B2B marketing
Your B2B
30-day plan.
Spend the first week with sales, not on ads: agree what a qualified lead is and make sure every form keeps the click ID, because Google's bidding works best with at least 15 conversions a month on the stage you bid to, as Google recommends. Week two fixes the pages a buying group reads. Week three makes you easy to find and check in Google, Bing and AI tools. Week four starts demand: one search campaign, one LinkedIn test, and outreach only to people you can show consent records for.
Written by Dan Picken, a marketer who checks the sources. Last checked 2 November 2026.Why B2B starts
with sales.
A local business can run an ad on Monday and count the phone calls by Friday. B2B can't. The deal from this month's lead may close next quarter, and the person who filled in the form may not be the one who signs. If you launch ads before marketing and sales agree what a good lead looks like, the first month's data teaches the platforms the wrong lesson.
That's why the plan starts with definitions and tracking. Google's value-based bidding works best with a stage that happens soon after the click, with at least 15 a month, uploaded daily, so the stage you'll bid to has to exist, be named and be recorded from day one. Then the website, then visibility, then spend.
Your B2B 30 days
Twenty tasks.
Tick as you go.
Four weeks, five tasks each, with who owns it. Ticks are saved in this browser only, so you can come back to it.
Done
0 / 20
Next up
Week one:
agree what counts.
Sit down with whoever sells and write four stage names with a sentence each. 'Qualified' is the one that matters: something like 'right size, right industry, has a problem we solve, and agreed to a second call'. If sales won't sign it off, nothing downstream will be trusted.
Then test every form from an ad click. For Google, auto-tagging has to be on and the GCLID stored exactly, since it's case-sensitive. Do the same for the LinkedIn click ID and UTM tags. While you're in analytics, set up a view of AI referrals: ChatGPT adds utm_source=chatgpt.com to the links it sends, though since October 2026 many clicks arrive untagged. It still gives you a baseline before you change anything.
Last, list where last year's won deals came from. It's often the most useful hour of the month: it tells you your real sales cycle and which channels already work, before you spend a dollar.
Week two:
pages for the group.
Most of a B2B purchase is researched by people you never speak to. The buying group page covers who they are. This week, give each of them an answer: a price range or what drives the cost for finance, a 'who we suit, and who we don't' section for the person shortlisting, and a page for procurement and IT with your ABN, insurances, where data is stored and how you handle security.
Then read the site with a salesperson and fix anything that's out of step with what they say on calls. And set a same-day reply rule for enquiries, with a named person. A buyer who contacts you has usually shortlisted you already; a slow reply is the easiest way to drop off that list.
Google's guidance on helpful content asks who made a page, how and why. A B2B site that answers those for each member of the buying group is doing SEO and sales enablement at the same time.
Week three:
found and checkable.
Verify Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools if you haven't. Both are free, and both now report AI visibility: Search Console has a generative AI performance report, and Bing shows when Copilot and Bing's AI summaries cite your pages. Then run the AI shortlist test and write down where you're named.
Ask three recent customers for a review on the site your buyers read. TrustRadius found 77% of technology buyers read user reviews during a purchase. Make your company description the same on the website, LinkedIn and every directory.
Finish with the privacy policy. If you upload customer lists to ad platforms, say so. From 10 December 2026, privacy policies must disclose certain automated decisions, so ask your adviser whether any lead scoring you use is in scope. The B2B marketing rules page has the rest.
Week four:
start demand, carefully.
Clean the outreach list first. The ACMA expects consent records to show how consent was obtained, the terms that applied and when. Anyone you can't account for comes off, including names from a bought list.
Then run two small tests. One Google Search campaign on problem and comparison searches, with negatives for job seekers and students, counting the qualified stage from week one. One LinkedIn ad that sponsors a useful post from a named person through Thought Leader Ads, aimed at the audience from your one-line ideal customer. LinkedIn needs at least 300 matched members to run, and you'll want far more.
End the month with a 30-minute pipeline review: every lead, whether it became qualified, and why not. Pick one test for next quarter and a date to judge it.
After
day 30.
Repeat the pipeline review monthly and judge channels quarterly. Send qualified leads back to the ad platforms so bidding learns, as covered in connecting your CRM to your ads, and use the budget planner to decide what next quarter can afford.
What I see most often
What I'd check first
in a B2B team's first month.
- 1
No agreed meaning of 'qualified'
Marketing and sales each use the word, and mean different things, so the reports and the CRM never match.
- 2
Ads live before tracking
Campaigns launched in week one, with forms that drop the click ID, so the first month's spend can't be traced to a single deal.
- 3
A plan with no owners
A list of tasks with nobody's name on them, where the sales half never gets done.
The honest bit. Thirty days won't fill a B2B pipeline when your sales cycle is four months long. What it does is make sure that when the deals arrive, you can see where they came from, and that next month's budget goes to the channel that earned it.
Questions
people ask.
What should a B2B marketing plan include?
A clear ideal customer, agreed lead stages with sales, tracking that keeps click IDs, pages for each member of the buying group, and a small number of tests judged on qualified pipeline over a quarter.
How long before B2B marketing shows results?
Leads can arrive in weeks, but deals follow your sales cycle, often months. Judge the first month on qualified leads, and channels over a quarter.
How many conversions does Google Ads need for B2B bidding?
Google's value-based bidding guidance suggests at least 15 a month on the stage you bid to. If won deals are rarer than that, bid to an earlier stage.
Should a B2B company start with LinkedIn or Google Ads?
Often both, small. Google captures people already searching; LinkedIn reaches the right roles before they search. Start with whichever your won deals point to, and keep the test running for a quarter.
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