Elevating your product messaging to resonate with the right buyers will allow you to reap the rewards of better-qualified leads and higher revenues. This right messaging strategy outlines how, when, where, and to whom you'll communicate this differentiator.
Without proper messaging, the marketing tactics or technology you may apply to get the word out, generate leads, and nurture them into paying customers will fall flat. Here's how to get B2B product messaging right.
Chances are you're not the only one offering a valuable product like yours in your area. Other SaaS and manufacturing companies have similar products and pricing. They also provide good customer service. So, at the end of the day, why should someone choose your products over others?
It all comes down to your brand differentiation and the B2B messaging you build around your SaaS or manufacturing products.
To start, think about your messaging using these terms.
These elements will become your UVP (unique value proposition).
A UVP is an unambiguous message about what you offer, how it benefits your target customers, what problems it solves, and why it's different. Ultimately, your UVP gives your ideal customers a reason to choose your company.
Your UVP is consistent and should be at the forefront of your most critical communications with customers, like your home page, landing pages, consideration phase content, and decision-making content.
In B2B marketing, in particular, your messaging expands on this concise UVP with storytelling (case studies, first-party data, etc.), visuals (hero images, infographics, videos), and other helpful content (blog posts, white papers, videos, webinars).
These communicate the same UVP in different ways, at other times, and in various places to reinforce the UVP and align it with where the contact is on the buyer's journey. Similarly, sales and service communicate this UVP, reinforcing it throughout what content marketing and inbound marketing companies like LAIRE call "the buyer's journey."
Your messaging framework is the well-laid-out document of your unique value promise to your B2B customers. This vital team resource outlines your:
Similar to a brand or style guide, this document keeps messaging consistent across your brand, so, ultimately, customers are always getting the same message.
Here's a look at how this product messaging framework aligns messaging across departments. This one document outlines:
To start building a product messaging framework for manufacturing or SaaS marketing, consider the following as a template:
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Product/Product Family Name |
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Buyer Persona |
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UVP |
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Customer challenges |
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Unique benefits |
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Most Important Features |
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Positioning |
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Relevant search terms (SEO) |
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Relevant hashtags (Social Media) |
Your company is more than a product. The message you build is what matters.
The message creates customer expectations by which they then judge their experience. And it directly influences how they feel about their decision—independent of the product.
Great messaging makes people "FEEL" good about their decision-making abilities. And make no mistake, feelings matter in B2B marketing.
With that said, you may think “we've been in business for a while. We've never really had a UVP or strong messaging. And we've done okay.”
Many find themselves in this place.
But without a doubt, you've also noticed something is changing, particularly if you're in B2B manufacturing marketing. There's more competition and not just in your local area. If you've been in SaaS marketing for 5-10 years, you'll see something similar.
You're no longer nurturing leads in a vacuum, one-on-one. You're no longer only competing with someone in your area as a manufacturing company. As a SaaS provider, you're no longer the only company with a product like yours.
While your marketing and sales teams are trying to get a prospect one step closer to a deal, that prospect is hearing from your competitors. They're even entertaining other offers. These decision-makers have no sense of loyalty to you… yet.
A sale is not a given like it once was. We have to adapt to this new reality because we're not going back.
Marketing, sales, and support need to work together to keep this contact engaged and actively moving through the buyer's journey with you. Together, they reinforce your messaging with customers and influence decision-makers at all stages of their buying decision.
What's at stake with failing to build a messaging strategy?
Your company must communicate this message where your target customers are. Today that means having a robust online presence.
Today's contacts get information from Internet sources before they even think about talking to a sales rep.
If your B2B messaging strategy doesn't make your message visible in these places, these interactions don't happen.
Define who your ideal customers are. That is the only way to create B2B product messaging that is highly relevant and connects on an emotional level. Knowing who you target is guides your trust-building strategies because you understand what trust signals look like to them.
This requires market research. Study how your existing customers are using your product and benefiting from it. Speak with them about why they chose you and stick with you.
From this, you can extrapolate valuable information that will become the buyer's persona you'll speak within your marketing message. It answers crucial questions about your target and what motivates them.
So the essence of the message doesn't change. You have a UVP, and you communicate it.
But how you present it differently based on where your prospects are in the buyer's journey or sales funnel. However, you want to look at it.
Your prospect goes through distinct stages:
And so the journey becomes a cycle, which grows exponentially as you move more people through the journey stages. It's easy to see how the way you communicate your message may change depending on stage timing.
A person who has just become aware they have a problem will not respond to the same messaging strategy as someone with whom you've already built trust later in the journey.
Avoid leading with features. Instead, lead with the value your product provides to the consumers. Focus on how the product impacts their specific needs or experience rather than its particular function.
Why?
Features can get too technical. "Latest technology", state-of-the-art, AI-powered—they're all great buzzwords. Sounds impressive on paper and probably around your C-suite conference table.
However, the more technical you get, the harder it is for your prospects to understand how this helps them. Most of the time, a B2B buyer will never actually use the product they buy. Their employees will.
So, if you're not selling the value your product offers to the person actually making the decision, you're not selling anything. What's more, you'll never differentiate on features. All a competitor has to do is say they have one more than you or give a mundane feature an impressive name, and they're now better than you.
Communicate the short- and long-term value of choosing your product in your messaging.
You'll communicate your message through content within your broader content marketing strategy. Leverage content to support every stage. Amplify your B2B marketing to grow your message's reach and influence.
Everything you've done in steps 1-5 will guide how you'll leverage your B2B messaging within each stage and type of content.
This may seem like an overwhelming amount of content. But know that as you get more precise about your B2B product messaging, it gets easier to streamline the content creation and optimization process.
Messaging is iterative. It will continually evolve through many iterations, and your brand, positioning, and even customers change. Brand messaging should regularly be reviewed, tested, and optimized.
You must put the technology in place to collect data and analyze it, so you can use it to update, refine, and even replace your messaging as needed.
Want to learn more about building a winning B2B product messaging? Download LAIRE's SaaS Marketing Checklist: