Millennials Are The New B2B Influencers
Millennials now make up half of today's workforce and many of them are maturing into decision making roles. As a result, the ecosystem of influencers around the B2B research process has changed dramatically.
For example, a common B2B marketing practice is to target high level executives. However, according to a recent Google study, 94% of B2B buyers rely on research prior to making their buying decision and half of those researchers are Millennials.
Additionally, 73% of Millennial workers are involved in decisions to purchase products or services for their companies.
If you're not marketing specifically to this group, it may be time to re-evaluate your strategy.
Millennials are digital natives. As a result, they require an outreach strategy that takes into account their familiarity with digital and how this influences the kind of content and media channels they are using.
Following are five strategies to consider:
1. Embrace alternative forms of communication. Marketers should consider deferring to the buyer's communication preferences. For Millennial buyers, that may be text, Slack, Skype, or some other innovative platform. Adjusting in real-time to various communication channels is the new norm when selling to Millennials.
2. Attract vs. Prospect. Historically the sales process has been very linear, however, the Millennial B2B buyer prefers a different process. Millennial B2B buyers gather information via social networks, videos, blogs, etc. As a result, sellers have to do much more work attracting vs prospecting with content that is as digitally native as Millennials are.
3. Active digital presence. Millennials will make decisions about you or your product based on your digital presence. 62% say if a brand engages with them on social networks, they are more likely to become loyal to the brand.
4. Stand for something. 50% of Millennials say they are more likely to recommend or buy a brand they know supports a cause and 91% would switch brands to one associated with a cause.
5. Think mobile. 80% of Millennials said mobile devices were important when researching new products and services. Marketers must rethink all communications through the lens of mobile in order to connect with the Millennial B2B buyer.
Global Event Marketer | Revenue Driver | FOMO Sufferer
6yBig numbers around brand loyalty developed through responding on social networks. Huge opportunity for brands!
Co-Founder at Lingua
6yVery informative, concise article. Personally, I was surprised when I first caught wind of this age shift in B2B, since the traditional hierarchy of decision-making within a company seems to come mostly from senior-level positions. I could see, however, how the absolute necessity of integrating technology into all business operations has led to a shift of recruiting the "born into tech" millennial generation for their expertise. Ironically, I wrote an article recently about the importance of marketing to millennials due to their immense buying power, so it seems like the current marketing strategy is overwhelmingly M2M: millennial to millennial.
Consultant pharmacist ARx LTC at ARx LTC
6yWow this is good stuff. Not being in marketing myself but looking at this from the perspective of watching my own millennial high achievers both interning in the fields of medicine and engineering/computer science and the exciting projects they have been put in charge of come to fruition. When there's a passion, millennials are super achievers and innovators that can move mountains!
Founder of Earth & Me, a newly launched zero-waste home goods and self-care store in New York City.
6yGreat article! As a B2B decision-maker myself, effective email marketing is also so vital to attracting and nurturing my interest. Marketing automation is a great tool, but only if B2B companies are using it to segment effectively. Relevancy (in both timing and topic) is a HUGE converter, in my experience.
President @ Multistory Media, Publisher @ He Said Dallas, (Infrequent) Blogger @ CoopedUp.com, Wannabe Comedian
6yYES! I work exclusively in the B2B space and it's so difficult to get many of the top executives to move past pre-2000 marketing approaches -- which is really what this is about. Even non-Millennials want to be marketed to this way today.