7 B2B SEO Tips That Work Every Time for 2020

Many B2B marketing strategies fail to recognize the importance of SEO despite its proven track record, especially in 2020. Are you making this mistake in your company's marketing strategy? If so, then it's time to refocus on B2B SEO and watch your traffic and leads skyrocket.

With seven actionable steps, you can turn your marketing from humdrum to highly effective. Read on to learn more about how and why you need to make SEO for business the linchpin of your marketing efforts.

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1) Define Your Goals & Strategies

Before delving into a new marketing strategy, start by assessing your goals and how you're going to reach them. If you don't have clear, definable expectations, it will be difficult to measure the effectiveness of your marketing strategies. So, get specific!

These goals also need to be actionable. Only then can you and your team strive to execute them well. So, don't settle for a goal like, “We want more traffic” or “We want more leads.”

Write down projections of where you'd like to rank and how you're going to get there. Remember that traffic and leads represent but a few important goals for your business. Also, strive to engage with prospects and develop ways to measure the success of those engagements.

Work on customer experience to ensure that when prospects visit your site, blog, or landing page, they remain impressed by your unique branding and web presence. Pay particular attention to:

• Creating strong, compelling headlines
• Eliminating distractions (especially on landing pages)
• Keeping copy simple and conversational
• Asking for information that's relevant to lead generation
• Avoiding jargon or overly formal language that could turn customers away

Making sure that you've checked each item on the list above will guarantee that prospects engage with your site and blog and come back for more. You'll also harness an effective way to learn about prospects and customers, a crucial component of successful marketing.

2) Understand Your Audience

Among the most crucial aspects of B2B marketing remains knowing your customer inside and out. But, this comes with unique challenges in the B2B sphere. Questions you might ask include:

• What does your average customer look like in terms of their industry focus and size?
• Which concerns and questions keep them up at night?
• How can you meet their needs while providing them with an individualized customer experience?

To get more acquainted with your customers, start by reviewing your CRM. It should tell you where each of your customers is located, how many employees they have, and what technologies they rely on. To delve even more deeply into your customer's needs, hopes, and fears, get a copy of your firmographics.

Like demographics for B2C companies, firmographics help B2B companies better understand their customers. They provide information on annual company revenue, purchase size, sales cycle, acquisition cost, and much more. These statistics will give you a clear sense of who your customers are and which problems they'd like you to help them solve.

Firmographics also help you identify and understand what's unique about the companies you work with in terms of their industry positioning and the roles of their decision-makers. Firmographics should help you answer questions such as:

• Which companies buy from you?
• Which industries do they belong to?
• Are they clustered in specific industries?
• What role does the decision maker play in this company?

Once you know what makes your customers tick and what keeps them up at night, you'll create customer-centric content they want to read. When they sense that you not only understand them but care, your leads will climb like crazy. According to Forbes, “The better you understand [firmographics], the better your targeting and engagement strategy plans can be.”

3) Focus on the Big Five

Find five search terms relevant to your B2B SEO strategy. These terms need to each generate more than 1,000 searches per month. You can use Google's Keyword Planner for limited searches, one element of the AdWords toolset.

Or, if you want a full suite of search term research tools, opt for SEMRush, one of the best on the market. You'll pay for it, though.

After you've nailed down your top five search terms, use them strategically as primary keywords in blog posts. When it comes to the “Big Five,” placement is everything. Pick one to focus on at a time and make sure it is located in your title, intro, one H1 header, and your conclusion.

To accommodate the latest version of Google's algorithm, find some secondary keywords related to your primary one, and sprinkle them naturally throughout your article. Whatever you do, don't stuff your content with awkwardly placed, repetitious search terms. Not only will it annoy your readers, but Google might just ding you for keyword stuffing.

While you're at it, make sure you target local SEO business in your marketing efforts. After all, the lion's share of your customers should be coming from your website. It only makes sense to target the low hanging fruit in your own neck of the woods.

4) Long-Form Content Rocks

What the heck is long-form content, and why is it important to your SEO business marketing strategies? Long-form content refers to blog posts measuring a minimum of 1,200 to 1,500 words in length.

Long-form content appears counterintuitive at first. After all, the short attention span of today's digital reader thirsts for short snippets of information, right? Not necessarily. According to Search Engine Land, “Many are now realizing that the inevitable ‘death' of long-form content was greatly exaggerated, and digital marketers are discovering that long-form content is extremely valuable for both users and search engines alike.”

Why? Well-written, useful, relevant long-form content gives your website an added air of authority. It also bodes well with Google search engines.

After all, Google's ultimate goal is to connect users with the most useful, authoritative site on a given topic. In-depth articles that thoroughly discuss a given topic will rank higher than shorter, more superficial treatments of a subject.

Perhaps Pandu Nayak, creator of the Panda algorithm and technical staff at Google, said it best: “Users often turn to Google to answer a quick question, but research suggests that up to 10% of users' daily information needs involve learning about a broad topic. That's why we're introducing new search results to help users find in-depth articles.”

5) Organize Your Content in Segments

You've, no doubt, already segmented out your email marketing lists. But have you done the same for your online content? If not, it's time to throw your customers a bone and put the content they need right at their fingertips.

This feeds back into an idea we've already tossed around about providing your readers with an excellent customer experience. If your content is easy-to-find and relevant, it'll let your customers know that you mean business. You're organized, and you know how to provide convenience to those who buy from you.

In order to make this work, define several segments that you'd like to target. Then, write content around each of those topics. Remember to use your “Big Five” search terms associated with each segment.

Then, organize your blog posts by categories and tags to make them easy for your customers to access. This will also make sending out segmented emails about your latest blog posts a cinch. This brings us to the next point…

6) Use Email to Promote Your Blog

Don't think that just because you're busy focusing on your company blog you can let the email side of things vaporize. Email remains far too valuable to brush aside. Just think about these stats if you don't believe me.

B2B email marketing boasts a 47 percent higher click-through rate (CTR) than similar B2C efforts. For every dollar spent on an email marketing campaign, you'll see on average a return on investment of $38. Email marketing nurtures leads, keeps your company top of mind, and produces more sales-ready leads.

So, make sure that you're sending out regular email messages that contain links to your recent blog posts. Provide some commentary about the posts and the latest company news at the beginning of each email. Make sure that your segmented emails align with your segmented content.

7) Position Yourself as an Authority

When you're ready to take the next step, position yourself as an authority in your industry and niche. This tactic requires careful planning and execution. But when done right, you'll be amazed by the results.

You're probably already doing some of the things that position you as a thought leader. These include maintaining a blog where you demonstrate your expertise. Besides posting regularly to your own blog, you'll also want to guest post on other people's blogs, hence building a larger audience.

Consider working with non-competitor influencers to further build your brand. Think of them as brand ambassadors. They can help you grow your audience quickly by lending their stamp of approval to your blog and company.

Visibility is key as you try to build your authority. Remain present and engaged at conferences and trade shows. Interact with others, particularly prospects and customers that line up with your company's firmographics.

Besides physical presence, you need to have a digital presence anywhere that your customers are online. So, get prepared to publish on LinkedIn, Pinterest, Podcast, YouTube, and wherever else your customers hang out.

Becoming a thought leader in your industry takes time, and it will most likely require marketing yourself apart from your brand. But it comes with huge rewards.

Perhaps you're not ready to take the full plunge yet. Regardless, it's important you be aware of this potential B2B marketing strategy.

That way, you can start making decisions to position yourself now, whether or not you're ready to take the full plunge. After you dip your toes in the water, you might just find you like your new position of authority. Just remember, as an industry thought leader you need to be accessible, ready to answer questions, and active online.

B2B SEO Strategy

When it comes to SEO strategy, many B2B companies lag behind the times. They prefer to rely on traditional means of marketing such as word of mouth. But to quote the Bard, “The times they are a-changin'.”

If you want to survive and thrive in the current digital landscape, you need to make SEO the priority. That said, it may take a little time before you start to fully reap the benefits.

But once you do, you'll wonder why you waited so long to jump into a committed relationship with SEO. Just remember, there's far more to an effective SEO strategy than keyword-stuffed 250-word blog posts. In fact, if you've read up to this point then you know that's about the worst thing you can do for your search rankings.

Seven Surefire Tips for B2B SEO Success

Follow the seven sure-fire tips above to ignite your online marketing efforts. Start by defining clear and actionable goals and the strategies you'll use to reach them. Then, spend a little time getting to know your target audience segments better.

Once you've learned your customers backward and forwards, do a little research to find five big-yield search terms to focus your marketing efforts around. Each of your audience segments should be associated with at least one of these terms, and they should each bring in a minimum of 1,000 searches per month. Then, use our recipe for keyword placement to ensure that Google's new Panda algorithm likes your blog.

Now that you've got your five keyword phrases, create long-form content that demonstrates your authority to your audience (and Google)! These should be in-depth articles filled with useful, relevant information. Remember that you're building trust with your readership through this content, so leave the slick salesman or dry jargon at the door.

Aim for a conversational tone that's warm and informal… business casual, you might say. Organize your content by segments, and send out an email about the latest and greatest blog posts and happenings at your company once a week. Finally, start thinking about the steps you can take now to position yourself as an industry authority later.

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We're Here to Help

How's your current B2B SEO marketing strategy working? If it's more fizzle than sizzle, then it may be time to revamp how you're approaching digital marketing.

At Marketing by Kevin, we're here to help you rock the SEO game. Contact us today to learn more about how we can assist you in leveraging your presence.