Heads or tails? This is not exactly how you decide whether social media is important for your B2B SaaS business or not. In fact, there isn’tmuch room for a question here. If you are of the notion that social media marketing is only meant for B2C businesses, B2B social media will be outright boring, then I’d love to know what you think by the time you finish reading this.

Before we dive into what social media can do for businesses, and why you need it, let’s look at what the numbers have to say.

• According to IDG, social media influences 84% of C-level and VP-level buyers. 55% B2B buyers mentioned that they look for information on social media before making a purchase decision.
  

• 83% of marketers use social media for their B2B businesses and 66% of them drove new leads through social media.
  

• 76% of B2B tech companies are using social media to drive results.
  

Articulate has done a great job in curating all these insights on social media. You can check it out here

Brand Awareness

The chances of your brand getting lost in this pretty world are (unfortunately), a little too high. But (fortunately), there are ways you can stand out from the crowd. Before you ask me how, there is something you need to understand in the first place.  B2B or B2C, you are talking to humans. Actual humans with real feelings and emotions. 

So it’s important to tell your audience(those fantastic humans)who you are and what value you bring to the table. How do you do that? That is where social media comes into play. With social media, you don’t have to go in search of them. You get a chance to build a connection with your audience and talk to them just exactly where they are and where they spend their time.

Lead generation

Trust me or not, marketers are ready to go above and beyond to generate quality leads all the time. B2B sales cycle being longer in itself, getting qualified leads and keeping them engaged throughout the cycle is very crucial. 

Social media can lift your burden here by identifying the people that are interested in your business, targeting them with the relevant content, engaging them and converting them to paying customers. Interestingly, social media can help you with Lead nurturing as well. 

SEO Link building

How much effort you put in creating amazing content for your audience, is not complete until you build links for your website to start ranking better on search engines. At the same time, you cannot expect anyone you reach out to give a link from their website. Then how do we go about it? Link building is all about relationship building. And social media is the right place where you can build those relationships. You find the right people, start conversations, build credible relationships, and gain backlinks.

Do you still wonder how social media can help you with link building?

You can use social media for link prospecting, as a platform to carry out outreach, content ideation, and content promotion. 

Drive traffic to your website

What’s the point if your content is not reaching the right people? All efforts will go in vain if you are not able to take them to the relevant audience. With more than 57% of the global population using social media, you get a chance to create and offer valuable content right where they are.

However, you need to keep in mind that with so much noise on social media, it is important to create engaging, helpful content to stay on top of your game.

Coming back, social media acts as a great source to drive traffic to your website. You can smartly repurpose content on the website, distribute it on social media and get the right audience visiting your website.

Social proof

Blowing one’s own trumpet is not always a bad idea. In fact, you should do that to build trust and leadership in your industry. Social proof, more than just a marketing strategy, has a lot to do more with human psychology. Social media is a great platform to showcase that. From reviews from existing customers to testimonials, media coverage, and User-generated content, anyone looking at your social channel should be influenced and able to understand how your business is one of the best players in the industry.

In this article, we discussed how social media can help you boost your B2B marketing efforts. Social media for B2B business is not a waste of time. When done well, social media can help you with more than just what’s discussed here. Are you new to B2B social media?

Learn about how to build social media strategies for your B2B business from scratch.