The Zero Moment of Truth for B2B Software Companies

What is the Zero Moment Of Truth?

Have you ever read a review for a beauty product? Or gone on Yelp to search for a good restaurant near you? This experience that you and thousands of people everyday go through is the Zero Moment of Truth.  The Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT) describes the online interactions between a consumer and a product, when the customers read reviews and compare options online.  Many consumers make their first impression, and ultimately their purchasing decision when they encounter the product online.

Companies that understand and take advantage of the ZMOT work on improving their interactions with customers and making themselves and their products as visible as possible.
Many customers today are increasingly relying on research and word of mouth to educate themselves on purchasing and making the best purchase possible. Therefore, customers are using tools such as mobile phones, customer review websites and price scanning apps to learn even before they go to the store. To take advantage of this new trend in customer behavior, companies must make themselves more available. In short, taking advantage of the Zero Moment of Truth allows companies to place themselves in the process between customer research and the purchasing decision.

ZMOT for the B2B Software Company

As a B2B software company, what can you take away from Winning at the Zero Moment of Truth? First, the benefits of understanding ZMOT are not solely meant for B2C companies; the advantages can extend to B2B companies as well. Software companies can take many of the principles given in Google’s Zero Moment of Truth and apply it to their applications.

Help Your Leads Find You:
One of the key strategies that Google describes is to understand when or where customers experience their Zero Moment of Truth. For consumers, this is mostly online; but your leads are still fundamentally consumers who do most of their research online as well. Knowing this, you should consider how they might find you online. When they enter common search terms for your industry into Google, do you appear on the first page? When they search a community like Spiceworks or Quora, do you have a presence? If you fail in these areas, your prospects may not know you exist and will be less likely to inquire about your products.

If your leads are still consumers, they are more complicated because they are a group of consumers. Due to a longer buying cycle and more decision markers, this makes the ZMOT important in a different way. Rather than thinking of the ZMOT as a single moment, consider how many ZMOTs occur in your buying cycle: in many cases there will be two or more, as every significant decision maker involved in the purchase will have their own ZMOT.

But the general principle is the same: when a customer receives a stimulus, he or she will conduct research to determine which company provides the best solution. It is critical that B2B companies place themselves in this process through the platforms and channels that their customers occupy. By influencing the conversation between stimulus and ZMOT, customers will be contemplating your solution as they make their purchasing decision. If anything, take ZMOT’s emphasis on taking advantage of trending customer behavior, and apply it with the understanding of your specific prospect behaviors.

Optimization:
A critical question that Google’s e-book addresses is how to show up more in customer’s search engine results.  Once companies are able to understand where their ZMOT occurs, they can take steps towards influencing the conversations between the company and the consumer. By optimizing certain channels and making content accessible to users, companies are able to facilitate the customer’s ZMOT process.

For B2B companies, the general principles of optimization can be implemented with regards to their applications. Engaging in social media and creating quality content are ideal methods to organically grow brand awareness. In addition, your company can optimize your own application to draw more attention. With proper landing page design, emails and other marketing campaigns, representatives can increase availability, forming impressions and relationships with leads. With subsequent, successful campaigns, your leads will constantly have your company’s name in mind.

Bill.com: A Case Study

Lets take the example of Bill.com, a web-based financial solutions company, and how they can implement ZMOT practices into their marketing campaigns.  Bill.com possesses a blog on extensive topics, ranging from case studies to financial tips and tricks. However, they have very little comments, retweets, Facebook likes, or other indicators that show that they’re reaching their audience across other channels. Although Bill.com has a presence in channels through which ZMOT can occur, there isn’t a lot of conversation occurring in these mediums. What more can Bill.com do to achieve ZMOT?

First, they can optimize their online presence  to increase their visibility. Tips include reviewing search traffic for popular search terms among new leads and looking for ways to rank higher through SEO or PPC efforts. In addition, a key principle of ZMOT is to stay on top of recent, trending issues, to influence dialogue amongst customers. For Bill.com, they might watch for these stories on Twitter, etc. and promote their financial solutions and quickly address the situations as they arise. This will get customers and perspective leads talking about their brand. By staying abreast of trending topics and placing themselves in front of customers, Bill.com can raise the chances that customers experience the critical Zero Moment of Truth.

Conclusion

With customer reliance on internet searches and reviews, it becomes more and more important to understand the Zero Moment of Truth. Through basic principles and practices encouraged by ZMOT, B2B companies can create a framework to facilitate leads and sales.