Social Media (Marketing) for B2B

 Chapter I

Introduction

This paper aims to provide a foundation of knowledge and thinking about the needs of social media marketing for  B2B company in their digital marketing strategy or plan. This paper will answer the question, what digital media is, why we need digital media, what the benefits of social media for the company are (B2B company), how social media can work for the company, what social media suitable are, what a digital objective of the brand in the social media is, and some critical success factors social media for B2B Business.  

Chapter 2

Digital Marketing: Why Company Need a Digital Marketing 

The Tight Competition

The competition of the business world in various industries is currently getting harder. The winners or connoisseurs of this business global competition are those who can keep their company's competitive advantage over their competitors so that the harsh competition is no longer relevant to them. 

Marketing Communication has a role in creating all the competitive advantages that the company has completely accessible to customers, known by customers, really perceived as good product by customers and become good choice (perceived value), and winning in the minds of customers (Positioning) so that our products are always the first to be remembered, considered, consumed and become problem solvers for the needs and desires of the market or customers. 

The needs of Digital Marketing beside Traditional Marketing

The Internet has changed social communications and social behavior, which lead to the development of new forms of communication channels and platforms (Ismagilova, Dwivedi, Slade, & William, 2017). This encourages the digital world is becoming increasingly advanced and our target market is now active and live in the digital world. If we don't exist and don’t engage in the digital world, it means we aren't present in the market or exist among them. No one can win the market unless they also exist and have strong presence in the market.  For the market in Indonesia we can see this digitalization phenomenon as follows:

Picture 2.1

Source: (Hootsuite, 2022)

 

The above data exposure shows the increasingly digitized market in Indonesia which is indicated by the very high penetration of internet use in Indonesia (73% of population), Cellular mobile connection (133.3%), active social media users (69.9%). This year's penetration of social media usage (2022 vs. 2021) also showed very high growth (+12.6%).

Picture 2.2

Source: (Hootsuite, 2022)

With this condition traditional marketing is not enough to make company wining the competition. In digital era, we also need digital marketing to complete our traditional marketing strategy/programs.

What Digital Marketing is

What digital marketing is and what digital marketing do? Digital marketing is the current popular term for internet marketing. Internet marketing has been described simply as ‘achieving marketing objectives through applying digital technologies’, (Bala & Verma, 2018) and (Chaffey, 2013) define digital marketing as the use of technologies to help marketing activities in order to improve customer knowledge by matching their needs. Simply put, digital marketing is marketing online whether via web sites, online ads, opt-in email, mobile apps or emerging platforms (Chaffey & Smith, 2017).  In the figure below, we can see the type of digital marketing and the comparison with traditional marketing.

Picture 2.3

Source: www.fortureglobal.com, www.infidigit.com

The role of digital marketing and traditional marketing can be described at the figure below:

Research data shows that the level of market involvement in Indonesia in digital marketing is also quite high. Such as 1. Research brands online before making a purchase (67.5%), Visited a brands website in the past 30 days (47,1%). For detail see below:

Source: (Hootsuite, 2022)

Chapter 3

Social Media: Introduction about the Social Media

What Social Media is

In digital marketing, social media as one of the channels has a very important role.  In a larger context, social media also has a very important role in the process of transforming society into a digital community of course driven by several drivers including the advancement of internet technology, the advancement of mobile technology (mobile devices) which is one of the highest access of the digital world, and the advancement of software technology. So dominant is social media in the digital community makes some identify digital marketing with social media marketing. Things that are not entirely appropriate but also acceptable.

The Term “social media” refers to the wide range of internet-based and mobile service that allow users to participate in online exchanges, contribute user-created content, or join online communities (Dewing, 2012). Social media is the umbrella term for web-based software and services that allow user together online and exchange, discuss, communicate, and participate in any form of social interaction (Ryan, 2014). (Zambrano, 2022) quoted (Wikipedia, 2022) that social media facilitate the development of online social networks by connecting a user's profile with those of other individuals or groups. (Dwivedi, Ismagilova, Rana, & Raman, 2021) cited that according to (Andzulis, Panagopoulos, & Rapp, 2012), from a marketing and sales research perspective, social media is defined as the technological component of the communication, transaction and relationship building functions of a business which leverages the network of customers and prospects to promote value co-creation

Interaction in social media includes text, audio, image, and video etc. The interaction is carried out either between individuals or groups or a combination of both.  Interaction in this social media produces the content that becomes the essence of the social media. We call it user-generated content. It could be in the form of recommendation or sharing the existing content, reviewing and rating products, services and brands, discussing the certain topic in society, talking about hobby and lifestyle, interests and passions, experiences and expertise, and others. Practically almost anything can be shared on social media. 

Source: (Hootsuite, 2022)

Based on the figure above customers, be it B2C or B2B using digital media, especially social media, in looking for brand references and looking for information related to their needs.

Social Media Landscape

The advancement of internet and digital technology encourages the birth of a digital society whose birth is in line and supported by the presence of many social media with a variety of platforms. We can identify the existence of social media, its diversity and some of the properties and functions of some social media by looking at the social media landscape that exists today. The social media landscape is made up of different platforms and applications that enables people to connect and share in different ways.  

If we try to identify and segment social media generally, we can identify from some of the dominant functions of social media. Although, that doesn't mean one social media has only one function. Some social media platforms have some slices of the same function as other social media as well.  The four main function of social media in this model is described in 4 function (Sharing, discussion, networking, and publishing). The social media landscape below is a global landscape. Some social media may not be popular enough in Indonesia.

Source: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Social-Media-Landscape

Chapter 4

Social Media for B2B Company: Why We as B2B Company Need Social Media 

(Dwivedi, Ismagilova, Rana, & Raman, 2021) in their journal cited several sources (Barreda, Bilgihan, Nusair, & Okumus, 2015) and (Kapoor, Tamilmani, Rana, Patil, & Nerur, 2018), stated  that B2C companies widely use social media as part of their digital transformation and enjoy its benefits such as an increase in sales, brand awareness, and customer engagement to name a few. Social media allows the company to directly reach their target market, interact with them, and build strong engagement with them. It also serves as a medium for companies to better understand and know their customers' needs, allowing them to fulfil their needs and wants profitably. Social media is transforming not only how businesses communicate with their customers, but also how they do business, how value is supplied, and how profit is created.

How about B2B? is social media suitable for B2B? B2B companies are currently also required to be able to optimize social media. Some facts below summarized well by (Dwivedi, Ismagilova, Rana, & Raman, 2021) and data from (Hootsuite, 2022) can describe that social media is very important as the tools for accelerating business (including B2B) in digital era:

• Due to digitalisation customers are becoming more informed and rely less on traditional selling initiatives (Ancillai, Terho, & Pascucci, 2019)

• Industrial buyers use social media for their purchase as they compare products, research the market and build relationships with salesperson (Itani, Agnihotri, & Dingus, 2017)

• Social media is an important facilitator of relationships between a company and customers (Agnihotri, Kothandaraman, Kashyap, & Singh, 2012)

• Customers are more connected to companies, which make them more knowledgeable about product selection and more powerful in buyer-seller relationships (Agnihotri, Dingus, & Krush, 2016) 

• Social media also helps companies to increase business exposure, traffic and providing marketplace insight (Stelzner, 2012)

• As a result, the use of social media supports business decision processes and helps to improve companies’ performance (Rossmann & Stei, 2015)

• 31.3% of global Internet users use the Internet for business-related research (Hootsuite, 2022)

• 22.7% of internet users use social media for work-related networking and research (Hootsuite, 2022).

According to (Ironpaper.com, 2004) , The use of social media for B2B companies also provides the following benefits: 

• Social media builds brand awareness and visibility

• Social media acts as an established distribution channel for an enterprise's content, ideas and offers

• B2B social media marketing can be used to build an individual's or enterprise's reputation as a thought leader within an industry

• By building brand advocates, which can create PR opportunities, positive web mentions, SEO and brand loyalty

• Social media can improve SEO by increasing third-party links, mentions and interest in a brand's content

• Social media marketing can drive new leads into the funnel when coupled with content offers, such as whitepapers, eBooks, factsheets or other items of interest

• Social media can be used as a B2B customer feedback program in order to better understand the needs of prospects, leads, customers and advocates

• Social media can be used to educate buyers and help them better understand the factors playing a role in their decisions. This education process builds trust and brand trust.

• Social media can be used for B2B customer care and loyalty programs

A study conducted on companies in India on the benefits obtained from social media marketing for B2B companies also showed the significance of the benefits obtained, among others:

Source: https://www.mantran.in/blog/b2b-lead-generation-through-social-media-marketing

Chapter 5

Social Media Platform for B2B: What The suitable Social Media for Ours are

In this chapter We will elaborate the main social media platform which is suitable for the company (as B2B company) to support the social media marketing strategy. We will elaborate the nature and characteristic for each platform (social media) and explain why the platform can be considered as channel/platform in company social media marketing strategy. 

87% of B2B companies view social media (other than blogs) as a highly successful element of their marketing mix. 83% say the same for articles on websites, 78% newsletters, and 77% blogs. (MyCustomer.com). But need to know and understand that not all social media platforms should be used to achieve business goals specifically for companies engaged in B2B.  The choice of social media platform to be used will largely depend on its marketing goals and social media marketing goals. (the examples of the marketing goals include: increase brand awareness, lead generation, lead management, customer retention and loyalty, establish your company as a mind leader or innovator, or increase sales)

B2B organizations must analyze various social media tools, antecedents/barriers to adoption, develop appropriate social media strategies that are in accordance with the company's overall strategy, and measure the effectiveness of social media use in order to successfully implement and use social media.

Nevertheless, some social media platforms are identified as very widely used by B2B companies in their social media marketing programs. The company can consider these social media as the platform of choice in its digital marketing activities.

Specific or some social media platforms can be considered by the company to support digital marketing strategy. The top five social networks used by B2B marketers to distribute content are LinkedIn (83%), Twitter (80%), Facebook (80%), YouTube (61%) and Google+ (39%) (Ironpaper.com, 2004). 

The report also aligned with CMI report, which placed LinkedIn as the most used social media platform for B2B for content marketing purposes. (LinkedIn 97%, Twitter 87%, Facebook 86% etc).

Source: https://www.sociallybuzz.com/4-best-social-media-platforms-for-b2b-marketing/

LinkedIn

With over 800 million users, LinkedIn is the world's largest professional network. It has a number of characteristics that are particularly beneficial to b2b marketers that are targeting firms and business owners. Businesses can use LinkedIn as a social media platform for b2b marketing to make connections, build networks, and produce targeted leads.

LinkedIn is a highly professional network where a variety of professionals and career-minded individuals have registered. This expansive platform allows us as brand to share the expertise, acquire insights, generate leads, boost the reputation, do market research, and create online communities.  Below is some advantage of LinkedIn utilization that I try to summarize from (Navarette, n.d.):

• LinkedIn is a high-potential network where the company can interact directly with a variety of productive professional people as well as potential customers. As a manufacturer and engaged in the B2B business, LinkedIn platform allows manufacturers to connect and foster relationships with decision makers in their fields. For the Company produce soy sauce, sauce and margarine as raw materials such as for restaurant and coffee shop, thru LinkedIn company can build relation with the owners, or professionals who are engaged in the industry and are interested in the supply of raw materials. (20 million professionals are registered in this platform in Indonesia)

• LinkedIn provides strong thought leadership and influencer marketing opportunities. The company can develop company  profile and participate in LinkedIn communities, create conversations, and generally grow the brand by creating high-quality material. It also allows the company/the brand to interact with a large audience, which aids in the development of a trustworthy brand image. The company can impact the market with the brand-oriented and customer-centric marketing tactics, thought leadership, and new ideas if the company have a smart and responsive online presence. This is an opportunity to build brand, brand reputation (such as high quality of sauce,

• LinkedIn improves sales and leads generation. LinkedIn is an excellent tool for generating leads and converting them into clients. LinkedIn allows you to find and connect with potential clients in a very personal way, and it opens up a lot of sales prospects.

• LinkedIn is an excellent CRM tool. Customer Relationship Management is a critical component of every company's growth and development. The Company CRM can quickly set up basic integration of your company's contacts because LinkedIn supports Google Contacts.

• LinkedIn boosts traffic. Because LinkedIn is a professional digital platform, Company can include business and product links in your articles, as well as compelling information. In fact, it offers clever status updates and content sharing tools that allow us to identify ourselves quickly. As a result, it enhances our B2B marketing services by assisting in authentic link building and organic traffic driving with greatest perfection and positivity.

• LinkedIn is quite useful for listening and gathering information. When we join a highly professional platform like LinkedIn, we gain access to a potentially large audience of ours peers as well as our company's target demographic.

LinkedIn Source: Google.com

One of the social media platforms that are very unique when viewed from who the user is and the purpose of use.   Most of the users are professionals with a variety of professions, employees who work in companies, business people, business people.   In Indonesia LinkedIn user :20 million (Hootsuite, 2022)   The purpose of the connectivity built on this platform is for the benefit of business, work (finding a job).   Brands can take advantage of this platform for Business to business or B2B relationships, in addition to building brands, getting customers who are in accordance with the character of LinkedIn users.

“The company’s advertising reach figures suggest that LinkedIn’s audience in Indonesia was equivalent to 7.2 percent of the total population at the start of 2022.For additional context, LinkedIn’s ad reach in Indonesia was equivalent to 9.8 percent of the local internet user base (regardless of age) at the start of the year (Hootsuite, 2022)”

Twitter

For B2B companies, Twitter can be an efficient channel for connecting with their target market. Hundreds of millions of people use Twitter. Given this, a B2B's target market is likely to use this social network. If the target market is on Twitter, the business should connect with them there as well.

Twitter allows businesses to communicate with their audiences in a manner that other social media platforms do not. Companies use Twitter to communicate with users in real time, responding to questions, posting updates, and responding to other users' messages.

According to (Ironpaper.com, 2018), B2B can take some benefit from Twitter as below:

• A platform to share thought leadership

• Build awareness within a niche industry or subtopic

• Share insightful content using subtopic hashtags (for example #SmartCities)

• Social selling

• Traffic building

• Lead generation using content offers

“Numbers published in Twitter’s advertising resources indicate that Twitter had 18.45 million users in Indonesia in early 2022.This figure means that Twitter’s ad reach in Indonesia was equivalent to 6.6 percent of the total population at the time. For additional context, Twitter’s ad reach in Indonesia was equivalent to 9.0 percent of the local internet user base (regardless of age) at the start of the year (Hootsuite, 2022).”

Facebook

Facebook social media has the largest number of users in the world including in Indonesia so the coverage is very wide. Data published in Meta’s Q3 2021 investor earnings announcement confirms that Facebook is still the world’s most-used social media platform, with 2.91 billion users as of October 2021 (Hootsuite, 2022). Social media marketing (B2B or B2C) on this platform is lucky with very high coverage.

Source: Google.com   Source: https://blog.milestoneinternet.com/getting-social/why-is-facebook-important/

It is the most popular platform with the most users in the world and also in Indonesia (Indonesia is the most Facebook user in ASIA after India-2022; 129.9 million users and globally time spent for the platform is 19.6 hours/month (Hootsuite, 2022)   Platform Content: text (main), image and video, including live video facilities. More choice of engagement features, and the most complete features in social media   This platform is based on friendships, family, siblings, coworkers etc. (his friendship-based nature then gave birth to community pages)-network friendship.   Social graph (people connected because of they know each other and need approval to be friends) (Zambrano, 2022)   In Indonesia, the user of Facebook mostly is old generation (baby boomer, gen x and Y)   To market products aimed at a target demographic like this, Facebook is more appropriate. Less relevant if for young generation products.

Benefits of Using Facebook

According to (milestoneinternet.com, 2019)  B2B can get the benefit from this platform as below:

1. Customer Interaction – Facebook pages provide a forum for dialogue between customers and the brand, giving companies the opportunity to build better relationships with target audiences and current customers.

2. Reputation Management – Facebook allows a company to gain a deeper understanding of how the brand is perceived online – through direct feedback and also by monitoring what users are saying about the brand.

3. New Customer Acquisition – Each time a Facebook user becomes a fan of a Facebook page, a notice is posted as news item for all of that user’s friends to see. This creates an opportunity for a Facebook page to go viral and reach new viewers.

4. Feedback Mechanism – In a service-based sector like hospitality, customer feedback is vital. Facebook allows users to communicate their experiences directly and give the company the opportunity to respond.

5. Branding – Facebook can be used as a medium for creating brand awareness in addition to a company’s corporate website. It provides brand exposure to a potentially new audience and gives organizations the opportunity to position themselves in new and unique ways.

6. Drive Web Traffic – As a Facebook page grows its fan base, traffic to the company website will increase. Facebook pages also appear in Universal Search Results.

YouTube

We can consider YouTube as the platform used for our social media marketing (even become an indispensable tool) for two reasons. The first is the rise of YouTube influencers, content creators, and digital asset management (DAM) systems that make video content creation simpler. Second is currently the tendency of people to increasingly like to look through video content about many things more than reading or listening to something.

Source : google.com

The main content is video format   YouTube is the biggest social media platform on video basis and the second largest search engine after Google.   In Indonesia, YouTube user is 139 million  (Hootsuite, 2022)   Platform audience mostly is millennials generation (born in 1980-2000)   This video-based platform is very suitable to be utilized by brands to increase brand awareness through product review content, advertisements, and mini-series programs.   This platform is appropriately used for brands / products to introduce their products in more detail and thoroughly to their target audience because they are video-based. The role of influencers for brands /products is also important on this platform.

Some consideration why this platform is very important:

• YouTube now has at least 2.56 billion active users, which equates to roughly 88 percent of the latest Facebook and time spent at the platform is 23.7 hours/month, and high user also in Indonesia 139 million (Hootsuite, 2022). By creating films and advertising on other users' videos, businesses on YouTube may easily reach their target audience.

• Brands all around the world are increasingly turning to YouTube videos for commercial marketing goals. That's because those firms realized that their customers wanted to see more video material from them.

• According to (Bullas, 2018)There are a number of different advertising formats available for businesses, which include:

1. Display ads – appear to the right of the video above the suggested videos list, in a range of different specs. Available on desktop only

2. Skippable video ads –these are inserted before, during or after a video, and allow the user to skip the advert after five seconds. This form of advertising works on desktops, mobile devices, TVs and game consoles

3. Bumper ads – these video adverts can last up to six seconds and must be viewed before the main video is watched; users are unable to skip these adverts

Instagram

Instagram, like all other social media platforms, has made its platform available to businesses to sell their brands, products, and services. Company can take advantage of Instagram's unparalleled growth by creating an account for the brand and posting content that attracts, engages, and retains followers. Instagram provides a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get the business in front of our target population.

Instagram is an excellent tool for B2B marketing. It provides a platform for new connections to be made in practically any industry, at any level of growth. It's valuable platform for communicating with present and new clients. Meta’s own data suggests that more than a quarter of a billion new users joined Instagram during 2021, pushing the platform’s global ad reach to almost 1.5 billion users by the start of 2022, while in Indonesia the user is estimated 99.15 million (Hootsuite, 2022). The B2B audience is very active online and Instagram has very high brand engagement rates; much higher than Facebook and Twitter (Czeczotka, 2020).

Below is the figure which tell us the potency of growth of the platform in the future:

Source: https://www.thoughtmedia.com/instagram-growth-benefits-social-media-marketing/

Instagram is one of the platforms with the most users among millennials. Currently 40% of the workforce in most ordinary businesses is millennial, in fact, millennials are expected to make up more than 70% of the workforce in ten years (Simmonds, 2022) and currently more than 70% of millennials are now included in the buying decisions (Czeczotka, 2020) 

The company must appeal to this group, which means the company should think of Instagram marketing as a wonderful way to establish the brand and produce leads.

Source: Google.com

This social media platform is very strongly positioned as a sharing platform with content in the form of images, photos (with more aesthetics picture compared to others)- so that’s why this platform become the main platform used by brand to build awareness   The source is more for life style content. People follow for beautiful visuals or videos People also can follow certain hashtag based on their interest (Zambrano, 2022)   Instagram facilitate short video content, very short video (reels) and live video session.   Instagram users mostly the younger generation (Gen Y/millennial - Gen Z)   Instagram user in Indonesia: 99.15 million*   The platform has a high level of engagement   This platform is suitable for the brands/products with the target market with younger age groups. (under 40 years old)

If, according to the previous survey, Instagram is less widely used for B2B social media marketing than other platforms (LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube), one possible reason for Instagram's neglect as a social media channel for b2b companies is a lack of understanding of how it can be used to increase traffic and brand awareness. To succeed on Instagram as a b2b company, The Company will need help from a team that specializes in photography, video production, animation, and graphic design, among other things.

Instagram's power resides in its ability to tell a story with photographs and videos. What Instagram isn't is a platform where B2B companies may portray themselves in an unduly corporate or impersonal manner. With the strength of Instagram which is perceived more life style and stronger appearance on image and video it can be valuable for company as tools to generate interest in business products and services. “Doing b2b marketing well on Instagram, therefore, does require a strategy. The platform won’t work well for those businesses that simply post content without any kind of strategy or targeting in mind (armstrong.com, 2021).”

Here are the reasons why B2B company must use Instagram for social media marketing strategy:

• The amount of time spent on mobile devices is on the rise and Instagram is perceived as more than a “lifestyle” social app. The company can use video and reels to build entertaining content to boost the perceived quality of product, strengthen the emotions with target market.

• Videos, one of Instagram's features, are more entertaining and may hold people's attention with their immersive experience. According to recent studies, video is the most successful kind of content, particularly on Instagram. According to study, 70% of B2B buyers research potential purchases by watching videos, and 45% of marketers expect to use Youtube and other interactive content into their marketing strategy by next year (Czeczotka, 2020).

• Promote the company's local B2B business. Use Instagram stories to advertise live feeds for the company events, team-building exercises, and store openings, among other things. People love seeing behind-the-scenes footage, and with Instagram Stories, streaming live video has never been easier. These videos can reach audiences who may not be aware of our most recent postings owing to algorithm adjustments. For our postings, we may utilize geotags or local hashtags, follow and engage with local businesses, and follow our local brands; our B2B audience can even Direct Message the company.

Chapter 6 

Setting Digital Marketing Objective

Setting digital marketing goals is a crucial stage in assessing if our digital marketing strategy is a success or a failure. We'll be able to track our progress and assess the success of our campaign if we have objectives. This will help the company understand what makes our customers tick because we'll be able to see what they're interested in or which activity brought the most traffic to the company website.

In social media marketing we can identify some main objective, below are the main objective and the key performance indicator according to (Andersen, 2017) :

1. Strengthen Brand Awareness; with key performance indicators:

• Mentions: the number of times the company or the brand is mentioned on social media and how many times these conversations are shared

• Impressions: the number of people who might see a message that a message has/potential view

• Reach: the total number of individuals who have seen an article/publication

• Social Sessions: the number of site visits, blog post views, etc.

• Share of Voice: The number of mentions a brand receives compared to the total number of mentions obtained by all relevant competitors.

2. Increase Size of Social Communities and Accurately Target Audiences, with key performance indicators:

• Community Performance: the number of fans, followers, or subscribers broken down by social media channel.

• Community Progression: the follower growth rate by social media channel.

• Share of Community Voices: number of followers compared to those of competitors.

• Share of Voice by Channel: the community size of each social media platform as a percentage of the total number of social followers across all platforms.

• Social Visits: visitors coming to social media accounts coming from the brand’s website or blog.

3. Strengthen Engagement Strategies to Increase Customer Loyalty, with key performance indicators:

• Interaction Performance: the number of interactions (likes, retweets, shares, etc.) and number of comments.

• Evolution of the Interactions: the growth rate of interactions.

• Publication Performance: the number of messages generating an amount of interaction greater than a predefined threshold.

• Influencer Population:  the number of influencers and brand ambassadors as a percentage of the community size.

4. Monitor Customer Feedback, with key performance indicators:

• Interaction Performance: the number of interactions (likes, retweets, shares, etc.) and number of comments.

• Evolution of the Interactions: the growth rate of interactions.

• Publication Performance: the number of messages generating an amount of interaction greater than a predefined threshold.

• Influencer Population:  the number of influencers and brand ambassadors as a percentage of the community size.

5. Convert Social Followers into Qualified Leads and New Business, with key performance indicators :

• Number of Leads from Social Media: the share of marketing leads originating from social media which are turned into qualified commercial leads and integrated into the CRM platform.

• Lead Growth from Social Media:  the growth rate of conversions from social leads to sales leads

When we set the objective, we must follow the good standard/practice of setting objective. In many literatures its defined as SMART. We can add the KPI or key performance indicator as part of our SMART Objective. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Timed.

• Our objectives must be specific. Our goals must be defined in order to focus the campaign and aid in the achievement of the desired outcome. 

• The objective must be measurable, so you can analyze certain aspects of your campaign and measure them against what you want to achieve

• When setting objectives, it is also important that they are achievable by our business. However, do not make goals that are too simple to achieve. Our goals must extend our team, which means they will look for previously undiscovered ways to attain them. It's not a good idea to set ourselves up for failure. If we set an unrealistic goal, our campaign may appear to be a failure while, in reality, the company could have expanded by leaps and bounds over that time.

• Our objective needs to be relevant to whatever digital campaign we are about to begin.

• Time, another important factor in setting goals is time. We need to give this objective an end date because it will help us to run an efficient campaign.

I will give the example of a clear digital objective for the company/brand in social media marketing as below: 

Objective	KPI	Target	Note	Platform	Period
Strengthen Brand Awareness	Mention Impression (Click-through Rate, Cost per Mile) Reach, Engagement Social Season Share of voice	-Mention :1000 (example competitor is around 500-700) -Impression (CTR: 100% of followers; CPM: 75% of average in the industry) -Reach: 1000, (example the account has follower 1000) Engagement: 200 (20% of followers) -social season: 1000 -share of Voice: 45% (for example market share of the brand in industry 45%)	(we can see the average in the industry or use competitor for benchmark.	Facebook, Instagram	Year 2022

Chapter 7

Critical Success Factor Social Media Marketing for B2B Business

Companies need to pay attention to several important things to ensure the success of marketing activities on social media so that the efforts and investments made can lead the company to its desired goals effectively and efficiently. 

1. Set clear Objective. The outcomes of a B2B social media strategy are regularly measured. Things can be improved if they are measured and the clear objective will make it possible. This objective then will greatly affect the social media platform to be used. Clear objective will impact to social media platform used and content strategy etc.

2. Have a comprehensive B2B Framework. Using a B2B social media preparedness framework to run a gap analysis versus how you're currently using social media to see where you might have gaps in your social media foundation that need to be rectified. Here is the framework that we can use according to (Polewarczyk, 2016) : 

• Segmentation and setting valid target audience: it will help us to make audience prioritization 
• Messaging development: Messaging should be integrated into all communications and channels, including social, 
• Resource allocation: Clearly defining and aligning expectations around personnel resources and program dollars are critical to ensuring that social goals are realistic, actionable and achievable, 
• Measurement. Goals and KPIs must be defined upfront as well, so they can inform planning and execution, and the metrics to measure and benchmark over time, 
• Technology: Once goals and KPIs have been defined, current tools and technology must be evaluated to identify gaps in execution and reporting capabilities, 
• Keyword strategy : For both organic and paid activities, a smart keyword universe aligns and amplifies search, social and content marketing around an audience-centric lexicon,
• Content strategy :Lack of social followership and engagement is often related to poor content strategy, quality and inventory. A solid content strategy, including an editorial calendar, provides the steady stream of content needed to drive social engagement,
• Localization strategy: While some social posts are region-specific, B2B organizations can often leverage centralized tools and content across multiple geographies and languages, 
• Executive sponsorship : Social readiness and success is highly dependent on the level of executive support available to champion for social strategy best practices and adequate resources and 
• Cross-functional interlock — social operations :Up-front alignment about cross-functional social media roles and responsibilities is essential. As B2B organizations mature, a social operations center of excellence is best practice for improving interlock, skills, processes, tools and measurement.

References

Agnihotri, R., Dingus, R., & Krush, M. (2016). Social Media: Influencing Customer Satisfaction in B2B Sales. Industrial Marketing Management, 172-180.

Agnihotri, R., Kothandaraman, P., Kashyap, R., & Singh, R. (2012). Bringing "Social" into Sales: The Impact of Salespeople's Social Media Use on Service Behaviors and Value Creation. Journal of Personal Sellling and Sales management 32(3), 333-348.

Ancillai, C., Terho, H., & Pascucci, F. (2019). Advancing Social Media Driven Sales Research: Establishing Conceptual Foundations for B2B Social Selling. Industrial Marketing Management (82), 293-308.

Andersen, G. (2017, October 26). digimind Website. Retrieved from blog.digimind.com: https://blog.digimind.com/en/insight-driven-marketing/5-objectives-to-integrate-into-your-social-media-marketing-strategy

Andzulis, J., Panagopoulos, N., & Rapp, A. (2012). A Review of Social Media and Implications for The Sales Process. Journal of Personal Selling & Sales Management 32(3), 305-316.

armstrong.com. (2021, June 09). wearearmstrong Website. Retrieved from www.wearearmstrong.com: https://www.wearearmstrong.com/insights/is-instagram-any-good-for-b2b/

Bala, M., & Verma, D. (2018). A Critical Review of Digital Marketing. International Journal of Management, IT & Engineering, 321-339.

Barreda, A., Bilgihan, A., Nusair, K., & Okumus, F. (2015). Generating Brand Awareness in Online Social Networks. Computers in Human Behavior , 600-609.

Bullas, A. (2018, July 11). opace. Retrieved from www.opace.co.uk: https://www.opace.co.uk/blog/youtube-business-case-b2b-b2c-social-media-marketing

Chaffey. (2013, February 16). Definitions of E-Marketing vs Internet vs Digital Marketing. Smart Insight Blog.

Chaffey, D., & Smith, P. (2017). Digital Marketing Excellence: Planning, Optimizing and Integrating Online Marketing. New York: Taylor & Francis Group.

Czeczotka, D. (2020, September 09). Ice Nine Online Website. Retrieved from icenineonline.com: https://icenineonline.com/blog/why-you-should-use-instagram-for-your-b2b-business/

Dwivedi, Y., Ismagilova, E., Rana, N., & Raman, R. (2021). Social Media Adoption, Usage and Impact in Business-to-Business (B2B) Context: A State-of-The-Art Literature Review. Information Systems Frontiers, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10796-021-10106-y.

Hootsuite, W. a. (2022). Digital Indonesia 2022. We are Social-Hootsuite.

Ironpaper.com. (2004, August 04). Ironpaper website. Retrieved from www.ironpaper.com: https://www.ironpaper.com/webintel/articles/importance-social-media-b2b-enterprise-marketing

Ironpaper.com. (2018, March 23). Ironpaper Website. Retrieved from www.ironpaper.com: https://www.ironpaper.com/webintel/articles/is-twitter-an-effective-social-channel-for-b2b

Ismagilova, E., Dwivedi, Y., Slade, E., & William, M. (2017). Electronic Word of Mouth (E-WOM) in The Marketing Context: A State of The Art Analysis and Future Directions. Cham: Springer International Publising.

Itani, 0., Agnihotri, R., & Dingus, R. (2017). Social Media Use in B2B Sales and Its Impact on Competitive Intelligence Collection and Adaptive Selling: Examinig The Role of Learnin Orientation as An Enabler. Industrial Marketing Management (66), 64-79.

Kaplan, A., & Haenlein, M. (2010). Users of the World, Unite! The Challenges and Opportunities of Social Media. Business Horizons Vol.53, 59-68.

Kapoor, K., Tamilmani, k., Rana, N., Patil, P., & Nerur, K. (2018). Advance in Social Media Research: Past, Present, and Future. Information Systems Frontiers 20 (3), 531-558.

Kunsman, T. (2019, September 25). Everyonesocial . Retrieved from https://everyonesocial.com/blog/internal-marketing

milestoneinternet.com. (2019, March 17). milestoneinternet website. Retrieved from blog.milestoneinternet.co: https://blog.milestoneinternet.com/getting-social/why-is-facebook-important/

Navarette, M. (n.d.). www.anthonygaenzle.com. Retrieved from https://www.anthonygaenzle.com/linkedin-b2b-marketing/#more-39491

Polewarczyk, C. (2016, April 22). Forrester Website. Retrieved from www.forrester.com: https://www.forrester.com/blogs/10successfactorsforbtobsocialmediamarketing/

Rossmann, A., & Stei, G. (2015). Sales 2.0 in Business to Business (B2B) networks: Conceptualization and Impact of Social Media in B2B Sales Relationships. The Lecture Notes in Informatics (LNI), Proceedings-Series of The Gesellschaft Fur Informatik, (pp. 67-78).

Simmonds, R. (2022). convinceandconvert.com. Retrieved from https://www.convinceandconvert.com/social-media-strategy/b2b-brands-using-instagram

Stelzner, M. (2012). Social Media Marketing Industry Report. Social Media Examiner.