How can we make the work activities of our business audience better, faster, and easier through mobile?
With more than half the planet currently owning mobile devices, and businesses well on board the anytime/anywhere mobile communications medium, the above question serves as a guide for B2B marketers working to develop their mobile-marketing strategies.
Whether the goal is to generate leads through a new medium or to retain customers with new benefits, mobile presents B2Bs with a remarkable new inroad to their business audiences. But to win the favor of busy professionals, B2B marketers must heed the call of "better, faster, easier."
Unlike B2C marketers who wield novel approaches to engage consumers, business audiences are driven by efficiency over entertainment. Whereas consumers have time to spare, professionals never have enough of it. And whereas consumers set their own priorities, professionals are accountable to their bosses and their priorities are determined by the organization's bottom line.
Let's take a look at some examples of how marketers can deliver on the B2B mobile imperatives of "better, faster, and easier."
Better: How can we make experiences better for our business audience through mobile?
There's no science that can predict exactly when business audiences will find themselves in the purchasing cycle, or via which medium they will cull information and evaluate among alternatives.
But just as marketers optimize their content across print and online channels to ensure they never miss a purchase opportunity, they should also optimize for mobile environments. After all, mobile is the one device that professionals always have within their reach.
A common misconception by marketers is that "Web-enabled is mobile-optimized." But when reviewing most corporate websites on mobile devices, what is most striking is not the vast amount of options available to users but the level of difficulty in trying to navigate through them on small handheld screens, especially B2B content that is often technical, complex, and lengthy.
A better experience for business professionals is for B2Bs to optimize their important content for smaller screens. And that applies to not only websites but also other content, such as articles, whitepapers, email newsletters, case studies, and product demos.
For examples, B2Bs might create slimmed-down websites for the mobile Web; develop shorter, mobile-friendly versions of longer thought-leadership pieces and email newsletters; and produce quick video case studies in addition to the longer, more technical text formats available at websites.
Remember, not only your products and services but also the mobile experience you provide must be better than your competitors'.
Faster: How can we make tasks and communications faster for our business audience through mobile?
To succeed in the frenetic, ever-evolving business marketplace, professionals must remain current on industry developments.
And professionals competing in today's fierce climate can't afford the loss of time—and, ergo, opportunity—spent in having to seek out information. Conversely, they need information routed to them at the precise time that developments break.
The drastic change from professionals' having to search for information to having it delivered directly to them has been fueled by innovations in interactive media (e.g., subscription email lists) and social media (e.g., RSS feeds).
But not all professionals have smartphones as their mobile devices and thus cannot remotely access their emails and feed readers. Moreover, the information delivered to professionals' inboxes isn't always of a pressing nature, nor is it as immediate as simple text-messaging.
A faster approach, and one that serves to initiate new dialogues between B2Bs and their business audiences, is to send time-sensitive information via short message service (SMS) alerts.
Depending on what is of immediate interest to your particular business audience, the content can be sectorwide, function-specific, or competitive-focused.
But a strong caveat is in order: Marketers should be very disciplined in determining which content to forward and how often SMS is merited over other types of communications media.
Remember that even though SMS campaigns are 100% opt-in and professionals rely on information that is relevant to their industry, they don't need their busy days interrupted with SMS sales pitches.
Easier: How can we make activities easier for our business audience through mobile?
At a time when technology has made it easier for professionals to streamline many business tasks, perhaps the most striking irony is that professionals are now tasked with far more to accomplish, and in less time.
Though business professionals are smart and savvy, what they seek above all else is more simplicity. (They contend with enough complexity in their daily routines.)
B2Bs that make work-related activities easier for business audiences endear those audiences to their brands and are afforded many creative mobile approaches to that end.
For example, if your B2B company targets sales professionals, developing a location-based mobile service around organizing and mapping business appointments can go a long way in simplifying their hectic schedules.
Alternatively, providing attendees at industry events with a mobile application that helps them navigate through the various trade-show exhibits and speaking sessions can make getting the most out of their experience much easier.
Even a seemingly simple app that helps jet-setting executives keep track of expense receipts accrued during their business trips can win big points with busy professionals.
* * *
Whether they use a widget, app, mobile website, location-enabled service, stream of SMS alerts, or other approach, marketers have a wide range of ways to support their mobile strategies.
But the B2B marketers who deliver on the marching orders of "better, faster, and easier" will claim the most success with these new media because they've focused on solving problems and producing benefits for the very audiences they want to court, and keep.
