You're struggling to reach diverse B2B industry audiences. How can you craft content that truly resonates?

Start by really understanding who they are—dive into their world and learn their pain points and aspiration, their values, their likes, dislikes etc Craft content that speaks to them in their language (not use industry speak or jargon) and addresses their specific needs. Use a mix of formats: blogs, videos, infographics—whatever floats their boat. Show real-life success stories they can relate to. And don’t forget to keep it human; a little humour and personality go a long way. Keep testing different approaches and stay flexible. Remember, it’s all about building genuine connections.

Understanding your audience goes beyond demographics; it's about empathizing with their unique challenges and aspirations. For instance, in the wastewater industry, knowing that utility contractors struggle with aging infrastructure can guide you to create content that offers innovative trenchless technology solutions, thus addressing their pain points directly. By aligning your content with the real-world issues your audience faces, you build trust and credibility. Remember, content is your currency; it should not only inform but also inspire and provide actionable insights that resonate deeply with your target market. Until then—keep it flowing.

This is Rule 1 of Marketing. Do not pass go. Do not pass collect $200. Know your audience. Speak to your Customers. Speak to anyone and everyone in your network that fits your ICP. Learn and understand their role, their day to day, and their pain points.

Understand Your Audience: Imagine you're at a conference, mingling with professionals from various sectors. Each has unique pain points and interests. Conduct market research and create detailed buyer personas to capture these nuances. Tailor Your Message: Like a storyteller adapting their tale for different listeners, customize your content for each audience segment. Use industry-specific language and address relevant challenges. Leverage Multiple Formats: Think of your content as a multi-course meal. Serve up blog posts, case studies, infographics, and videos to cater to varied preferences. Engage with Empathy: Picture a consultant offering tailored advice. Show genuine understanding of each industry's struggles and successes.

I don't think reaching diverse B2B audience is the right way to go. If you are in B2B marketing, you need laser focused ICP and Buyer Persona. Otherwise it's waste of money and effort. So, let's start there. Let's say a product or service has a diverse industry adaptability and application, it still comes down to focused messaging. In that case pain point analysis would be a good place to start. Every industry may have different pain points and value propositions for the same product/service solving business problems in various verticals. Knowing your product/service and the user is important place to start. Know your product/service, the customer and the problem(s) solved.

Create, or even better yet, repurpose content that your audience *heavy italics* actually cares about. Yes, your scalable, optimal, AI, best in class, buzzword, buzzword, buzzword solves all of the problems they could ever dream of. But, create content for each, individual, and specific pain point your ICP encounters. Prioritize by internal initiatives, closed-won data, etc. This may be role-based, industry-based, persona-based, etc.

As a B2B Marketing Manager struggling to reach diverse audiences, I found that personalizing content was the key to resonance. Facing a challenge of engaging varied industry professionals, I focused on tailoring content to address their specific pain points and aspirations. For instance, I created industry-specific case studies and whitepapers that directly addressed their concerns. One impactful moment was when a personalized email campaign, highlighting solutions tailored to each segment, led to a surge in engagement and conversions. By crafting content that spoke directly to their needs, our message resonated authentically, bridging the gap and strengthening connections with diverse B2B audiences.

Remember when growing up we all had a moment where we though the TV is talking to us directly, it made us feel special! Most of the times that was not the case but with changing marketing it's completely possible. Once you understand the pain points of your buyer personas, create content that directly addresses those specific issues. This way, when your audience reads your content, they’ll feel like you’re speaking directly to them. They should think, “This is exactly what I needed; it’s helping me solve my problems. Remember, people buy from the people/companies they like and trust.

It's easier than marketers think to win against your competition by speaking directly to your individual buyer's issues or concerns. Most of your competitors will put out the same general message as part of "doing their job" instead of personalized content that gets a response. One-to-one marketing will continue to improve due to emerging technologies and AI. Speak to your buyer's need to know WiiFM (what's in it for me?)

Tailor your content to fit the unique requirements and desires of each segment. Personalize your messaging, tone and format with data and insights. When your content is personalized, you are able to demonstrate that you get what they struggle with and how only YOU can provide them a solution. Use Marketing Automation tools to help you deliver personalized content for large-scale.

When it comes to captivating a diverse B2B audience, I believe storytelling is a powerful weapon. Unlike dry facts and figures, stories tap into emotions and create a connection on a human level. By incorporating diverse characters, scenarios, and challenges that resonate with different industry segments, you can make your content more relatable. Think of it as using a universal language that transcends industry jargon and speaks to the core human desire to solve problems and achieve success.

Storytelling becomes particularly powerful during the buyer's MOFU stage. As you get to know the buyer's unique needs, sharing stories about a previous customer or client in a similar situation raises the buyer's confidence. Even when going through the first call deck with a prospect, you'll want to have a couple of relevant stories during the proof section of the presentation. Buyers like performance data, which resonates even better as part of a story.

Storytelling is a powerful way to create content that resonates with people. Tell customer success stories and case studies, providing concrete examples of how people have actually used your product or service in the real world. It helps to build your brand further by humanizing it, becoming more relatable across a wide array of audiences. Focusing on stories shows that how your solutions are impacting different industries.

Crafting content that resonates with your diverse B2B audiences requires context, relevancy, and urgency. You must understand your target audience well enough to make your content relevant to their specific situation. You must uncover and teach them about the risks of not changing. And you must craft the content so they are at the center of the story.

In my opinion, the key to reaching diverse B2B audiences lies in utilizing multiple content formats. Not everyone consumes information the same way. By offering a variety of formats, from blog posts and white papers to infographics, videos, and podcasts, you cater to different learning preferences and attention spans. This creates multiple entry points for your content, allowing people to engage with the material that resonates most with them. It's like setting a bountiful buffet – there's something delicious for everyone, ensuring your message reaches a wider range of B2B professionals with diverse interests and consumption styles.

Multiple content formats should be common sense in 2024, but you must offer a multimodal approach to your marketing deliverables. Some people are visual learners, others like to talk, while others read. If you create any content, the first step is to deliver it in no less than three formats to test how they perform. You'll want long-form and short-form content. Long-form can have positive education results, while short-form helps buyers understand your value.

Actively seek and integrating feedback from all stakeholders - customers, industry experts, product, sales, marketing, and CS. But not all feedback is valuable. Gather insights on relevance and priority, customer engagement, and industry trends. You can gather feedback periodically. Twice a month with CS and Sales. Once a month or quarter from other teams (depending on which product lifecycle stage).

If I can share three words, it's Talk to People. What content resonated with your customers? What content did they share internally? You can also look at your web traffic and see what pages visitors visit and spend time reading. What lead magnets are they downloading? Review this information as part of your feedback picture as you check and adjust your content investments.

The key to crafting content that resonates with diverse B2B audiences lies in continuous analysis and adaptation. We can't assume a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, we should leverage website analytics and social media insights to understand what content formats, topics, and tones perform best with different segments of our audience. For example, decision-makers might prefer in-depth white papers, while frontline workers might connect better with bite-sized infographics. The iterative approach allows us to continually refine our content and build stronger connections.