How to do B2B Social Media Marketing in 2019

If you feel like the people constantly don’t want to engage with your B2B social media content, then you’re on the right spot. I know that struggle and the pain that comes with it. I passed through it. Over the 7 years of experience in working with different B2B companies, I went through a lot of difficult times. But I also learned a lot from that period.

And now, I’m willing to share with you my best practices to grow your B2B social media strategies.B2B Social Media Marketing has always been a tough job. Mainly because people don’t have a tendency to engage with brands online anymore. Especially in the B2B SaaS industry.

Companies became boring, dull and too promotional on social media. That’s not what social media are created for. Even the LinkedIn - “the social media for business people” - doesn’t work that way anymore.

Over the years, we’ve lost the human element in our strategies. We’re trying to make every task automated and to do things at scale.But unfortunately, that’s not the way to succeed in the B2B social media marketing.Things have changed, and in this article, I’m going to share with you my best practices that helped me to scale my client’s businesses, make amazing connections and meet great people.So, continue to read if you are looking to:

• See the real examples and screenshots of how I’m using social media to engage with people, build relationships, and sell in a subtle way.
• Find out how to make the most of Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Quora and Slack in B2B Marketing.
• See how to create stunning B2B social media strategies.

For easier navigation, I’ve decided to divide the articles into different segments according to the social media channel.

In other words, we will see real-life examples and tips on how to create B2B social media strategies for:

• Twitter
• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Quora
• Slack

Let’s get started!

How to succeed at Twitter

Without any doubt, Twitter is probably one of the most important social media networks for any B2B company - but not in the way you think soo. Unlike in other social media channels, Twitter is focused on conversations.

One of the main problems with Twitter is mainly because people don’t have a tendency to engage with brands out there.

That’s the reason why you need to be a game-changer.

So, the tip number one for Twitter is:Use the personal account to promote the brand.

For better engagement, avoid using the company’s name to build a relationship with other people and to eventually “sell”.

Talk about the trending topics in your industry through your personal Twitter account. Share ideas, events, tweets from occasions or industry meetups.

One of the best general tips of advice I can give you on B2B social media marketing is that you should not try to make your B2B social media strategies scalable.

The rule is the same for twitter.Try to answer every comment and engage with every share or mention you have.In other words, add the human element in your twitter and other social media strategies.

If the Elon Musk can engage with his customers through his personal account almost every time, then you can do it too.

Pro Tip: You can use Twitter Mobile Notifications to immediately answer to those type of tweets

As I already mentioned, the most important thing about Twitter is in the conversations.So, for that reason, try to ask controversial questions whenever you can. Controversial questions will in most cases, have great engagement and reach.Pro Tip: Mention influencers in your niche to get credibility and better engagement.

So far now, we only talked about how to use a personal Twitter account to boost your engagement and build company awareness, but what happens with your official company’s account?

The best way to use your brand’s Twitter account is to engage with influencers, customers and to distribute your content.

Brand’s Twitter account is great for engaging with influencers, both inside and outside of social media.

You can see how Social Media Examiner uses Twitter to engage with almost every mention, tweet or reetweet.

But also, here’s how Social Media Examiner uses Twitter to distribute its content:

How to make the most out of LinkedIn

For creating great B2B social media strategies, LinkedIn can also be used from both personal and company’s profiles.

At the beginning, LinkedIn was imagined to be a social media network for HRs and people who are looking to find a job.Over the years now, it evolved into the largest business community worldwide.From that reason, now it’s more important than ever before to use LinkedIn with a certain dose of the human element.The most important tip I have to share with you about LinkedIn is: be yourself.Be real. Don’t try to fake things.Share your stories, experiences and amazing things you and your company achieved together.Don’t be too promotional. Instead, be personal. Mention your company in a subtle way while telling the stories your audience might care of.Here’s an example of how Drift’s VP of Marketing use LinkedIn to engage with customers and other people:

LinkedIn is also a great channel to create valuable connections and meet amazing people (that can eventually become your leads, and later the customers).

You can use your personal profile to reach out to potential customers, and build real relationships:

In this particular case, I managed to sell Userpilot to Todd a couple of months after these messages. Todd eventually became a customer btw.

When you’re reaching out to the people on LinkedIn for the goal to make great connections (and eventually sell them something), don’t be too much promotional at the beginning.Listen to what they have to say. Offer them help. On this way or another, the law of attraction will always give you back what you offered.When it comes to content distribution, LinkedIn can be a very great platform, whether you’re going to use it through the personal or brand’s profile.Here’s a good example of how Wes Bush promotes his new book on Product-Led Growth through LinkedIn:

Here are the key takeaways from this example:

• Intrigue your customers from the beginning
• Offer the great value
• Let them know, in a subtle way, how can they benefit from your content
• Point them out to your content.

Especially when you’re in the B2B industry, LinkedIn can also be a great tool for connecting with your competitor’s customers.

Connect with them, but don’t bee to promotional. As for anything else, offer them value.

How to get A LOT of views at Quora

I saw a lot of people that underestimate the power of Quora as a lead generation channel.

Why would they do that? Quora is the place where you can find people who are directly interested in your product.At the end of the day, in a lot of cases, the reason why are they asking the question is that they probably need the value your product has to offer.From that reason, Quora is a great content distribution channel.Here are a couple of tips and tricks that you can use to boost your Quora profile and reach a lot of people:

1. Make a great profile at Quora

Be recognizable and let the viewers understand why are you the best fit to answer the questions they asked for.

In other to build that credibility, you will need to create good, compelling and eye-catching Quora profile:

Let your viewers know how to reach out to you, and briefly explain to them what is your expertise and how exactly can you help them.

2. Find potentially great questions

One of the best ways to find good questions that can perform well is to type the desired topic in the search bar on Google and see what questions have the best SEO and rankings:

The SEO ranking is a clear indicator that tells us: “this Quora question will constantly generate the new number of readers”.

3. Take advantage of the Quora algorithm

The more upvotes your answer gets in the first couple of hours after publishing, the better your rankings in the upvoter’s followers quora feed would be.

So in order to boost your rankings, you can join some of the current Quora “pods” out there.“Pods” are little communities and groups of people that mutually upvotes and likes other people’s posts and answers.

A good Quora pod to join is the Game of Content on LinkedIn.

4. Distribute your content through Quora

As mentioned, Quora is a great content distribution channel. While finding the relevant Quora questions, you can easily re-use some part of your content.

Pay attention to how you’re writing your quora answers. The answer (especially if you’re looking at it from your article), should be at the same time informative enough and intrigue your readers so they will click on the link. I wanted to hit walkme alternatives and appcues alternatives (my competitors)

Hack your growth through Slack

In the last couple of years, Slack became quite popular among the business people. Even more, nowadays, Slack isn’t only for the company’s chat. Right now, there are various Slack communities you can joint to (some of them are free, while for some of them you would need to pay the subscription).

When it comes to building great relationships and connections through Slack, the process is very similar for LinkedIn.

Be yourself, personalize your messages, and show value above everything else.

When joining different Slack workspaces, in order to save your time, be sure to create different notification preferences, so you can be notified whenever something important shows up.

Getting the leads and relationships through Facebook

When it comes to B2B social media marketing, one of the best ways to kickass it through Facebook is over the Facebook groups.

Like for almost any other social media platforms, Facebook also requires from you a certain dose of personalization and the human element.

You can use Facebook group’s search to find relevant topics and threads where you can provide value to:

Also, to keep up with the trends and interesting topics, you can follow particular posts:

General Tips for creating B2B social media strategies

There are some general tips you should follow for almost all social media channels.

They will not just help you to take your marketing campaigns on the next level. They will also help you to reach out to more people and have better engagement. 

1. Always be yourself

This is a really important part of every online copy you’re creating. Don’t be generic. Be yourself. Show to other people that you're human, not robots.

Personalization became a very popular part of almost everything. It’s the same for B2B social media strategies too.Showcase your stories, experiences, case studies and share value. People will appreciate it.

2. Create “social advocacy” and “pods” inside your company

In Slack or any other communication tool you’re using, create a separate channel for upvoting, commenting and liking. Whenever you publish something new or release a new Quora answer, ask your employees and coworkers to upvote it or like it.

It’s a great way to boost your engagement. Remember, your team is your biggest asset.

3. Find one channel, and ace that first

Diversify only when you develop one social media channel. Don’t focus on so many things at the same time. The best way to develop your B2B social media strategies is when you nail one social media, and then you go to nail another one.

4. Schedule your social media campaigns

In this busy world, scheduling is everything. Algorithms appreciate if you’re posting continuously.

So, schedule your B2B social media campaigns and posts ahead. It will save you a lot of time.

The Bottom line

We can conclude that consumers don’t have a tendency to too much engage with brands online. That’s the reason why the new era of B2B social media marketing requires personalization and human elements.

Based on this, make sure that your next B2B social media campaigns have a certain dose of personality. Make sure that you’re going to share stories that will touch people’s hearts.

Your ultimate goal is to be on the top of the mind of your potential customers. So remember: Be personal and provide value.

About the Author

Aazar Ali Shad is the VP of Growth at Userpilot (a user onboarding tool), and has more than 5 years of SaaS Experience. He is currently helping 500+ SaaS companies improve user onboarding and increase product adoption.