4 Ways B2B Firms Can Provide Value & Create Urgency with Interactive Content

Whatever service your B2B business provides, your success depends on communicating a sense of urgency. Though your buy cycle can go on for months, your website needs to communicate to your prospects that they have come to the right place and you have what they need. And, if your prospects keep coming back, all the better.

As the B2B tech market has grown more competitive, more companies are reaching beyond the typical mix of blog posts, solutions pages, and news updates in their content. By creating interactive, timely features, your website can provide your prospects with a shareable resource to keep users engaged and coming back for more.

Thoughtfully designed interactive content doesn’t have to be overtly tied with your products or solutions to be effective. Some of the most engaging features focus primarily on providing relevant, valued information around issues tied to their industry. Then, once your firm is established as an essential resource, your site can surface how your services can resolve important issues.

An interactive feature can build upon your company’s reputation while placing your offerings in a meaningful context for customers. Consider these three examples:

How a Risk Management Firm Provides Valuable Content That is Related to Its Services

With a focus on statistical probabilities and catastrophe models, risk management firms can be associated with dry, technical content.

However, when placed in the context of current events, your marketing takes on a fresh sense of urgency. With the right design approach that evokes one of biggest entertainment platforms, you can highlight your firm’s value proposition in a way that’s engaging and vibrant to customers.

RMS Curated: The ‘Netflix’ of Timely Climate Updates

A risk management company assessing the likelihood and potential impact of disasters, RMS promotes their products through a new angle with RMS Curated. Instead of directly focusing on their services, RMS Curated uses current events to cast their offerings in a new light.

At the top, the page offers users an option to further curate their experience by subscribing to topics targeted to their interests. Focused on mitigating losses to catastrophic events, RMS surfaces content around hot topics such as cyber crimes, climate change, and the pandemic. As climate change-related events such as wildfires and hurricanes occur, RMS can quickly surface related content with a relevant connection to their services.
With a list of headings that feature lateral scrolling thumbnails, RMS Curated echoes another familiar digital resource: Netflix. To further underscore the visual connection, the firm offers a video “Coffee Series” that echoes Netflix’s “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.”

Though risk management’s customer base traditionally skews older, it’s getting younger. By remaining mindful of their evolving audience, RMS delivers curated information that promotes their offerings in a way that’s both relevant and familiar.

A Network Security Firm Extends Its Brand’s Reach With a Shareable Resource

Network security is a constant priority for IT professionals, who need to be up-to-speed on the latest threats. However, with the advance of technology, digital privacy is a topical issue for a far-reaching audience.

When your firm provides a crucial service, the insights your teams can offer grows even more valuable. By designing a page that recalls destinations where your users acquire equally valued, trusted information, you can create a resource your customers – and other interested users – will return to again and again.

Palo Alto Networks’ Unit 42: Building an Authoritative Presence

Just as RMS looks to streaming services as a design inspiration, you can use cues from other industries to inform your interactive features. In the security industry, an interactive page that evokes design norms of media companies provides additional urgency for a B2B firm’s content.

For years, Palo Alto Networks’ threat intelligence team Unit 42 has enjoyed a strong reputation for repairing security breaches. Unit 42 has built such a following that it’s grown into a strong, standalone sub-brand in the security industry.

From its branding and graphic approaches, Unit 42’s page stands apart from its parent company. Reaction data, reading time estimates, and a chart of trending topics draw further connections to the user experience of a media outlet. As users mouse over, subtle motion graphics supply further interactivity to increase engagement.

Featuring a link to Unit 42’s podcast and an assortment of articles, threat assessments, and briefs, the page is a standalone security resource that’s used by both the industry and the media. Though providing a standalone experience, the page remains aligned with Palo Alto Networks through email signups and references to the company’s solutions within individual articles.

By capitalizing on your position in the industry, you can create a vital resource that also contributes to lead generation. And, with consistent updates to the page, you further encourage users inside and outside of your target audience to keep coming back and further your brand’s reach.

How a Virus Protection Specialist Provides a Risk Level Assessment to Customers

To do their jobs properly, IT teams need to know about the latest virus threats and defense strategies. Given the value of their services, antivirus firms have a unique opportunity to use their content to present information about the latest problems their customers need to address. And, in the process, highlight the solutions they provide.

Even if your firm primarily creates blog content, you can shift the way your articles display to communicate a greater sense of urgency.

McAfee Threat Center: Timely Information in an Engaging Format

As one of the biggest names in security, McAfee has an audience that consists of existing customers, IT professionals, and the media. Along with longer-form blog content, their recently redesigned threat center identifies security issues of note in an eye-catching chart at the center of the page.

By providing a ranking of the latest cybersecurity threats, McAfee underscores that their page is offering the latest content their audience needs. Plus, upon clicking through a threat, users receive more detailed information about where and how the malware was discovered and its global presence.

Most importantly, each threat and its prescribed prevention are tied with McAfee’s product, MVISION Insights. Though providing news the firm’s customers can use, the page offers a plainly visible explanation of their software, its capabilities, and an opportunity for a demo.

Though functioning as an informative resource for any user, the page is driven toward the message that you can resolve critical issues with McAfee’s solution.

When you can illustrate how your firm’s products resolve an ongoing, pressing problem for your prospects, the sales process grows that much easier.

A Cloud Security Firm Underscores the Scope of Its Solution

Any technology professional understands that security threats can arrive at any time and from any source. However, when your firm can provide a compelling visualization of the constant, ever-changing demands for digital protections, you draw a closer connection with your customers.

In security, only the latest information matters. Effective interactive design allows you to communicate that your firm operates at the pace your customers need.

Imperva: Security Threats in Motion

Users want to see content that’s both current and applicable to their problems. Though displaying immediate security updates is a massive undertaking, the cloud security firm Imperva provides a close approximation of a to-the-minute experience with its Cyber Threat Attack Map.

With color-coded animations, Imperva’s feature displays detected automated threats around the world. As security issues migrate between nations such as the U.S. to Singapore and Russia to Peru, a chart describing the nature of the threat and the impacted industry displays below. In the process, the firm’s audience gains a sense of the constant presence of security threats worldwide.

Though the page clearly indicates the map is a compilation of data from days ago, the dynamic animations feel as if they display in real time and offer a shareable resource. And the underlying message to their customers is clear: Security issues are all around us and remain a constant threat.

Key Takeaways for Building Urgency With Interactive Website Content

All your marketing efforts are built upon attracting customers to your website. However, by focusing on the vital ways your firm provides a solution to their problems , you create a sense of urgency that underscores the value of your solutions.

Consider the following guidelines when aiming to draw a closer connection with your prospects through interactive content:

• Build a resource that feels essential, engaging, and current. Repeat visitors are more likely to have your firm in mind during a long sales cycle.
• Gain trust by staying ahead of the curve. Consistently creating new content that reflects current events demonstrates that your firm is staying on top of a quickly changing industry
• Connect with your audience before they are even in the market for your services. Presenting content that demonstrates value to users who are not yet potential customers will build your brand reputation over time.

Of course, the range of possibilities with interactive features doesn’t mean you should abandon more static content like your blog. But when you can develop a resource that promises a dynamic, immediate experience, your customers will follow again and again.