Does your company have what it takes to thrive in the era of the nonlinear B2B buyer journey?
Today’s buyers make informed decisions with minimal input from sales teams. They rely on their own research and peer networks, showing up in spaces where vendors are mostly absent and where content is nearly impossible to track. Like it or not, this is the new normal.
How should CEOs and their teams navigate this change? The following are some key actions you can take to compete in a world where the buyer is firmly in control.
Reframe Marketing Expectations
CEOs and marketing teams are sometimes misaligned on where to focus marketing efforts and what constitutes meaningful ROI. Be honest: Is your instinct to prioritize a high volume of content that ties neatly to conversions? If so, it’s worth checking that against the current realities of the buyer journey.
Ninety-five percent of the time, the vendor that wins was on the shortlist from the beginning, so visibility is a big part of what drives conversions later on. If you’re not in a buyer’s initial consideration set, you’re counting on a late-stage miracle, and those are increasingly rare. Your marketing team needs the green light to invest in top-of-funnel initiatives, such as brand awareness campaigns, that build brand recognition well before a buyer begins looking for solutions.
Look To Qualitative Indicators
Dark social is defined as “the private, often untrackable ways people share content: through messaging apps, email, DMs, and other one-to-one or one-to-few channels,” and it’s forcing teams to rethink traditional attribution models.
Simply put, your marketing team is no longer able to track every touchpoint or tie every outcome to a clean data trail. This is a scary proposition, even for those of us who have seen this shift coming. The alternative? When you lack quantitative data, look for qualitative indicators of success.
There are plenty of other meaningful signs that your efforts are working: comments on LinkedIn from the right people, prospects mentioning your content in conversation and a customer referencing an event you attended months ago. Treat those signals as evidence that your efforts are paying off.
Get Your People Out There (Starting With Yourself)
Buyers have made it clear that they trust individuals more than organizations, which means your company needs visible, credible voices in the market. That responsibility can’t fall solely on sales and marketing. In this environment, every employee can play a role in brand building, and CEOs set the tone from the top.
When you show up on platforms like LinkedIn and participate in industry conversations, you demonstrate that being present in these spaces matters, and you can make a stronger case for your team to follow suit. A company with multiple active voices can gain a competitive advantage over time.
Don’t overlook offline opportunities in this process. There is a renewed appetite for in-person engagement (e.g., events and panels); these are ideal chances for you to engage directly with prospects and put a credible, human face to your organization.
Invest In A Stellar Customer Experience
If buyers are leaning on peers to influence their decisions, the best-case scenario is that your company’s name comes up positively in those conversations. Your customers can be your strongest advocates, but that only happens when the experience you deliver aligns with the promises you make.
A standout sales and onboarding process isn’t enough. Buyers need proof that you value them long after the deal closes. Now is the time to strengthen the entire customer experience: service quality, responsiveness, renewal processes, ongoing communication and how you support customers as their needs evolve.
Every interaction a customer has with your company becomes part of the story they tell in the conversations you can’t see or hear. Treat customer experience as a growth engine, because in today’s buyer landscape, that’s precisely what it is.
Strengthen Your Marketing Foundations
Strong marketing foundations are key to navigating any significant changes, and the buyer journey is no exception. Positioning, messaging, unique value propositions, ideal customer profiles—these foundations give your team the context they need to speak to the right people in the right ways.
When your foundations are solid, your teams can move faster and smarter, whether they’re launching a campaign or joining a conversation.
Having clear messaging is especially important as AI redefines how people search for information. AI-generated results can be hit-or-miss, but the more consistent and well-defined your messaging is, the more likely it is that your company will be represented accurately when it surfaces.
Maximize The Value Of AI
AI can be a real marketing multiplier that supports your efforts to connect with buyers. But maximizing its value requires time, training and a willingness to experiment.
Most AI tools don’t deliver meaningful results right out of the gate. It takes effort to learn how to use the platforms and fine-tune the outputs. Are you willing to make an upfront investment of resources, including the budget to explore new tools and the time to master them?
Support that learning curve, and the payoffs will come. At its best, AI can streamline monotonous tasks, freeing up your people to focus on the strategic and creative work that will really move the needle in this new era of the buyer journey.
Originally posted on Forbes