A Short Note On B2b And B2c Marketing

'Traditional marketing in the business-to-business environment requires very different strategies from those campaigns directed towards the consumer market.' (ExtraVision, n.d., p. 1) 'Consumer competition can be a lot fiercer, with customer loyalty a constant battle.? (ExtraVision, n.d., p.1)

This report is a supply chain comparison between two companies in which one is a business-to-business (B2B) model company and the other is a business-to-consumers (B2C) model company. The comparison will be between the companies Wal-Mart and Grainger. Wal-Mart is a well-known conglomerate known around the world that is in the retail business that seeks to sell products to consumers at a significantly reduced discount compared to its rivals. Grainger sells supplies to different companies through the company 's own website.

Essentially, Pacific Agriscience (refer to hereinafter as “PAS”) will be changing from a B2B business to B2C business (or F2F as termed). To transit to this F2F model, I foresee 3 major challenges PAS will face in implementing it:

Though e-businesses vary in scope and methods, they can be categorized basically as business-to-consumer (B2C) or a business-to-business (B2B). A B2B model involves transactions between one business and another business. A B2C model involves transactions between a business and individual consumers. The term B2C could be applied to any business or

Think of the expanding power of the internet. Consider the unique behavior of B2B buyers. Put them together for…

The global marketplace increasingly favors specialty platforms for B2B eCommerce sales, and companies can now design their own international marketplaces or sell on multiple platforms to extend their marketing reach. It’s valuable to leverage these sales, marketing, lead-generating and commission-generating opportunities, but success depends on how well a business handles the challenges of marketplace sales. Specifically, successful companies speak contextually to an audience of varying interests, nationalities and purchasing habits.

In two distinct e-commerce business types, Business-to-business (B2B) and Business-to-Consumer (B2C), there are many differences in the way they operate. Specifically in marketing, differences include how the marketing is driven and the values of the strategies, the size of the target market and length of the sales cycle, and even the buying patterns of the target consumers. Each of these differences will be better defined and explained in the following paragraphs.

When looking at demand, a business must consider what is influencing this demand. The business buyer behavior model relating to the influence can be seen in Figure 2 in the Appendix. In a few ways, both B2B and B2C markets are similar in influence however the main difference is seen in the buying unit, the types of decisions made and the decision process (Kotler, 2012, p. 192). In the B2B environment, one can see that the marketing mix, which will be discussed later on, and also other stimuli under the name PESTLE affect the business market. The PESTLE stimuli can be referred to as the political, economical, social/cultural, technological, legal/competitive, and the environmental, where each of these aspects affect the market in one way or another.

Toyota Motor Corporation is a Japanese multinational automobile company since 1937 found by Kiichiro Toyoda. It is currently directed by Akio Toyoda. Toyota is a large company that currently work with 331,876 employees since March, 2013. (Toyota, 2013). As most successful companies, Toyota had its great moment of success in the United States. Due to acceleration issues on its automobiles, the company was recalled for safety risks in 6 million of its cars, and Toyota’s reputation really suffered from it.

Transactions or trading that is done between two or more companies and does not include the final customer of products is considered to be a business-to-business model. (What is business-to-business (B2B)?, 2016) These types of businesses have distinct differences from business-to-customer companies that raise multiple marketing hurdles to jump. Some of these differences include longer sales cycles, more complex products or services, few identifiable buyers, less buyer research, and different channels for marketing strategies to use. (What Makes Business-to-Business Marketing Different?, 2016). These problems have increased the demand for improved content marketing strategies for companies in the business-to-business environment. Content marketing is the use of a strategic marketing approach focused on presenting valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a specific and identified audience. (Pulizzi, 2012) The increased demand for more and better content marketing has forced marketers to evaluate and develop marketing strategies focused on this type of marketing. According to research done by the Content Marketing Institute, marketers who document their strategy are more effective than companies that do not. (Pulizzi, 2014)

* Chapter 4 - Audience identification – “I’ve discovered through many years of trying to work with target audience statements that most of them are not worth the paper they are written on”. This direct quote could be quite discouraging if taken at face value. However the book does stipulate two areas of focus for B2B marketers: obtaining input primarily from employees (to optimize internal integration) and, secondly, from customers. These are important issues but the discussion is a bit superficial on one aspect: how to obtain better “insight” into customer motivations. * Chapters 4 and 5 - Brand Positioning/ Brand Personality – as with B2C marketing, these are the two cornerstones of B2B branding. But there is some confusion between brand positioning, brandpersonality and brand image – there is some confusion between the latter two and brand image (the cornerstone of business branding) is not discussed in much depth at all. Regardless, these two chapters include some excellent and unique examples of B2B branding. There is a particularly nice discussion of B2B slogans and symbols and their role in business branding – and more excellent examples. * Chapters 6 and 7 - Consistent Execution/Brand Equity – the former emphasizes the need for a long-term view

Most people have shopped at Amazon or eBay and understand how convenient the buying process is at B2C eCommerce websites where the user experience or UX trumps every aspect of the business process. Although the B2B process differs in many ways, smart decision-makers in business-to-business marketing understand that the user experience is critical and not just for customers but for business collaborations, distributor efficiency, lead generation and important internal processes. The user experience

Any B2B company -- whether operating a simple eCommerce store, client portal or combination of the two -- needs to captivate and compel its audience with personalized features, easy, mobile-optimized ordering and user-friendly architecture. In short, supplying a better customer experience is what 's required to land new customers and foster loyalty among established B2B buyers. The business-to-business buying process is more complicated than selling to consumers, but B2B customers want want B2C-type shipping integrations, personalized displays, drop shipping and

The B2B market requires a very different sales and marketing approach than B2C. Yet, companies in the B2B space continue to over emphasize certain sales and marketing activities at the expense of others. This paper explores the principal problems with the current sales and marketing approach in the B2B space and identifies what’s required to improve it.

Boriana Koleva bnk@cs.nott.ac.uk C54 Key components of e-commerce business models Major B2C business models Major B2B business models Business models in other emerging areas of e-commerce Benefits and Problems with E-Commerce