A while back, some information came to my attention that just made me smile my evil marketer smile. It was something I had never really thought of before, but is a real no-brainer common sense move. I’m not going to name any names, because that’s not the point. Apparently this company has learned a way to make some bucks off of its competition. Let me explain how…

Company A owns a facility that receives goods from wholesalers and distributes to retail locations all around the US. This type of set up is pretty routine, as most retailers do this type of thing. However, instead of branding the facility with company A’s name, they use a generic company name for the facility… and then they run it like it’s own separate company. This means that the facility is free to accept orders from other locations that aren’t owned by company A, and may even be competing against their corporate masters. What? You may be thinking that it doesn’t sound very smart, but indeed it is.

If you’re doing business in a free economy then you will have competition. This comes in the form of direct competitors and indirect competitors. For example, if you make soda then you are competing against other soda companies, as well as the guys that produce juice, sports drinks, lemonade, tea, and other beverages. They all serve a similar purpose, and they are all competing for a similar market. Like my man Luke Skywalker says “you can profit by this or be destroyed.”

By providing the same service to your competition that you provide to your own company, you can capitalize on this competition and make some money off of them. If they don’t come to you, they will get it from somewhere so it’s not like you’re going to put them out of business by denying service. On top of all that, if the competition begins to rely heavily on your services, you can always pick a strategic time to cease services and kick them while they are down. Hahaha, there’s nothing like pulling the rug from under your competition just when they need you the most. Suckers!

I was going over some data at the marketing charts website and was kind of surprised to see a report stating that business to business companies don’t have much of a social media presence. I read the report, and it got me thinking. What could these companies accomplish with social media, and how should they use it to their advantage? It seems we (as marketers) focus alot on business to consumer social media marketing, especially when it comes to Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube, and maybe that’s the major problem. So I’d like to discuss some ways that business to business companies can use social media to their advantage. Let’s start by discussing…

Top barriers to social media for business to business companies

According to the report, there are 4 main reasons why b2b companies don’t focus as much on online marketing. Here we go…

1. Insufficient personnel to maintain - It’s not surprising that this is number 1. So many companies have downsized, and they are continuing to do so (HP just let go of a ton of people the other day). However, why do you need to hire more people to do this? Here’s what I think. I would solicit blog entries from employees and offer some sort of reward for entries that are picked. Wow, pretty simple. Every one of your employees should have a presence on LinkedIn. If not for the company, then for their own good. Encourage them to post and answer questions. Now you have a social media presence and you didn’t even have to hire anyone.
2. Lack of organizational knowledge - I’m not sure what they mean by “organizational” knowledge, but I think that if you don’t know something you need to go and figure it out. There are a ton of online resources to find out more about online marketing. There are tons of books out there. If you don’t have time to research them yourself, then pick a different career. To think, these guys call themselves marketers. You should always make time to educate yourself.
3. Preference for traditional marketing - Let me say something here (like you have a choice). I prefer traditional marketing. And yet, I still engage in online and social media marketing. Why? Because I see the advantages, and also because a marketer needs to use any and all weapons at his or her disposal. If you aren’t using social media, you’re leaving a big weapon in the armory collecting dust. There’s no reason for that.
4. Perceived irrelevance to their field - Bottom line: you have to go where your customers go. This is 2010, take a deep breath and say it with me now, twenty-ten, soon to be eleven. People go online to find information. When you go fishing, you probably go to the lake where there are tons of fish. Why is marketing any different. Sure you’re dealing with a company, but that company is made up of individuals. And individuals like to go online to educate themselves. If you have a presence online and provide relevant information, then those individuals will find you. That’s called marketing.

What can b2b companies do to take advantage of social media

1. Start a blog - We’ve talked about it before. People go online to find information. Provide useful information to people and they will find you (and your company). Provide information on all aspects of your industry and your business. Like I said before, solicit entries from your co-workers (you’ll be surprised at all of the great ideas and talent that you have on board). If you can become an industry expert, then you can’t help but increase your brand awareness… and your profits.
2. Get on LinkedIn - People go to Facebook to interact with friends, relax, and play games, and all that good stuff. People get on LinkedIn to interact with other professionals, and to learn. You and every one of your co-workers should have a presence on LinkedIn. You should spend time asking and answering questions, linking up with other professionals in your industry, and basically becoming a part of the community.
3. Be one of the few - The fact that not many b2b companies are using social media means that the ones that do are ahead of the game. Going back to the fishing analogy, if you’re the only one at the lake, you’re going to catch alot of fish. Get started, stop making excuses and do it. Your competition will hate you, but your customers and prospects will love you.

What do you guys think? How can b2b companies take advantage of social media? What other obstacles do they need to overcome?

Wise words from one of my favorite bands (Rage Against the Machine), “know your enemy”. In marketing, you are competing with other companies, and even industries (look at how movie theaters compete against DVD, and television) for scarce money. In order to succeed, you need to arm yourself with all the knowledge you can about your competition. You need to know their strengths, weaknesses and strategies, so that you can develop your plan to defeat them. Great, so you already knew that. But how do you go about obtaining this information? Here are some quick tips for you…

1. List your direct and indirect competitors. How are you going to learn about your competition if you don’t even know who they are? As one of my old mentors (and good friend, you know who you are) would say, “make a list”. Don’t forget to include both direct (companies that provide similar products or services to yours) and indirect competitors (companies that provide products or services different from your own that satisfy the same need).

2. Pay them a visit. After you have your list, you should visit your competitors website and learn what you can. Not only will you learn about their products and / or services, you will also learn how they are marketing themselves, what they think of their own brand, and you will be able to get an idea of which type of customers they are targeting. You can also learn about their history, and the officers of the company. If there is a trade show, visit them and find out all you can. If they have a store, go in and patronize them. Find out what you can up close and in person. It’s important to do this early so that you will get a fresh impression of what type of business they run.

3. Dig a little deeper. Visit www.hoovers.com and check out their financials. If they are a publicly traded company, then there are tons of sources to go to get additional information. Go to www.dnb.com and check out a credit report. Remember those officers you learned about in the previous step? Google them and find out more about them. This will let you know a little bit more about how decisions are made at this company.

4. Set a date to follow-up. Like all marketing, competitive analysis is a process not a project (we’ll probably discuss this in detail in a future post). This means that you need to set up a follow-up date in your calendar so that you can go through the process again, and find out what’s changed. If you’re dealing with professionals, then your competition is looking at you just like you’re looking at them, and they’ll react to whatever strategy you’ve chosen to take them down. Do yourself a favor and stay vigilant.

Once you know all about your competition, you can use this information to find out what you can do better or differently than them. Develop your strategy and watch the competition suffer. We’ll talk more about how to take these suckers out in the future.

Hey, I’m not an expert on competitive analysis, so if any of you readers have anything to share, let me know in the comments, or email me at edwardviator@evil-marketer.com