Healthcare SaaS marketing is challenging because the B2B buyer journey is complex, and the B2B sales cycle is lengthy and non-linear. Yet, failure to understand the nuances of the customer experience in B2B marketing has derailed many companies.
So, how can you cater to the B2B customer experience to accelerate your pipeline and drive conversions?
B2B sales cycles are long and non-linear compared with B2C ones, mostly because of the number of people involved in the decision-making process. These stakeholders have different concerns and priorities and are often at various stages of the B2B buyer journey, requiring different content to meet their needs.
As such, your B2B SaaS marketing strategy must address buying groups with multiple stakeholders, often as many as six to twelve decision-makers, along with the heavy regulations in the healthcare industry.
You should also understand your ideal customer's typical purchase timeline and plan your outreach accordingly. Help your team stay on track by setting smaller sub-goals within the longer B2B sales cycle, such as signing up for a demo or scheduling an on-site presentation.
If possible, time your B2B SaaS marketing and sales communications to align with your prospect's significant milestones along the purchasing journey, such as a new funding release for a department or business unit.
A longer B2B sales cycle doesn’t mean your marketing department can just sit back and wait for prospects to convert into clients on their own. On the contrary, you must stay on their radar and position your brand as a trusted ally by creating a nurturing funnel or sequence to earn their business when they become in-market.
B2B buyers research online extensively before engaging with sales. They tend to shortlist vendors who provide informative content to educate them. Busy B2B prospects may forget about your brand or solution if you don’t have a lead nurturing strategy to deliver a memorable B2B customer experience.
Map out the B2B buyer journey from your prospects’ perspective to reach high-quality leads. For example, identify the resources, information, and demonstrations they may seek at each sales cycle stage and deliver them via the appropriate channels (e.g., email and social media.)
Gartner found that over 90% of B2B buyers need a business case to support their decisions to purchase technology solutions. As such, your B2B SaaS marketing strategy should include data-based content to demonstrate why a prospect should invest in your offering and how it will deliver a sufficient return on investment (ROI).
Successful B2B healthcare marketing practitioners know how to connect their offerings to tangible business results. For example, you may demonstrate how your solution helps increase monthly revenue, boost workflows and cost-efficiency, enhance employee experience, and improve patient engagement and treatment outcomes.
Incorporate real-world data, examples, and testimonials into your B2B SaaS marketing materials. These may include case studies, client quotes, statistics, and other evidence presented in a conclusive method. For example, you may add a statistic on a landing page that reads: “Company X saved 25% on quarterly marketing costs by using our analytics dashboard.”
Some buyers are a better fit for your solution. These ideal clients are happier with your solution and tend to require less post-sale service and assistance. Additionally, some prospects may be ready to buy soon, while others are still in the earlier stages of their B2B buyer journey.
So, how do you know which clients are ideal and ready to buy and which are less-than-perfect fit?
A lead scoring system is “a shared sales and marketing methodology for ranking leads to determine their sales-readiness.” It helps you assign value to each contact based on attributes like the professional information they submit on your website and how they engage with your brand online.
Lead scoring helps you avoid wasting valuable time and resources on prospects who likely won’t become clients while neglecting to nurture those ready to do business with you. It also helps you understand when to conduct sales outreach and deliver relevant B2B customer experience to the right stakeholders at the right time to drive conversions.
To set up a basic lead scoring system, create an ideal customer profile (ICP) to help you better qualify leads. This ICP should describe your ideal buyer’s essential characteristics like company size, industry, geographic location, years in business, etc.
Then, assign each qualified lead a numerical value (e.g., o to 100) based on the ICP attributes and metrics on online behaviors, email engagement, and social media interactions. You may also get insights from your sales teams and analytics reports to identify the best customers.
Bonus tip: Some leads can be spam. Identify those with missing form fields, non-sensical input, or Gmail accounts. You may assign a negative score to weed them out.
A relevant, timely, and memorable B2B customer experience is essential for guiding your prospects through the B2B buyer journey stages.
Regardless of your solution, understanding the B2B sales cycle, creating nurture funnels, building a data-backed business case, and setting up a lead scoring system will help make your B2B SaaS marketing more relevant to high-quality prospects and more effective at achieving your desired goals and benchmarks.
At Spot On, we’ve helped many healthcare software businesses elevate their digital marketing strategies. Click here to schedule a time to chat with one of our experts to discuss how we can help.
