There’s a common assumption that B2B content is boring — that it has to be dry, formal, and corporate.

After all, B2B content is meant for other businesses, not individual people. So it should maintain some rigid professionalism, right?

Wrong.

In fact, if your B2B content is stiff, you’ll put off your audience.

• Your brand will seem impersonal and unapproachable.
• Your audience will look for a competitor whose content has more of a human touch.
• Even worse, they’ll end up doing business with one of those businesses instead.

To make sure you’re keeping your audience interested in your brand, you need to provide exceptional content. Content that helps customers solve their problems and leads to conversions.

See, coming off as too professional or too casual won’t sound right to your target audience. Instead, you need to achieve a careful balance between the two. That’s how you can appear capable without being stuffy. 

So if you want to create content that fosters long-term engagement with your audience, this article is for you. Keep reading to find out how to make your audience keep coming back for more.

No more throwing ideas at the wall to see if they stick. Instead, you can feel confident with the content you produce.

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 1: Offer Content Your Audience Wants To Read

The first step to creating exceptional B2B content is figuring out what your readers want.

Your customers are other businesses. As someone in a business, think about what kind of content you’d want to see. What would make you trust another business and want to engage with it?

Chances are you want content that’ll help you reach your business goals or objectives. You might also want to see content that’ll help you avoid pain.

This is a good starting point, but there’s more to writing good B2B content. You won't win businesses over by offering general advice. Instead, your content should relate to your target customers’ industry, desires, and problems. 

For example, each industry has specific standards and benchmarks. A fashion brand will have different problems and goals than a consulting firm for healthcare providers. 

Your goal is to create content that appeals to your reader’s needs within their industry. Show them how you can provide unique solutions to their problems and help them make well-informed decisions.

Providing the right information in your content will help you build trust and credibility with your audience. If you can’t do that, you won’t have many customers.

Analyze Past and Current Customers

If you’re having trouble understanding your audience on a deeper level, try gathering data about previous customers. Find out what kind of content your customers engage with by checking your website's analytics. 

Figure out who reads your content and who purchases your product or service. This can help you see if your current content is valuable to your audience.

Or you can try asking them directly. Send out a survey to see which kinds of content readers found most helpful. You can also ask which content convinced them to buy your product or service. As an incentive for filling out the survey, you could give them something in return, like a 15% discount on their next purchase.

If you can’t gather much useful data internally, look outward and conduct proper audience research. 

With B2B content, you’re not only interacting with an abstract business entity. You’re engaging with real human beings — people in charge of the buying decisions in the company. 

More often than not, multiple people are responsible for those decisions. These are the people you need to focus on persuading. 

Get to know more about them. Make a list of their titles, roles, responsibilities, and team size. This will help you keep track of the people you need to address through your content.

Remember, they want information, knowledge, insights, strategies, and inspiration to reach their goals. Your content should provide these things for them.

Here's how you can conduct proper audience research and increase conversions.

B2B Content Needs

B2B content has specific requirements.

First, your B2B content needs to appeal to a team of people. This could include the CEO, the head of marketing, and the head of finance, to name a few. There may be more people on this list, depending on the business. Check the business’ website or LinkedIn to see who else you should include.

Ultimately, these are the big players in the company. Their main concerns are business concerns like increasing conversion rates, making a profit, and mitigating costs. Your content should show how you can benefit them with tangible results.

How has your business helped other businesses achieve their goals or reduced their burdens? What evidence can you provide? Including this information will convince your audience that you’re the right business for their needs.

Don’t forget: you’re trying to develop a long-term relationship with your customers. That means you need to start a dialogue with them and spend time building a rapport.

Closing a sale like this won’t happen overnight, though. That’s why you need to make a dedicated effort with your content.

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 2: Offer Content In The Format Your Audience Wants

The “right content” refers to what your audience finds helpful. Consider what helps them achieve their goals. The “right content” also makes your audience convert.

Think about what the “right content” means for your customers and your business as a Venn diagram. Your goal is to figure out what kinds of content fit in the middle. There are many kinds of content including, but not limited to:

• Blog Posts
• Case Studies
• White Papers
• Interviews
• Reviews
• Testimonials
• Infographics
• Webinars
• Newsletters

Check the performance of your content to find out which formats your audience prefers. Examine your website’s analytics. Which kinds of content got the most views, likes, engagement, and shares?

This data will help you determine the content your audience prefers.

Let’s say your audience seems to like your interviews with industry thought leaders. You find these interviews get a lot of engagement from the audience — even from people who aren’t in your industry. 

It would make sense to focus more of your time and energy producing more of these insightful interviews. Especially if other kinds of content don’t attract as much attention. 

You can also ask your readers what they want to see. Send them surveys and ask which kinds of content they find helpful and why. That’ll save you time guessing what they want from you. 

Imagine creating and releasing multiple forms of content only to have them land poorly with your audience. Naturally, you’d feel frustrated about wasting that time, money, and effort.

The best way to avoid this is knowing exactly which kinds of content resonate with your audience before creating them. These strategies will help you understand exactly what’ll convince prospects to do business with you.

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 3: Provide Data And Insights

Now that you understand what makes exceptional B2B content, you need to show how your brand will benefit your target audience.

What does your brand offer that’ll help customers achieve their goals or eliminate pain points? Can you provide evidence to back up your claims?

B2B customers focus more on logical decision-making. They do what makes sense for their business. So your data should prove how effective you are at solving their problems. 

To do this, try providing internal research results with data and statistics.

For example, imagine you’re a website developer that helps small businesses improve their conversion rates. You can provide case studies that show the methods and steps you used to optimize their website. 

Showing the rate at which their conversions increased can also help. These numbers will convince future prospects that you can deliver the same outcomes for them.

You can even explain the method you used to get your results. This information will make your business seem more transparent. Your customers will also believe you’re really looking out for their best interests.

Preparing numbers, charts, and graphs will convince your target audience to work with you. You’ll persuade them you can cut their costs and improve their efficiency.

If you can’t provide much through your findings now, you could try looking outward and interviewing experts in your industry. Even if these insights may not come from you, you’re still offering useful information to your audience.

That can also show how well-connected you are within your industry, building up your credibility and trustworthiness.

Bottom line: as long as your content is useful, your audience will choose to convert more. 

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 4: Create Unique Content 

B2C companies don’t get to have all the fun with their content. You can show your audience how enthusiastic you are about your offer, too. 

Rather than appearing childish or unprofessional, think about presenting your offer in a relatable way. For example, you can create content that emotionally appeals to your target audience.

Targeting your customers’ emotions works because buying is an emotional process. Sure, B2B content needs to be more logical and substantial, but that doesn’t negate the human aspect of buying.

Emotions help people bond and form connections with each other. They also compel people to take action. If you want people to buy your product or service, make sure you tap into their desires and concerns.

Another way to make your content more unique is by adding humor. Instead of distracting from your work, it’ll make your brand seem more approachable. For example, some businesses add GIFs or memes to their content. 

Since B2B content is more informational and instructional, injecting humor will add levity to your content. Your audience will thank you for lightening the mood.

Learn how to effectively add more humor and wit to your copywriting here.

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 5: Write For Humans And Evoke Emotions

Even though you’re writing “business to business,” you’re still writing for people. That means your content doesn’t always have to be dry or boring to be professional. It can be knowledgeable and entertaining at the same time.

Think about an appointment with a humorless doctor. Sure, you might respect them for their expertise — but it might be hard for you to trust them with all of your problems. 

You might even feel scared to reveal all of your concerns to them. What if they judge you? What if they think you’re asking dumb questions?

Nobody wants to work with a professional who makes them feel that way. People want someone with competence and a personality. 

That’s the balance you need to reach in your content — one that’s professional yet personable. It’ll make your audience not only respect you but also like you.

You can develop this kind of tone through storytelling. 

Storytelling is a great way to create a connection between you and your audience. You can use the emotional pulls you learned above to make the audience invested in your story. They’ll also be more likely to buy from you if they relate with brand, goals, vision, and mission.

For example, say you’re writing a case study for an e-commerce consulting business. Try showing the conflict and struggles your past clients went through before working with your brand. 

Maybe they tried all options available, but nothing worked. This kept happening until they feared for their company’s survival.

Then talk about how your business swept in and saved the day. Maybe you rebranded their products to make them more appealing. Your sales promotions might have generated a lot of attention and long-term customers. Regardless of what you did, show how your business solved their problems. 

After seeing this kind of story, your future customers will feel like you can help them in the same way. Taking them on this emotional journey will make them want to experience it for themselves. 

Again, buying is an emotional process. That means you can’t neglect the emotional aspect of your audience, no matter how high up the corporate ladder they are.

Of course, B2B content needs to be more meaningful and informative for your audience. Still, if you can write in a way that appeals to their emotions, you can build more trust and attachment with your audience. 

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 6: Write In A Way That’s Easy To Understand

Since you’re offering insights and analysis, your copy can be longer and more technical. That doesn’t mean your audience will want to read dense text packed with industry jargon.

You still want to use the right terms when appropriate, though. Don’t fill your content with industry-specific terms for no reason. It’ll look like you’re cheating for higher SEO rankings.

Write your content with more simple language and it'll be much more accessible and digestible.

That’s not to say you shouldn’t be technical when you need to. After all, you’re providing hard data to educate your prospects. Just don’t pack them in for the sake of sounding more professional. That’ll make you sound like you don’t know much about your industry. 

If you can explain complicated topics in a simple way, that means you have a deep understanding of the subject. It’ll boost your credibility as a valuable source for readers.

It’s also important to be direct. You don't need to use fancy prose to lure your audience. If anything, that can make your business seem over-indulgent and unhelpful.

By writing in a direct manner, you’ll show readers that you understand them as a business owner yourself. Showing this kind of respect to customers will make them respect you.

Learn how to proofread and self-edit for better copywriting here.

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 7: Reuse Old Content

Now that you’ve learned how to make compelling B2B content, you don’t have to trash everything you’ve already created. In fact, the content you already released can still be useful.

As your analytics show, some of your old content already won you some customers. Don’t stop there. You can update and repurpose your old content through a content audit.

Analyze your old content. Which pieces of content get the most traffic, engagement, and shares? In what format? A content audit can show you which content you should create more of and which you shouldn’t.

For example, maybe your brand’s forte is explanatory videos on YouTube. Try to analyze why these kinds of content were so effective.

Maybe your company’s spokesperson has the right personality to draw in your audience and keep them hooked. Or you might explain the information in detailed and easy-to-follow ways. 

Regardless, these results will show you which kinds of content your audience likes best.

Remember, you don’t have to create long-form blog posts or webinars just because everyone else does. If your audience isn’t interested in that content, don’t waste time on it.

Instead, focus on what works for your company and audience. Ignore the rest.

How To Write Exceptional B2B Content Step 8: Stick To A Content Distribution Plan

You can’t only create good content. You also have to distribute it in a timely manner.

Consistency is a great way of building a long-term relationship with your customer. If you can provide helpful content on a regular basis, your customers will consider your business trustworthy and reliable. 

The catch is that this requires a plan. 

To start off, how often do you plan on releasing content?

If you haven’t thought about it yet, once a week is a great pace to start. Once you’ve settled into this routine, you can start increasing the content and the rate you release it.

Then determine where you want to release your content. Are you going to do it on your website? Will you promote it through Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Reddit, or YouTube?

Think back on the content your audience wants to see from the point above. 

That’ll help you figure out where you should publish your content for the most views and engagement.

If you run out of content ideas, go back to your content audit and look for things you can update and reuse in the previous stop.

The important thing is to be consistent. Releasing your content on a set schedule will show your audience what they can expect from your business.

Use These Steps To Make Your B2B Content Exceptional

As you can see, B2B content doesn't have to be stiff or boring. You can infuse it with levity to get customers engaged with your business.

If you’re not creating exceptional B2B content like this, you might be putting your audience off from doing business with you.

Your target audience is other businesses, sure. That doesn’t mean humans aren’t behind them. The key to exceptional content is giving it a personal touch. 

You can make your audience laugh and smile with your content. That’ll make them more attached to your brand and increase the chance they’ll become customers. 

By creating positive emotions in your audience, you can show that you understand, relate to, and can help them.

These steps will help you provide content that stands out. This will not only improve your content but also your brand’s marketing efforts. 

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