What Is B2B Copywriting: How Is It Different to B2C, and Why Is It So Important?
Business-to-business or B2B copywriting is a challenging craft. As the name suggests, this type of copywriting involves creating persuasive content for businesses, rather than consumers. It’s not just big brands that need to understand this subject; every marketer needs to know how B2B marketing is different from B2C, and why it matters so much.
You might not think of it as such, but copywriting is an art. You might even go so far as to say that it’s a difficult art. In that case, a B2B copywriter is a valuable artist indeed. The details and nuances of B2B copywriting can make or break the success of your business communications. So, how do you know your copy is fit for a B2B audience?
Well, that’s what we’re about to walk you through in this blog post: we’ll answer the question of ‘what is B2B copywriting?’, as well as lay out the differences between copy for B2B and B2C, and show you how to write it for optimal results.
B2C vs B2B copywriting: what’s the difference?
Copywriting is copywriting, right? Not quite. Just like how the style and form of content differs depending on the platform, it also differs depending on the audience.
B2C copywriting is aimed directly at end consumers, so they’re the target audience. As an audience, consumers tend to make purchasing decisions more emotionally than a B2B audience will.
Consumers want something that doesn’t just serve a purpose, but also gives them something extra — fulfilment, purpose, happiness, fun, relaxation, the list goes on. In short, consumers are looking for something that improves their everyday lives.
Businesses, however, are looking for things that benefit their bottom line, their employees, and their work lives as a whole. As an audience, they tend to make more logic-based decisions than emotional ones.
That’s the difference between B2C and B2B copywriting — one focuses heavily on writing to elicit an emotional response, and the other offers logical decision-making. A B2B copywriter will write with the needs of other businesses in mind.
The 3 main benefits of excellent B2B copywriting
Getting your B2B content right is vital for your business, and comes with a whole host of neat benefits. Do you want to make people more aware of you? Make them trust you? Keep them coming back for more?
Of course you do! That’s why we’re going to explain exactly how a good B2B copywriter benefits you.
1. Improves brand awareness
Simply put, the better and more tailored your content is, the more likely people are to find, consume, and share it. This then leads to getting your brand name out there and making it more recognisable.
Creating high-quality content improves reach and engagement, which in turn works towards increasing your brand awareness — and brand awareness is vital.
This is largely the same across all copywriting, but a B2B copywriter will focus specifically on making your brand appeal to other businesses, and this sort of targeted approach will be much more successful.
2. Increases customer retention
What is B2B copywriting at its heart? It’s writing to retain, as well as to reach.
Customer retention can be important for B2C companies, especially those offering subscription services or products that need to be regularly replaced. It is, however, a huge part of B2B marketing.
Think of three B2B companies you know, or types of B2B companies (including yourself if you are one!).
Now think about their business models. PR agencies are usually B2B, for example, as they handle the public relations for a company. How do you think they make most of their money? The answer is retainers. Retainers are big business for any B2B company that offers a service. Certain services are needed on a constant basis, even if it’s something as simple as website maintenance.
Not every company offers a service, though — some offer products instead. So, how do a large number of B2B commerce companies make most of their money? Through return custom. Companies that sell materials, stationary, office equipment, etc. rely on their customers coming back for more.
That’s not to say that new customers aren’t important — of course they are, and you need to bear in mind how to improve reach and increase your customer pool — but retention is key in B2B.
Consistent, quality content can absolutely help with customer retention. How? Through improving your customers’ confidence in you.
That content doesn’t just stop at websites, because the customer journey doesn’t end there. Follow-up emails, social media posts, blogs, and the quality and speed of your customer service are all major contributors to retaining customers.
3. Gets you more conversions
B2B customers tend to research several options. If you want to be the one they choose, you need to write content for that investigative search. A B2B copywriter writes content that lines up with the specific customer journey of another business.
That’s another way B2B and B2C audiences differ — their customer journey. Part of the customer journey is the research stage. During this stage, customers know they need something, but they don’t know which option to choose. They’re browsing the market to find the best option.
Whilst this does happen in B2C journeys, it’s not only more common, but a bit more intense with B2B journeys.
B2B businesses will often research and consider several options, taking a number of factors into account before they make their decision. Figure out what those factors might be and play into them.
5 top tips for writing industry-leading B2B content
Now we know why B2B copywriting is important for B2B success — but what about the nitty-gritty? It’s great learning about how vital this all is, but what about how it’s actually done?
How do you write copy for a B2B audience to effectively raise engagement, conversion, and customer retention? What should you keep in mind if you want to try your hand at being a B2B copywriter?
1. Research and write for your audience
Customer profiling is a large part of marketing for any business, and it’s no different for a B2B business. Well, actually, maybe it is slightly different — let us explain.
Rather than prioritising demographics like age, interests, location, or gender, B2B customer profiling focuses on broader aspects, which can be trickier than with B2C content marketing.
Is the person who’ll probably be reading your content the decision-maker? What is the industry they are likely to be in? What does their position value the most?
For instance, let’s say you’re a PR agency (hey, maybe you are!), and you specialise in PR communications for the beauty sector.
Within that sector, who in the business is most likely to make the decision to hire you? What do most beauty companies value the most? What do they offer their customers? You’ll need to do some research.
Once you know this, you can tailor your content to them, and explain how you can help them facilitate positive relationships with their customers.
2. Use storytelling techniques
Storytelling is a powerful tool in B2B copywriting.
In B2B, you want to sell your story to your customers. Tell your brand story well and you increase brand confidence, which then increases sales, as well as customer retention.
Storytelling also refers to the structure of your content. All content, no matter who it’s aimed at, should have a beginning, middle, and end. Introduce, explain the importance and benefits, and then conclude.
3. Use data — but make it engaging
B2B customers tend to make more logical decisions based on actual, measurable data, rather than desires, wants, and emotions. You’ll need to work objective data into your copy to help them make their decision, but you still need to keep them engaged.
Don’t just offer a list of facts and figures; weave it in masterfully through the content, giving statistics and links to sources and data wherever it’s relevant, and then summarise all the data and what it means as part of your conclusion.
4. Outline the benefits
As you know, discussing the benefits of your product is essential — it’s how you sell. But remember that you need to be more logical than emotional.
Try to use benefits that can be measured, rather than abstract concepts such as ‘it makes you and your customers happy’ or ‘it helps you feel better after a long day’. Keep emotion out of it and give them measurable results.
Doing this also means that your customer can see the objective benefits your product has had after they’ve purchased, and match them to what was promised, meaning they’re more likely to come back for more.
5. Don’t be afraid to get creative or break the rules
You know better than we do who your brand and audience are.
Some companies thrive by throwing disruptive content marketing into the mix, and it’s becoming more popular. If you think your audience would respond to a ‘more B2C tone of voice’, then give it a go! You can always amend it later.
There are no hard-and-fast rules in B2B marketing and copywriting, only advice to cover the majority of situations.
Find the best B2B copywriter for your needs
If you’ve made it this far, you’re now– well, not quite a full-time B2B copywriter, but hopefully you’ve learnt some helpful information about the craft.
You’ve learnt what B2B copywriting is, why it’s different to B2C copywriting, what the benefits of tailoring B2B content are, and some tips about how to write for a B2B audience.
All that’s left to do now is to get started! That means you’re probably in the market for someone who can write killer B2B content for your business, netting you more sales, more engagement, and better customer retention.
ZippyLingo can help. We can provide you with exceptional B2B copywriter talent. Our copywriters have years of experience and an eye for detail that will blow your socks off (metaphorically of course, we don’t want you to get cold). Fast, efficient, and reliable, our B2B copywriting services are the perfect choice for your company. We listen to your goals and implement our copy to help you reach them.
Get in touch with the ZippyLingo team today to see how we can help your B2B business.
