When most people think of influencer marketing, they think of brands directly targeting consumers. This is what’s known as B2C influencer marketing (business-to-consumer). However, these days, an increasing number of companies are reaching out to influencers in order to target other businesses, known as B2B influencer marketing (business-to-business).
But what is the difference between influencer marketing B2B vs B2C? Should you use the same strategies or design different campaigns for each target market?
Let’s take a look at some of the main differences between the two domains and look at a few tips to keep in mind to help your key brand message resonate in each market.
You’ve probably heard the acronyms countless times already but let’s start by looking at a quick definition to highlight what each one means:
B2B stands for business-to-business, and it refers to a commercial transaction between one business and another. B2C stands for business-to-consumer, and it refers to a commercial transaction between a business and an end customer.
There are a number of differences between the two concepts that you need to be aware of as they can have a direct impact on your influencer marketing strategies.
Influencer marketing B2B vs B2C:
Now that we’ve looked at the difference between influencer marketing B2B vs B2C, let’s take a look at a few tips to help you design the best campaign for each market type.
Let’s start with B2B.
The success of your B2B influencer marketing campaign is ultimately down to the influencer you choose. Make sure they have experience with B2B audiences and know how to appeal to the market. Here are some things to consider:
It’s also important to make sure the influencers you choose don’t have conflicting agreements with other brands, especially if those brands are your competitors.
Before you start looking for a B2B influencer to collaborate with, make sure you are clear about what your campaign goals are. Do you want to attract more B2B leads, build traffic or create brand authority?
The clearer your goals are, the easier it will be for you to determine the KPIs you need to focus on and the best influencer for the job. Clear objectives can also help you design a clear roadmap for success so that you can work together with an influencer to create a strategy that will keep you on the road to success.
Finally, let’s look at a few tips to help you improve your B2C influencer marketing campaigns:
When it comes to B2C, it’s all about making connections and eliciting an emotional response. One way to do this is to focus on creating lots of attractive visual content. This might be in the form of videos, photos or infographics – or even a mixture of all three formats.
Make sure you fully brief the B2C influencer you are working with so that they know exactly what you are looking for with your creative content.
Another great way to get your audience excited and get those emotions pumping is to run contests and giveaways. These are very effective tactics for getting your target followers engaged. Stick to simple CTAs for entering contests, such as sharing your influencer posts or tagging a friend. These actions will also help to expand your reach, boost your brand awareness and increase your sales, especially if followers feel that they stand a chance of being rewarded for their actions.
Finally, as we mentioned above, one of the biggest differences between influencer marketing B2B vs B2C is that B2B is all about rational purchase decisions, whereas B2C is all about emotional responses. This means that tactics like posting influencer reviews and recommendations can really sway consumers and encourage them to commit to a purchase decision.
To achieve this, you can ask influencers to try out your free product samples or services and share a review on their social media pages. Encourage them to give honest opinions so that their followers perceive them as authentic recommendations, not business propositions. The more genuine their review posts are, the more B2C sales you are likely to achieve.