With consumer trust reportedly on the decline and a challenging economic climate forcing customers to pull back on spending, today’s marketers are having to work harder than ever before to nurture their community, generate return on investment (ROI), identify innovative ways to engage and support customers, and meet their high and ever-changing expectations.
Though we all strive to meet those demands, key questions must be considered in order to make them a reality. How do you create a dialogue to understand what your customer wants and create experiences that target different clients’ needs? How do we create that perfect relationship both online and offline when your clients are scattered around the world?
In my role at Zengenti, we’ve built our community around shared ideas and values over the years, putting into practice simple but effective ways to nurture our new and existing community of clients.
With more focus placed on ROI, and improving user experience (UX) to retain relationships for business continuity and stability, there’s never been a more opportune time to review how you engage with your customers.
The marketing landscape
It’s been four years, and yet we’re still talking about the pandemic because it led to a complete overhaul of the B2B marketing scene in many ways. Consumer buying patterns have shifted in accordance with changing priorities, businesses’ online channels have become even more important, marketing tools and interactive, in-person events – which could previously reach hundreds – became impossible.
It took its time, but we’ve seen a return and appetite for in-person events. In 2023, we hosted our first annual community event since 2019, Velocity. We listened to the needs of our users, shook off the covid blues and brought together our clients to reconnect, share product updates and listen and learn from our community members: University of Birmingham and Actegy, best known for Revitive.
While the marketing industry has seen the return of traditional strategies, we’ve also adopted some of the positive side effects which sprang from the pandemic, such as an increase in webinars and virtual on-demand content. This helps ensure there is something to suit every customers’ needs – increasing accessibility and maximising reach.
In the present day, the current pandemic that plagues the B2B marketing landscape is the repercussions of the cost-of-living crisis. Though this can lead to increased pressure for marketers to keep up sales in spite of the challenging economic climate, it also presents an opportunity, giving marketers the chance to take stock, and in our case, take inspiration from scrum and iterate our strategies as companies tighten their budgets.
AI and personalisation
2023 was certainly the year for artificial intelligence (AI). Some of the most talked-about trends in B2B marketing include personalisation and, of course, AI and automation.
Personalisation has been a huge focus for us in our marketing – a process which doesn’t stop when we onboard a client. We deliver relevant marketing material based on what matters most to our community – whether it be AMA – ask me anything sessions which answer common queries in real-time, or blogs that inform on popular topics in the CMS space. Being present for those questions or concerns is also a really powerful tool in your marketing arsenal – we live in the age of immediacy, after all.
While it is tempting to jump on the AI bandwagon completely and overhaul your content and personalisation strategy, there are some things automation and AI can’t replace – the human touch. At Velocity, we heard so much positive feedback from customers about getting to know the team behind Contensis and how it continues to impact their everyday working lives. Community is at the very heart of everything we do.
Our ‘secret weapon’ is nurturing that community and carefully curating and developing relationships with our clients. While this can take years to perfect and isn’t the quick win that other competitors can achieve with tools like AI, it’s central to our company ethos.
Bringing your community together
When your prospect officially becomes a customer, the next challenge is to keep hold of them. Start by reminding your community members, new and old, about what makes you different. Reinforce the belief that your users are backing the right horse, which all stems from nurturing relationships and building community.
Think about your values and mission of the company. What drives the business, where did it start and where are you now? If your organisation has been around a while, like ours, remind your community about your heritage, experience and ongoing commitment. There is a reason that in the 23 years of Zengenti operating, Torfaen Council has been on the journey with us for 21 years of it.
Your community will engage with authenticity, seeing that while the company continues to grow and develop, your spirit, culture and beliefs have remained.
But how do you prove it? By showing up; whether online or offline.
In 2017, we set up our Contensis Slack community; a platform that gives our customers a place to connect in real-time. Since then, we’ve had the pleasure of watching it grow and evolve into a space where they regularly interact with our team of experts, and support each other, offering advice and answering each other’s questions.
This channel goes some way to showcasing our constant commitment to supporting and caring for our community, through that always-on, approachable mindset.
In person, clients enjoy visiting our HQ, The Moor Hall, a converted Georgian home in the Shropshire countryside. Whether it is to meet the team, tour the facilities and eat delicious, locally sourced food (if you know Zengenti, you’ll know garlic bread is involved), mull over challenges with their business or kick off new projects. It’s all part of what our ‘community’ is about.
We like to get away and visit clients across the world too, whether in Canada, Europe or sites in the UK. We know the value and importance of meeting customers face-to-face. Kicking off projects with an in person meeting, where possible, helps to develop our connections further and get to know them on a personal level.
Working from home has many perks, notably it has presented the opportunity for many of us to connect remotely. Once a novelty and a trend, it has helped build our online community and made our team more accessible, regardless of distance. We’ve actively tried to embrace this mindset, working remotely, flexibly and as efficiently as possible. But we also recognise that we do some of our best collaborative work in person. Another reminder of our balanced, community-driven ethos.
Understand their needs
Success comes from getting to know your prospective customers’ industries, learning about their challenges and pain points, and building your community around the solutions they need. Speaking their language will see the investment pay off.
Earlier this year, we launched our very own online accessibility tool, Insytful, because we understood the challenges and legal implications our customers were facing. Designing, developing and testing for accessibility is an ongoing process that requires all members of a digital team.
Another challenge was budget; why should it cost a fortune to make a website accessible? Accessibility should be accessible, so we introduced a free-to-scan plan, where your first one hundred web pages are free, with no time limit. Pricing is transparent and buildable too, so everyone knows where they stand when they get started on that road to online accessibility. We’re building our community around pain points and how we can solve them.
Now more than ever, customers are looking for added value—a business that understands its people, its community, its obstacles, and its sweet spots. To retain your community though, as marketers, we must constantly be prepared to review and adapt strategy, stay agile and in tune with our customers’ markets, and be open to giving them your time and expertise to nurture that relationship for years to come.
I’m excited to see where our network may go from here, but one thing I know for sure is that we’ll do it the Zengenti way: https://www.zengenti.com/.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Danielle Mee, Marketing Manager for , a digital governance
tool at Zengenti, creators of CMS, Contensis
A marketing professional with over eight years of global B2B experience, Danni specialises in campaign planning & management, events, and digital marketing and has worked across various verticals, including SaaS, satellite and telecoms, retail, and the fire industry.