This is how good B2B e-commerce marketing works

Latest update 20 May 2021

As a B2B company, you are naturally proud of the products you sell. Whether they are tools, car parts or abrasives. But how do you ensure that those beautiful products are actually paid for? Powerful B2B e-commerce marketing is the key. B2B e-commerce differs from B2B lead generation and therefore requires a different approach. This applies even more to B2B companies. Read in this article what successful B2B e-commerce marketing looks like. Bring on those conversions!

Visibility with Ads

Making conversions. That’s what B2B e-commerce marketing is all about. Advertisements are crucial. It is still mainly “Picture/Product/Price marketing”. Tip: with B2B e-commerce, focus on Google Shopping & Feed marketing. The Cost Per Click (CpC) is lower than with regular search ads. Another advantage is that the ads are always shown. Even if someone does not click on it, he or she has still seen the advertisement.

Important with B2B Google Shopping:

  1. Always add a unit price per item/ SKU, even if the VPE is per 12, per roll of 10, etc.
    1. This makes you price competitive with your competition.
  2. Customer-specific prices are possible behind log-in. Only for Google shopping is it important to be able to checkout directly. So work with volume advantage at the front end of the B2B webshop and generate the 1st order directly. You can then assign this customer to an existing volume and/or price agreement.

Not budgets but conversions

Thinking in terms of budgets is passé – at least in an infinite B2B marketing strategy. This is also very relevant in B2B e-commerce marketing. Don’t stick to a certain budget per month. The central question is: how much is a new customer worth to you? In marketing terms, this is the Cost Per Acquisition (CPA). Suppose a click costs 1 euro. Then on average 2 people pay for 100 clicks. The CPA at that moment is 50 euros. You have 2 new customers for 50 euros “out of pocket”. Set up your advertisements based on this reasoning. It is a constant deduction of cost per click and desired margin on a product. It is also smart to work with evergreen campaigns. You can run these all year round. It is only a matter of adjusting them now and then, so that the advertisements always remain relevant. We do this on a daily basis and for large budgets every hour.

Pure B2B

B2B marketing differs from B2C, also in e-commerce. It is important to choose the right keywords. Filter out the noise. The word Christmas tree, for example, is very popular, especially with consumers. That’s why we set up the ads for our client Beekwilder in such a way that they attract entrepreneurs. For example, by explicitly mentioning the word B2B or by adding relevant words such as ‘hospitality‘ or ‘office’. So think carefully about what your ideal target group is and then do a keyword research. After that, you can set up your advertisements very specifically and, of course, continuously fine-tune them.

Take action

B2B e-commerce may focus less on branding or display ads than lead generation. Still, there are plenty of opportunities for display campaigns here as well. Promotions are always good ways to create extra conversions. Remarketing is a handy tool for this. For example, you can show an action to everyone who searched for a certain keyword. Does someone type ‘milling’ into Google? Then he or she will see your beautiful display with an attractive promotion around milling (such as: “buy 5 and get 1 free”). Bring on the conversions! Otherwise, take a look at our page with beautiful examples of B2B banners created by our own design team.

Create order in your product data

You sell many products in your B2B webshop. It is important that these products are provided with the right information. This is for three reasons:

  1. SEO. Products are found better organically if there is sufficient text on the page and if this also meets the SEO rules. For example, include relevant keywords in the title and text.
  2. User experience. People are more likely to check out if the page is user-friendly. Is your website slow or does it look chaotic? Then you have a greater chance of a high bounce rate. Also make sure that all product information is complete (including product photos and features). After all, unknown makes unloved.
  3. Advertisements. Google rewards websites for relevant content. Suppose you advertise on grinding wheels. The landing page in the advert must actually be about grinding wheels. Google will charge you if the relevant keyword is hardly mentioned on the page. This is all the more true if the content is about something completely different, such as hand drills. As a result, your advertisement will be shown less often and the cost per click will increase. So good content pays off.

Select the right PIM system

All that product data has to be stored somewhere. With only 50 products, this is still manageable. However, there are also web shops with 10,000+ products. Manually processing product data is not an option in such cases. A PIM system offers a solution here. Using this system, you can easily load new product data or change it via an excel file. The process is also less prone to error, as all data is stored in one central location. Greedybean is an example of a PIM system that is specially tailored to B2B companies.

The secret of a good B2B e-commerce website

A good B2B website is important. After all, it is your online business card, and in the case of an e-commerce website also your order portal. It is therefore important that this website functions properly. Our client Röwac and Kinap are two examples of a good B2B e-commerce website. The specialists at Jelba designed and built these websites themselves. Of course we take into account ease of use, e-commerce marketing and house style.

A few general things to watch out for:

  • Speed. Visitors drop out if the website loads slowly.
  • Structure. Is the menu structure logical and can visitors easily find the right information?
  • Design. Choose a house style and use it everywhere.
  • Mobile friendliness. Potential customers no longer orientate themselves or buy exclusively via desktop. Your website should therefore also be designed for mobile use.

Also successful B2B e-commerce marketing for your company?

Do you want to generate more turnover from your B2B webshop? Contact our experts! Our online marketers know everything about setting up dazzling campaigns and our ad specialists know exactly how to target your ideal audience. Add to that our content and design specialists and you have a whole team of colleagues who work hard every day to increase your online reach and conversions.

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