EdTech Digital Marketing Strategy Tips for B2B Businesses
The global education technology target market was estimated at £74.16 billion in 2020 and is anticipated to reach a growth rate of 19.9% from 2021 to 2028. As the EdTech industry grows and more educational institutions appear, the market becomes highly competitive. Thus, it gets harder to stand out from the competition.
Despite the EdTech industry's ongoing growth, it is clear that the product quality itself cannot guarantee its success. Therefore, companies must focus on building a robust marketing strategy as well as a strong brand to get a competitive edge and engage effectively with the audience.
Why is marketing strategy essential for your EdTech company?
Marketing strategy is an essential step and is rightfully considered to be one of the most important first-round decisions to make for any growing business. According to the 2022 Trend Report, companies with a documented marketing strategy are 538% more likely to report success.
A marketing strategy helps an organisation concentrate its resources on the best possible opportunities and provides a straightforward guide to targeting the desired audience. In this blog, you will find tips that will help you set up a powerful EdTech digital marketing strategy and leverage your EdTech business in 2022!
By firm bee
1. Develop and test omnichannel campaign concepts to raise customer engagement
Omnichannel communication gives your EdTech business better chances to be noticed and drives more engagement for your content. By bringing all communications in line with consistent content and seamless links between channels, we create a more appealing, frictionless customer experience. Statistics prove that 85% of digital consumers start the purchasing workflow on one device yet finish it on another.
Firstly, consistency is a key to increasing engagement. For example, an average consumer uses approximately 6 touch points before making a purchase. Thus, each channel of your business must provide value for the audience to keep them engaged.
By creating such a supportive and consistent environment, your company gains loyalty and increased audience involvement in return. Moreover, customers are more likely to interact with your service functions such as chatbots or customer service if the business has cross-channel consistency.
Secondly, personalisation can also help you set up an omnichannel approach. Omnichannel communications make it easier for you to follow the entire consumer journey which, in its turn, allows you to collect the necessary information to adopt a personalised approach. According to statistics, 83% of buyers would exchange data for a more personalised experience.
Although excessive data collection has a poor reputation that can turn customers off, 74% of people feel frustrated when web content isn't personalised to suit their habits and preferences.
2. Join events and host webinars
In order to promote your EdTech brand and gauge customer sentiments, you can host or join webinars that have gained great popularity during the global pandemic.
For EdTech businesses, webinars provide an excellent opportunity to show their competence and expertise as well as establish more personal relationships with the target audience and clearly communicate the business's key messages to the customers.
Besides, webinars can be a perfect learning tool as they offer plenty of benefits for every party involved, such as flexibility, convenience and cost-effectiveness.
3. Start a podcast
According to WARC's Global Ad Trends report, podcasts are one of the go-to-market strategies for EdTech firms! And since the pandemic, podcasts have been the fastest-growing EdTech marketing channel. Moreover, Forbes estimated that 100 million people would listen to a monthly podcast in 2022, which makes it particularly attractive for the EdTech industry.
Podcasts seem to be an effective tool and content marketing solution for EdTech brands that want to increase their market share, but as the trend is picking up speed, the competition for listeners is getting more intense. Therefore, you need to be creative and produce value-added content to stand out from the competition.
By starting a podcast, you can provide original insights and engage with listeners who can become your brand advocates. In addition, podcasts can be a great networking tool as it is a perfect way to interact with influencers and invite them to cross-promote your EdTech product to their audiences. Furthermore, it can effectively complement general digital marketing efforts and drive website traffic.
4. Utilise Email marketing
Although email marketing is quite a traditional digital marketing tool, it proves its effectiveness in the EdTech industry. It delivers the highest ROI of all marketing channels — on average, £35 back for every pound you spend. Mind that the emails should be tailored to recipients' interests and pain points to increase engagement and response rate. You should ensure you understand your target audience and the issues they are trying to solve so you deliver the right content to the right people at the right time.
To manage your email marketing effectively, consider using some of the specialised marketing automation tools such as Mailchimp, Hubspot, Marketo, or Pardot. These tools also provide in-depth analytics about your email marketing performance, which can help you optimise your emails to deliver desired results in the future.
Email marketing standards must be followed by emailing the contacts that agreed to be contacted for marketing purposes only, ensuring we comply with GDPR requirements and using a warmed-up email account if it's a new one. Thus, you can secure yourself from getting punished for spamming users and eventually having your domain suspended.
5. Focus on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
The audience targeted by educational companies is likely to be keen to actively search for more content about webinars and online classes, helpful educational platforms and tools, as well as the EdTech companies that can provide the solutions they need.
Setting up an effective SEO strategy is crucial for EdTech companies if they want to get noticed by decision-makers. The right plan requires a considerable time investment, and you can't expect to see results overnight, but the efforts made here will pay off in the long run.
Revise the keywords and optimise the content of your website. This way, Google and the other engines rank it higher and more people will find you.
By kmuza
6. State how your product solves a problem
The most common EdTech marketing pitfall is the inability to adopt a solution-oriented approach. You may have a slick website and be active on all social media platforms but still, fail to clearly communicate how your product solves consumers' problems.
In addition, it is crucial to avoid vague language and buzzwords. You should think thoroughly about how to inform educators of the product's unique value and benefits. For example, ask yourself if you were talking to a stranger at a party, or even better, a child, would they understand what you're offering and why it's important?
7. Consider Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising model
You can use a PPC advertising campaign if you feel that your website does not generate enough qualified leads organically. Google Adwords is one of the most commonly used providers, where you can set a daily budget and optimise various advertising parameters to attract more leads.
Remember what type of visitors you want to develop when creating your ads. To maximise the chance of reaching the right customer and predict their behaviour, pay attention to the timing and geography of ad placement.
By adeolueletu
8. Improve customer loyalty through Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives
With the rise of social awareness, people may be willing to pay more for products associated with an issue they are not indifferent to. Therefore, supporting the right cause can help create a solid emotional connection with your audience. It can also help you authentically drive engagement and increase customer retention. Consider creating one marketing campaign around these issues to shape the right customer perceptions of your brand.
Authentic marketing is successful because it speaks to the values and beliefs of your audience. You can instantly become more attractive to customers that share the same ideas by putting your brand values into practice.
9. Map your buyer journey
Typically, the buying cycle in the EdTech B2B industry is long and often involves a lot of decision-makers. Therefore, mapping your buyer journey and taking customers through the sales funnel is crucial. You need to know where your EdTech customers are entering your funnel and what are the key triggers they react to.
Buyer journey mapping can be broken down into 3 parts.
Top of Funnel:
Research what your potential customers are looking for in the Awareness Stage. Then, plan content ideas for buyer personas and identify the most suitable content format. After that, devise content concepts for buyer personas in the Consideration Stage.
Middle of Funnel:
Outline what your potential customers are searching for in the Decision Stage and devise content concepts for them.
Bottom of Funnel:
Determine what your buyer personas are searching for at the Customer Stage and brainstorm content concepts for them.
If you are interested to learn more about how to set up B2B Marketing Goals and Strategies, check out our blog.
Summary
There has never been a better time to work in the EdTech industry! Due to the pandemic, the worldwide demand for EdTech services is expected to accelerate by ten times in the next five years.
Developing a reliable marketing strategy ensures your EdTech business targets the right people with relevant content that appeals to them. The more time you spend creating a clear marketing strategy, the more opportunities you create to sell.
These EdTech marketing tips will help you build an effective digital marketing strategy to generate more qualified leads and accomplish your goals:
1) Develop and test omnichannel campaign concepts to raise engagement
2) Join events and host webinars
3) Start a podcast
4) Utilise Email marketing
5) Focus on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
6) State how your product solves a problem
7) Consider the Pay-per-click marketing (PPC) advertising model
8) Improve customer loyalty through CRS initiatives
9) Map your buyer journey
Reach out to Yay!Starter team, and we will help you set up a powerful and effective digital marketing strategy for your EdTech business!
