What's all the buzz about? It's about spreading product information person-to-person. A marketing campaign to generate buzz can be much more effective than traditional promotion techniques since customers view conversations with their peers as being more credible. The advent of social networks has amplified the buzz about buzz marketing. But there have been comparatively few examples of successful buzz campaigns for products and services sold to business. So should you invest in a buzz marketing campaign if your company fits the B2B model?
At a recent Product Strategy Network forum, Saman Haqqi, the Vice President of Marketing of Landslide Technologies, makers of software for sales professionals, explained how buzz marketing can be applied effectively to the world of business products as well.
Set expectations. Buzz generation requires networks of people who share common interests. However in B2B markets, these networks are generally much smaller than in a B2C environment. And besides, most people don't find most business products to be inherently interesting or worthy of conversation. B2B products typically are purchased by committees and often lack the emotional or impulse buying characteristics found in consumer markets. However you can still get buzz in B2B markets and generate interest, credibility, and value for your company. But, it's just not as likely to go viral.
Know your audience. Are they well-networked? Do they have ample opportunity to interact with each other? Has viral marketing occurred with that audience before? What do they read? Where do they congregate? Buzz marketing can only work if there are already social, business, or professional networks of people available to spread the message among their members. For example, technology products that are relevant for IT buyers and engineers are often well-suited to buzz campaigns since they tend to use social networks, communities, and other resources to interact and collaborate with their peers. Landslide recognized that its targeted customers - salespeople - don't read blogs or visit online communities. But they do tend to read self-help books. So Landslide partnered with a well-known author of books about sales through which they would buy and give away copies of the books in exchange for the author's encouraging his readers to view a demonstration of Landslide's software.
Buzz marketing for B2B is more about ideas than budget. Creative ideas based on an understanding of what will interest people and get them talking goes much farther than spending lots of money on extravagant campaigns and agencies.
Dare to be different. If your product features a unique technology, a novel approach to getting work done, or an innovative business model that can excite or surprise your customers, you have the currency necessary for building buzz around your product. For me-too products, buzz marketing campaigns usually center around creating attention for the campaign itself, which in turn can build awareness for the company and its products. Landslide discovered that its VIP service - a virtual assistant for salespeople - created a lot of buzz in its target market.
Give people a reason to talk about your product. It can be something that's unique, surprising, funny, remarkable, or secret. People like to have something new and interesting to talk about when meeting and/or talking with other people in their networks.
Get comfortable with uncertainty and loss of control. Buzz marketing is a trial-and-error process, often requiring several attempts before one hits the mark. Accept the fact that you can't control how people are going to react to your campaign idea.
Take a long-term view. Effective B2B buzz marketing tends to reflect the cumulative results of a collection of small events rather than of one high-profile episode. Use a combination of tactics over time; don't put everything into one basket.
Make it possible for customers to talk about it. Buzz marketing is about facilitating the sharing of opinions among customers by providing the forums, tools, and encouragement for those conversations to take place. Create environments that enable happy customers to talk to one another as well as to others who are not currently in the franchise.
Deliver. Make sure the product or service can deliver on the substance of a buzz campaign. Where a product fails to support the buzz around it, the company and your product can be hurt.
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