B2B marketing is no longer "how to sell", but to think from the perspective of "how will customers buy" and provide the customers with the answers they want through content. FocusVision's research found that 70% of B2B customers prefer to find content directly from the supplier's website, where they can freely choose specific topics and industry content to research and make decisions. Bright data shows that marketing segmentation can double the chances to communicate with customers, reduce customer loss by 8%, and increase revenue by 64%.

There are four stages from the process of which leads to customer purchase decision as follows:

Step one: Recognition of needs and wants

At this stage, marketing content should be distributed through channels that gather targeted traffic and potential customer groups, such as search engines, social media, Zhihu, video accounts, etc. Thus, the main purpose of content construction at this stage is to stimulate demand and gain initial trust, convince buyers of the importance of solving current problems, understand customers’ real business needs and pain points, and highlight the solutions availables. 

Step two: Evaluation of choices

At this stage, customers have various choices and will start to evaluate each choice. Customers will know what is needed and begin to compare the products on the market, hoping to find the most suitable option for them.

Step three: Decision making

At this stage, the sales team is the main role, and the content at this time mostly appears in the role of auxiliary orders. Many companies ignore the impact and role of content at this stage, thus missing out on huge opportunities. The most critical feature to enter the decision making process is the need to have a deep understanding of the manufacturers and products, and minimize risks of purchase.

Step four: Loyalty

For SaaS companies, customer retention is an important performance indicator, and customer success plays a major role at this stage. Correspondingly, many SaaS companies have begun to gradually increase the marketing capabilities of their customer success teams, and to optimize the overall customer experience of using the product.