Getting started with B2B Digital Communications: 10 steps you can take TODAY to reach and grow your audience

In today’s uncertain landscape, online communications are vital in the B2B space for nurturing leads, building relationships, and maintaining a competitive edge in a digital-first business environment.

This is even more so given the increased digitisation of business ecosystems and the reliance on data-driven decision-making. As remote work and global collaborations become standard, effective digital tools and strategies are essential for maintaining connectivity & responsiveness.

With social platforms fragmenting and AI changing the quantity of content (as well as decreasing the quality!), there are more challenges – but for that reason, also a greater opportunity – for clued-in companies to reach their key audiences.

10 Steps To Get Started With B2B Digital Communications

I was very fortunate to host a webinar on B2B Digital Communications last week, which had CEO James McCobb of the fantastic new digital agency Radstone Group Ltd as our guest speaker. You can watch the session here.

In this video we go through 10 steps to get started with B2B Digital Communications, all of which you can also find below! So, without further ado, here they are.

1. Find Your Purpose

Start with the basics. To succeed, you need to articulate the purpose of your B2B digital communications in a single sentence and keep it by your side as a guiding light. This should reflect and complement your overall organisational vision but be tailored to the use of your online channels. It can also evolve over time, so look to review it regularly.

2. Define Your Audience

Create a basic persona to help define your target audience(s) – and yes, there may well be more than one audience to think about. Think investors, customers, potential partners, etc.

Who are your target audience(s)? Identify their digital habitats and choose the platforms to be on based on this. Similarly, define the basics of your B2B content strategy: engage, entertain/educate, and convert.

3. Digital Audit

Take a look and note down where you are currently. What are your current areas of strength and weakness? Knowing where you are is essential for determining where you want to go.

4. Strategise

At the beginning a communications strategy should be a concise and practical go-to guide – don’t get overwhelmed. Lay out your objectives, the way in which you can best get there (aka the strategy), the necessary actions that will be needed along the way, and what achievable and ambitious results shall represent sustainable success. Produce it as a practical go-to guide; you can add details and updates as you go along.

5. Make Your Website Your Digital Home

Your website should represent and complement who you are, as the most important part of your online presence. Having it as your hub is crucial since it is fully owned (as opposed to existing on social media platforms which exist on the whims of others), and thus can be the most fully realised version of who you are online – essential for wanting to attract investors, win customers, or achieve whatever else your priorities may be.

If you’re looking for some excellent examples of this, you can visit the Radstone Group website where they speak of how they helped position Global Infrastructure Partners as a leading infrastructure investor, and articulated energy transition facilities provider Haventus’s vision through impact-driven storytelling.

6. Be On The Right Platforms

Create compelling presences where your audience is most likely to engage. For B2B, LinkedIn and newsletters are usually the best additional platforms besides your website. However, as mentioned above, think about your audience, where they are, and how you can best represent your brand.

7. Set a Tone of Voice & Content Mix

Outline a basic Tone of Voice with 4/5 key values so that you speak consistently and in a way that reflects who you want to be as an organisation. Then, when it comes to content, think of 4/5 themes that may be of interest to your audience and the best formats for showing these off (visuals are increasingly key!).

8. Planning & Preparedness

Planning tools and content calendars increase efficiency. They provide visibility of what’s upcoming, allow you to plan appropriately for big events, and can include the capacity to react to relevant topical events. There are a variety of options based on budget, from the humble Excel spreadsheet to multi-featured tailored solutions.

Also, be prepared! Don’t ignore crisis communications. Start considering what may lurk around the corner, and sketch out plans to ensure you respond objectively rather than react emotionally, and can do so with key stakeholders involved at the right times.

9. Focus on Networking & Build Your Customer Database

Build strong online relationships with your partners and the wider industry. This can lead to referrals, partnerships, and new opportunities. Use Customer Relationship Management software to effectively facilitate client interactions and track leads better. Every time you speak to someone, it is a form of communication that can create opportunities, so be considerate and methodical.

10. Do It All Again (Measure and Optimise)

Put learnings into action, schedule regular analytics reports, surveys, and re-assessment sessions – ensure you have the time and resources to continually identify opportunities to evolve and grow. Plus, look to stay ahead of the curve! It’s fun to do, and can really pay off when you are one step ahead of the competition.

And Finally, Don’t Delay

Especially when it comes to strategies, there can be a tendency to take too long to get going, and to be overly theoretical rather than getting stuck into the nitty gritty.

That is why it is advisable to get started with these steps today and begin putting them into action as you go along. Start building out as you get the infrastructure in place, and use learnings along the way to inform the path you take. In what feels like no time, you will better understand your organisation’s voice – as will your audience – and how you can achieve your goals.