Is Your Value Proposition Insulting Your Potential Customers?

In the world of B2B marketing, a company’s website is often the first point of contact for potential buyers, so clear and effective website messaging is crucial to a successful marketing strategy that provides a user-friendly experience and improves conversion rates. Yet not all website messaging is created equal. Some messaging can actually be detrimental to a B2B company’s sales efforts. What distinguishes powerful messaging from poor messaging? The messaging’s ability to effectively communicate what the buyer’s company needs to hear, which isn’t that your company is superior to theirs. Rather, they should be encouraged in the success already achieved and informed how your company can help them reach the next level.

Understand Your Buyer’s Company

Crafting successful website messaging starts by understanding the buyer’s company. Research your potential buyer’s company to identify their pain points and goals, and use this information to tailor a message that speaks to their specific needs. Doing so will resonate with your prospects. Simply inserting generic messaging will not, and it can be a major turn-off for potential buyers. Taking the time to ensure the message is unique to your potential buyer and therefore speaks to their unique challenges makes them feel valued while also establishing your company as a trustworthy partner to achieve their goals.

One effective strategy for tailoring messaging to your prospect’s needs is to talk about the buyer’s company’s problems rather than your solutions. Keep in mind that an early-stage prospect may need to first be enlightened that they even have a problem that is worth fixing. If they don’t see the problem (or the urgent need to fix it), they will never progress to the point of engaging with your business to get the solution.

Emphasize the Buyer’s Success

Equally as important as understanding your buyer’s pain points and goals in your website’s messaging is emphasizing their successes and accomplishments. By doing so, you’re clearly demonstrating that the company values and recognizes their achievements. A simple shift in your website messaging can achieve this, for example:

We’re Smart, You’re Not Copy: Our Team of Experts Can Improve Your Sales Efforts

You’re Smart and We Can Help Copy: Get the Most Out of Your Sales Team and Win Market Share

The shift in the above copy is subtle. The first example shows what your company can do, while the second example shows what your buyer’s company can achieve. A buyer’s response is always going to be in favor of the latter.

Focus on Optimization, Not Intelligence

An all-too-common mistake made by many B2B companies is website messaging that focuses too much on their own expertise. While any business should, of course, be confident about what they can do for their clients, it must be done with sincere thought given to how your potential buyer would read it. After all, you aren’t your customer, so you must think through what your customer needs to hear and how your customer would interpret your words. Your prospect more than likely doesn’t want to hear that your company is superior to theirs. Rather, they want to hear how your company could optimize theirs.

Communicate your company’s ability to optimize the buyer’s company and help them achieve even greater success. For example, how does your company’s solution enhance your target market’s business? Another effective strategy is to utilize language that stresses a collaboration with the buyer’s company. By doing so, it shows you are committed to a partnership that focuses on the buyer’s success and that you have their best interest at heart.

In conclusion, effective website messaging is essential to a successful B2B marketing strategy. By understanding your prospect’s company and their unique needs and then tailoring your messaging to that in a way that illustrates your value as a trusted partner, your company will be well positioned to build trust and increase the lifetime value of customer relationships.