B2B marketers need to embrace online search

Search is a key area in which B2B marketers are falling behind their B2C counterparts. Despite the huge growth in online advertising, business is not harnessing the internet to build brand awareness or drive product education. In fact, according to the IAB only 39% of businesses are using display advertising and less than 39% make use of online classifieds.

And these figures deteriorate further when we look at less frequently used online advertising media. If we take affiliate marketing, 67% of affiliates promote B2C merchants, 29% promote both B2C and B2B but only 4% promote B2B advertisers only (source E-consultancy, January 2007).

Why is this?

There are a number of factors. Firstly it’s a direct reflection of the lack of significant B2B-only properties & audiences in the space. However, despite the enormous size of the market, vertical B2B websites are only just starting to spring up.

Secondly there is the feeling that media planners and buyers lack awareness of these properties when planning online strategies.













[Source: E consultancy / Convera, Nov 2007]


Of course, some business sectors have been well represented in the online advertising space for some time – Technology being the obvious example.

And it is, perhaps naturally, in this sector where companies are pioneering. Take Second Life for example. Within the B2C space many brands have used Second Life less as a means of targeting specific audiences and more as a way of generating PR.

However, IBM’s large presence in Second Life has evolved into a real sales channel. Last year it opened a “virtual business centre” in Second Life, staffed by IBM sales personnel from around the world.

Clients looking to purchase hardware, software or simply get support in solving a business problem can actually meet with IBM sales personnel within the virtual business centre. The IBM avatar can interact and work with the Client avatar right up to the point of signing contracts and the final sales transaction, which are handled via a link to the main IBM website or by telephone.

“We seek to engage with clients in the way they prefer to engage,” Lee Dierdorff, vice president of Web strategy and enablement for IBM, said. “This may be over the Web, this may be over the telephone, and now it may be over a 3-D virtual world.”

So there’s huge potential for businesses to upweight their use of online advertising and other digital awareness routes.