What’s hot in business-​to-​business (B2B) marketing? According to the 2023 B2B marketing mix report by Sagefrog Marketing Group, paid search advertising. Here’s what you and your client need to know for the upcoming year based on data from 2022.

Paid Search Advertising to Remain Big for B2B

SEO Ranks First in Implementation in 2022

According to Sagefrog, here are the most implemented marketing tactics of 2022:

• Search Engine Optimization: 49% of B2B companies implemented SEO in their marketing strategy
• Content Marketing: 43%
• Organic Social Media: 43%
• Email Marketing: 36%
• Paid Social Media: 35%

The top marketing goal of brands is to boost revenue and conversions. So, it makes sense that paid search advertising is the most implemented tactic. No matter whether consumers are planning on shopping online or in person, the buyer’s journey usually begins with search. If your client ranks high on results pages, consumers will be more likely to check them out and take action. Good SEO results in more website traffic and higher brand awareness.

Paid Search Gets Results

Paid search advertising not only heightens brand awareness and website traffic, it also brings leads into the sales funnel. According to Sagefrog, the top two sources of sales and marketing leads in 2022 are SEO and Search Engine Marketing (SEM). “These digital marketing tactics appear to be the most successful, as more traditional methods of lead generation are on the decline,” says Sagefrog.

Follow the Money

Paid search advertising has proven to be such a high priority for B2B marketers that they’re putting their money where their mouths are. In 2023, according to Sagefrog, 31% of B2B marketers plan on increasing their SEO budgets. The only strategy B2B marketers plan to increase their budgets on even more than SEO is in-​person trade shows and events. But that’s to be expected since the world continues to open back up after COVID, and people are itching for the in-​person events they’ve been missing the past few years. Either way, SEO is obviously a high priority for B2B marketers, says Sagefrog.

How to Improve Your Client’s SEO

Search advertising is going to be BIG next year. That means your client’s competitors will also be assigning a chunk of their marketing budgets to SEO and SEM. How can your client continue to stand out? A crucial first step is conducting an audit, according to a previous SalesFuel blog, based on research from Search Engine Land. Performing an audit, or review, of your client’s online content will let you know whether their content is meeting their online traffic goals. An audit will let you know which content to update and optimize in order to rank well on search results pages.

You can perform a Digital Audit on your client with SalesFuel to get a real-​time capture of your client’s digital presence. With those results, you can see how their SEO is faring, compare your client’s digital advertising to their competitors’ and compare their online presence to competitors’.

Will Paid Search Work for Your Clients?

In short, yes. But for proof, you can look up your client’s target audience on AudienceSCAN on AdMall by SalesFuel. There, you’ll be able to see what percentage of this audience took action after seeing sponsored search results within the last year, as well as which internet search engines they use the most often, which websites or mobile apps they use to search for information about local businesses, what devices they use and their internet usage habits. With that information, your client will realize what an asset paid search advertising is to their business.

Photo by Mimi Thian