Here now is a reprise the 4th most popular Exo B2B blog post in 2016. Enjoy!
We are helping one of our key clients re-evaluate their target audiences. We started by looking at their sales data. It soon became apparent that this did not answer all our questions. For example, what types of customers outside the 20% most profitable are most likely to become significant contributors in the coming years?
In B2B more often than in B2C, segmentation, or rather hyper-segmentation, is extremely important. I always repeat this mantra: a market is a group of buyers who consult one another when they make a buying decision. Segmenting, and hyper-segmenting, consists of identifying the elements that compose the characteristics, motivations and other criteria that help us identify a group of buyers, in order to facilitate the approach to one or more markets.
Let’s imagine who could be the buyers of accounting systems. We could start by saying that every company is. But that’s too wide a scope. Let’s be more specific, or even hyper-specific. Let’s imagine that these are companies who manage the installation and maintenance of heating and cooling systems, employ 5 to 15 people, and are located in Quebec and in Eastern Canada. These have one thing in common: they are independent companies with a part-time accounting employee. This represents a market in itself. Continue the exercise and regroup is necessary.
Segment with the help of your website
You can segment in different ways. Analyzing how people navigate your website is a good starting point. This may include the search words used to get there and the most popular pages. You can identify the path of visits to your site, by geographical origin or by ‘channel’, according to Google. This could lead you to concrete facts to include in your segmentation criteria.
Other ways
you can segment by
- Psychographic criteria
- By behavior by criteria related to the company (size of business, turnover, NAICS code). Don’t forget to consider the intended buyer and how they relate to the business or organization (role, department, employee status).
- By criteria related to the company (size of business, turnover, NAICS code).
Don’t forget to consider the intended buyer and how they relate to the business or organization (role, department, employee status).
Segmenting in B2B is a major step. The more accurately you segment, the more the marketing dollars invested will provide quality leads, and consequently, a better return on investment.
