isn’t really sustainable.
But when it comes to brand awareness, there’s so much more to it than simply getting your company name in front of your key personas. You could have a strong brand but with poor category awareness, there could be a change to what you’re known for as result of acquisitions or product transformations, or you’re simply drowning in a sea of sameness. Solving the brand awareness problem is on the mind of many B2B CMOs right now.
With this in mind we’ve put together five ‘aware’ness considerations’ in building B2B brand awareness.
1. Make people aware of your existence
When we talk about brand awareness, we’re talking reach, but not in the media buying sense. A ‘hey, we’re around if you’d like to say hi’ type of brand (no, let’s call it bland) awareness messaging won’t cut it, no matter what the media buy. And if you’re a B2B marketer, chances are you don’t have that kind of money to burn!
No, the kind of reach we’re talking, is reaching inside your target customers’ mind and placing a little flag (or locator pin if you’re a digital native) right in their hippocampus.
You need to show up consistently, build brand equity, and make your company mentally available for the 5% in market now, but more importantly remembered by the 95% who simply aren’t ready to buy just yet.
2. Make sure you’re aware of your customers’ needs
You should have a good idea of what your ideal customer profile looks like (and if you don’t you should at least speak to us, and we’ll help you define it).
Depending on who’s in your target market’s buying committee, their challenges could be anything from barriers to productivity, financial pressures, resource constraints, driving innovation, containing costs, streamlined processes … the list goes on and on.
As noted by the B2B Institute and Bain, your buying group doesn’t just consist of target buyers, but is often made up of a significant number of hidden buyers that need to know you’re credible and that they can trust you – this familiarity and trust goes a long way to getting their vote when it comes to selecting a preferred vendor.
Here, clear and consistent brand awareness can be the difference between winning and losing – as Jann Martin Schwarz, founder, at The B2B Institute puts it “81 per cent of deals when the entire buying group knew of the brand at the outset” were successful!
3. Make them aware of what you do
Knowing your audience is not enough. You need to use that knowledge to start crafting the type of core value proposition, and a series of benefit pillars that link directly to their needs and address their pain points.
A compelling CVP is crucial. It builds on those customer pain points and should clearly articulate how you can address them, backed up by proof points to validate your claims.
Think of the CVP as the ‘why’, its pillars as the ‘what’, and the proof points as the ‘how’ and you’re onto a winning value proposition that will stand the test of time (relatively speaking) and make your target customer stand up and take note.
As Simon Sinek pragmatically put it “people don’t buy what you do; they buy why you do it.” And your CVP and subsequent message framework will create the strategic foundations for the customer facing messaging to come. For B2B, messaging frameworks often need to account for more complexity, such as variations for personas or regions, or business units – all doable if the foundations are right.
4. Make everyone aware of your point of difference
We hate to break it to you, but these days everyone’s got a shiny new thing – that overlays or integrates with existing things, to tell you things or automate and streamline things, and usually includes some sort of AI thing – so how do you stand out in a crowded market?
By identifying and owning a point of difference. What’s that one thing you want to be famous for? And we mean famous. What is it and let’s bring it to life, position it, and make everyone aware of it.
Al Ries said it best in his book Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind “positioning is not what you do to a product. Positioning is what you do to the mind of the prospect. That is, you position the product in the mind of the prospect”. That’s the hippocampus we mentioned earlier.
5. Make customers aware of what to do next
And finally, don’t forget to add a strong call-to-action at every touch point. We’re in the response business and just because we’re going for awareness, it shouldn’t mean sacrificing a potential opportunity or helping your prospect navigate their buyer’s journey. So, tell them what’s next, where to go and how to find out more – and make it worth their while if you want the conversion.
So, there you have it, five awareness considerations in making sure your organisation stays top of mind with your target (and hidden) buyers. And oh, just so you’re aware, at TSM, we can help you with any or all of them.