Complete Guide to B2B Influencer Marketing

In a world where consumers are becoming increasingly skeptical of brand messaging, influencer marketing offers a refreshing alternative, the alternative that is not only reserved for B2C brands. Yes — influencers can promote complex B2B software or consulting services (not just make-up and clothes).

So what is B2B influencer marketing, why you should get interested, and what are the steps to introducing a successful campaign?

In this comprehensive guide to B2B influencer marketing, we’ll explore the ins and outs of this strategy. Next, we will show you an easier way to manage your campaign using a comprehensive tool for B2B influencer marketing so that you can launch and measure your influencer campaigns faster and easier.

What is B2B influencer marketing?

At its core, B2B influencer marketing is a strategy that means partnering with industry experts and thought leaders to promote your brand’s products or services to your target audience. These influencers have a strong following in your industry, and by working with them, you can leverage their influence to increase brand awareness, drive traffic, and generate leads.

Why is B2B influencer marketing important?

Now you must consider how B2B influencer campaigns can translate into your ROI.

There are several reasons why B2B influencer marketing can significantly boost your bottom line. Here are the key ones you should know before you introduce any type of influencer campaign:

1. Trust and Credibility: Influencers have built trust and credibility with their followers through years of hard work and expertise. By partnering with them, you can leverage this trust to build credibility for your brand.
2. Targeted Reach: Influencers have a highly targeted audience, meaning you can reach the right people with your marketing message.
3. Cost-Effective: Unlike traditional marketing methods, B2B influencer marketing can be a bang for your buck to reach your target audience.
4. Increased Engagement: Influencers have an engaged following, meaning your marketing message is more likely to be seen and acted upon.

B2B Influencer Marketing Strategies

Now that we’ve established the importance of B2B influencer marketing, it’s time to explore creating a successful campaign and deliver actionable employee training on influencer marketing in your team. In this section, we’ll look at the critical components of a winning B2B influencer marketing campaign, from identifying the right influencers to crafting compelling content and getting your team to introduce the campaign. So, grab a notebook and a pencil, and let’s get started!

1. Define your Goals and Objectives

Before you begin your influencer marketing campaign, defining your goals and objectives is essential. What would you like to achieve through your campaign? Is it increased brand awareness, more leads, or higher conversion rates? Once you’ve defined your goals, you can work with your influencer to create a campaign that aligns with your objectives.

2. Identify the Right Influencers

The success of your campaign is tied to partnering with the right influencers. When identifying potential influencers, consider their reach, engagement rate, and alignment with your brand’s values and goals. Don’t just focus on the number of followers; look for influencers with a highly engaged and targeted audience. Use TrendHERO to dive into over 100 million influencer lists and check their followers’ credibility.

Identify the best influencers with credible following

3. Build Strong Relationships

Once you’ve identified the right influencers, building solid relationships with them is essential. Reach out to them and introduce yourself and your brand. Show that you value their expertise and are interested in collaborating with them. Building a solid relationship with your influencer is critical to creating a successful campaign.

4. Create Compelling Content

Once you’ve built a relationship with your influencer, it’s time to create compelling content. Your content should be authentic, engaging, and relevant to your target audience. Work with your influencer to create content that aligns with your brand’s values and resonates with their followers.

5. Promote Your Campaign

Once your content is created, it’s time to promote your campaign. Share your content on your social media channels, website, and email marketing campaigns. Encourage your influencer to share your content with their followers as well.

6. Measure and Analyze Results

Finally, it’s essential to measure and analyze the results of your campaign. This will help you understand what worked well and what areas need improvement. Use analytics tools to track metrics such as engagement rates, click-through rates, and conversion rates.

With trendHERO’s analytics dashboard, you can build in-depth reports, access over 90 metrics, and check post engagement with just a few clicks.

This data will help you optimize your future campaigns and ensure continued success.

B2B influencer marketing examples

While you must be thinking of influencer campaigns as Instagram posts where influencers apply a magic cream and encourage you to buy it, there is much more to it in B2B campaigns. Influencer marketing has become one of top B2B ecommerce trends that helps generate a significant ROI uplift with the help of industry leaders and experts. So what are the examples of successful B2B influencer campaigns? Here are just a few you should know.

1. Microsoft

Microsoft has executed several remarkable B2B influencer marketing campaigns in recent years. In one of them, Microsoft aimed to showcase and encourage more girls to pursue careers in STEM by promoting women in the field. They collaborated with National Geographic photographers to highlight the stories of women scientists and their experiences.

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As a result, the message reached over 91 million people.

Apart from this campaign, Microsoft has also collaborated with some impressive micro and macro-influencers in adventure photography on Instagram as part of their marketing efforts. They featured a team of skilled rowers who completed a challenging journey across the Onon River in North Mongolia and rowed the length of the Amur River. The team set up cameras at several checkpoints to capture the changing characteristics of the river as they progressed down the river.

The campaign’s results were extraordinary, receiving 3.5 million likes daily and reaching 91 million people.

2. SAP

The SAPPHIRE NOW conference is a prominent annual business and technology conference that draws thousands of attendees worldwide.

The SAP’s influencer campaign involved inviting influential industry leaders to participate as keynote speakers in their live video chats. The videos included interviews with these influencers, who shared their knowledge and skills on relevant topics related to the conference.

This approach allowed viewers to participate in the event from the comfort of their homes, enabling them to ask questions and receive responses from leading experts.

The campaign was a huge success, with a total of 80,000 viewers.

3. TopRank Marketing

TopRank Marketing, a leader in B2B marketing, tops the list of successful influencer marketing campaigns. The agency aimed to produce high-value eBooks on content marketing to share with their audience and achieved this by partnering with influential experts from reputable brands such as Facebook, Copyblogger, and LinkedIn.

These experts provided their expert insights, which were converted into four eBooks, creating a wealth of resources on content marketing. The eBooks received over 200,000 views and generated over 4,000 downloads, resulting in over 1,000 leads. TopRank Marketing successfully gained significant attention and numerous leads by collaborating with influencers to create high-value content.

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4. Okta

Okta, a company specializing in identity and device management, expertly demonstrated how powerful customer content marketing can be by inviting its clients to share their experiences with the brand. Okta then published these stories, showcasing how their services helped clients work more efficiently.

Influential clients such as News Corp, Adobe, and 20th Century Fox were featured on their landing pages, along with relevant media such as statistics, videos, quotes, and blog posts. According to our experts, this campaign was highly influential in using client testimonials to influence potential customers.

5. Cisco

Cisco, a renowned technology leader in networking and communication, has found success with its B2B influencer marketing campaign, the Cisco Champions Program.

They have established a community of IT experts called “Cisco Champions” who help promote their products on social media platforms. In return, these advocates receive exclusive access to events and recognition from Cisco.

One way they started the conversation was with #CiscoChat on Twitter. They also created unplugged videos with their champions and featured them in the company’s weekly podcasts, allowing them to share their expertise and enhance their skills. Cisco’s B2B influencer marketing campaign has been highly successful, generating a substantial amount of promotional content. The campaign resulted in over 55,000 tweets and numerous blog posts, receiving over 44,000 hits and 8,000 mentions on social media.

Wrapping up

Building solid relationships with industry leaders and customers is essential for the success of your B2B influencer marketing campaign. Incentivizing these actors and keeping open communication with them are effective B2B influencer marketing strategies.

Setting clear goals for your campaign and working towards achieving them is crucial. Remember, with the right approach, B2B influencer marketing can be a game-changer for your business. So, don’t hesitate to launch your campaign — over to you.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What is B2B influencer marketing?
   B2B influencer marketing is a marketing strategy that involves partnering with industry experts or thought leaders to promote a brand’s products or services to their audience. These influencers have established credibility in their industry and have a loyal following, allowing them to promote a brand more authentically and reliably.
2. How does B2B influencer marketing differ from B2C influencer marketing?
   B2B influencer marketing differs from B2C influencer marketing in critical ways. Firstly, B2B influencers are industry experts or thought leaders, while B2C influencers are often social media personalities with large followings. Additionally, B2B influencer marketing usually involves longer sales cycles and more complex buying decisions than B2C influencer marketing.
3. How do I find the right B2B influencers to partner with?
   When looking for B2B influencers to partner with, it’s essential to consider factors such as relevance to your industry, reach and engagement rates, and overall reputation and credibility. You can use tools like trendHERO to help you identify potential influencers to partner with.