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The most important difference between B2B and B2C marketing
The most important difference between B2B and B2C marketing
The most important difference between B2B and B2C marketing
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Marketing Differences Paper: B2b vs. B2c
In two distinct e-commerce business types, Business-to-business (B2B) and Business-to-Consumer (B2C), there are many differences in the way they operate. Specifically in marketing, differences include how the marketing is driven and the values of the strategies, the size of the target market and length of the sales cycle, and even the buying patterns of the target consumers. Each of these differences will be better defined and explained in the following paragraphs.
Drive and Strategy Values
Business-to-Business
Business-to-business companies are relationship driven. They are offering another company a product or service that the company should use to their benefit, and in order to sell this product or service, they have to build a strong, working relationship between the two businesses. B2B companies have to maximize the values of the marketing strategy: relationships and trust. In order to be successful, these two businesses must be able to trust each other, work together, and form a working relationship that will benefit both businesses in the end.
Business-to-Consumer
In contrast, B2C companies are product driven. These products have to be highly in demand to the consumer market, and in order to be successful these companies have to sell the product or service in high volumes to make a profit. Therefore, the relationship between the company and the consumer is not nearly as maintained as that of a B2B company. The value of this marketing strategy is the transaction- as many as possible to cover the costs and make a profit. In a similar fashion, however, there is also the value of trust, as a consumer that trusts the company or the brand will often assist the company in increasing transactions (Murphy, 2008).
Target Market and Sales Cycle
Business-to-Business
In business-to-business companies, the company is seeking out a smaller, focused target market. B2B companies usually offer something to other businesses that help another company to increase productivity or offer another benefit that the company will need. Therefore, the company must target a smaller group of companies that will have a demand for this product. The target market can increase after some level of success has been achieved. However, because of the focus on relationships throughout the marketing strategy, smaller target markets are easier to approach and to continue building and nurturing that business relationship.
Also due to the value of the business relationship, the transaction cycle is often longer than that of a B2C company. Communication between the two businesses will start slowly, building up trust and demand for the product or service on offer.
Although relationship customers also use the BAS system, it is more valuable for transactional customers. Since transactional customers emphasize more on quick delivery and low prices, but less on relationships, A/S focuses its efforts with the BAS system on providing the transactional customers with these values.
Although the goal of B2B marketing is to convert prospects into customers, the process is longer and more involved. A B2B company needs to focus on relationship building and communication using marketing activities that generate leads that can be nurtured during the sales cycle. B2B companies use marketing to educate various players in the target audience because the decision to purchase is usually a multi-step process involving more than one person. For example, the goal of an email campaign for B2B is to drive prospects to the web to learn about your products and services.
Developing healthy associations with suppliers, distributors, accomplices and customers Marketing Strategy and
Relationship Marketing Many companies focus on building relationships with their customers instead of always exclusive trying to sell them something (transactional marketing). Customers who love your brand more will also spend more money with your brand. Many traditional retailers have found this to be true. Walgreens has seen that customers who buy from all of their purchasing channels (store, web, mobile, etc.) buy up to six times more than the average customer that only buys in their store.
In the other hand, the appropriate marketing strategy to reach corporate buyers are different. This is because corporate buyers involving large contracts, larger compared with small businesses and individuals, and often longer-term. There are other methods can be use to reach corporate buyers;
Second, B2B Customers finds it more comfortable in purchasing and collaborating through remotely, they use the web to search for the product information and communicate with sellers through E-mail, social media, telephonically.
In marketing, there are two ways of selling products to consumers. One is the mass marketing or undifferentiated marketing, and the other is target marketing or differentiated marketing. The former is the traditional way of reaching out consumers by selling all of them the same products. The latter is the contemporary way of connecting with the consumers whereby companies choose select groups of people or organizations to sell to. Target marketing is the trend nowadays in selling products in which companies are creating customized sales approaches for every group of buyers.
Business-to-Business (B2B) is a great trading concept that involves all Internet-based solutions that facilitate and accommodate building new business relationships between companies worldwide. B2B could be interchanged with Ecommerce, e-market, or e-business.
Buyer-supplier relationship established since human beings started to trade goods and services. The relationship developed naturally over time after buyer and supplier developed trust and friendship which was supported by quality of product and services (Wilson. D.T, 1995). The relational development is accelerated as firms attempt to improve their relationship to achieve company goals. At the same time, the expectations in the performance have increased, and this has making the satisfactory relationship became more difficult.
Relationship marketing is a part of the marketing concept and strongly applies to this article. A company wants to build trust with its customers in order to build customer loyalty and a long-term bond. This gives the customer a value-added feature of doing business with a particular company. In marketing orientated companies, the customer's needs have to be targeted and different social classes or issues need to be taken into account. If a company does not take different sensitive and social groups into account when marketing, then they will not build a feeling of goodwill with the consumers. The consumer will think that the firm cares more about selling its goods than the consumer.
The report also talks about the differences between, advantages and disadvantages of e-business and e-commerce. Recommendations and advice have been given in the end for businesses intending to adopt an e-business dimension.
Business to Business (B2B) is a transaction which occurs between two companies, that is to say, the consumer is not involved in the transaction of a company. The term may also refer to the total information of the company that provides goods or services to another company (Investor Words, not dated).
The types of relationships a company has with its clients help strengthen customer relationships. The target market of people a company aims to reach are customer segments. Value propositions can be defined as the quality of products or services that a company has in order to reach a specific target market. Key resources are resources that a given company can use to offer and create quality products for their consumers. Revenue streams are monies a company renders from its customers. Key activities are steps required by a company to operate successfully. Key partnerships are one of the driving forces to making the business model work. Lastly, the cost structure describes the costs incurred to operate a business model (Osterwalder & Pigneur,
Gummesson (2004) describes CRM as "the values and strategies of relationship marketing with particular emphasis on customer relationships- turned into a practical application." CRM has become a necessity to successfully and profitability manage customers and a firm’s relationship with them, with the market reaching a value of approximately $11.5 billion in 2002. (Xu et al. 2002). However, despite this large spending it is estimated that 70% of CRM implementations fail. (Xu et al. 2002). There are a number of reasons for these failures, such as a failure to implement it throughout the organisation and resistance from employees. But in some cases the buyer-seller relationship does not merit a collaborative-style relationship; the customer may only require a transactional relationship. It is because of this reason than I believe that CRM does not always have to constitute the heart of B2B marketing.
Business to Business Application is the relationship between to businesses or companies. It is used to perform financial and commercial transactions over...