by Elizabeth Hines | Aug 12, 2026 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in July 2016 and has been updated for 2026 with new research on how B2B buyers use social media, peer reviews, and AI to research vendors.
When we first wrote this post, the big news was that B2B buyers had started using social media to research vendors. That’s no longer news. Today’s buyers move between LinkedIn, YouTube, peer reviews, industry communities, and AI tools like ChatGPT before they ever talk to a salesperson. And by the time they do reach out, most have already decided who they like.
Here, we walk you through what the latest research says about how B2B buyers research vendors, which channels matter most, and what supply chain, logistics, and manufacturing companies should do about it.
Quick answer: do B2B buyers use social media to research vendors?
Yes. Social media is one of several channels B2B buyers use to research vendors, alongside peer reviews, word of mouth, and increasingly AI tools. LinkedIn’s research found that nearly two-thirds of B2B buyers say social video helps shape their buying decisions. Buyers also do most of their research on their own, so your social presence is often how they first judge whether you’re credible.
Buyers do most of their research before they talk to you
The biggest shift in B2B buying is how much happens without you. In the 6sense 2025 B2B Buyer Experience Report, which surveyed nearly 4,000 buyers:
- Buyers made first contact with sellers about 61% of the way through their buying journey.
- Buyers, not sellers, initiated 79% of engagements.
- 94% of buyers had already ranked their shortlist by preference before engaging sellers.
- The vendor that won the selection phase went on to win the deal 77% of the time.
In other words, buyers are forming opinions about your company long before your sales team gets a chance to make its case. Social media, your website, reviews, and AI answers are doing that selling for you, whether you’re managing them or not.
How B2B buyers use social media today
LinkedIn is still the center of B2B social
For supply chain companies, LinkedIn is where buyers, partners, and future employees are most likely to see you. Buyers use it to check out your company page, see what your leaders are posting, find out who they know at your company, and get a feel for your expertise. A quiet or outdated LinkedIn presence sends a signal, and it’s not a good one.
Video is shaping buying decisions
Video has become one of the most influential formats in B2B. According to the LinkedIn B2B Institute, nearly two-thirds of B2B buyers say social video helps shape their buying decisions. The same research found that vendors known across the whole buying group from the start are 20 times more likely to be bought than those known only through an expert recommendation.
For supply chain companies, video is a natural fit: facility tours, equipment demos, customer stories, and short explainers from your own experts all help buyers see what working with you would actually be like.
Peers and reviews still carry weight
B2B buyers trust other buyers. TrustRadius’s 2026 B2B Buying Disconnect report found that most buyers consult customer reviews during their purchase journey and more than half speak with a peer along the way. Industry groups, LinkedIn conversations, and word of mouth from people buyers already trust remain some of the strongest influences on a shortlist.
AI is now part of the research process, too
The newest research channel is AI. Forrester reports that 94% of business buyers now use AI in their buying process. And in G2’s 2026 research, 51% of B2B software buyers said they start their research with an AI chatbot more often than with Google, up from 29% a year earlier.
That matters for social media, too. AI tools pull from what’s published about you across the web, including your LinkedIn presence, reviews, and mentions in industry publications. A consistent, active presence makes it easier for AI tools to understand and recommend your company. Here’s more on how logistics companies get recommended by ChatGPT and AI search.
What buyers expect when they find you
Whether a buyer finds you on LinkedIn, through a peer, or in an AI answer, they’re looking for the same things:
- Proof you understand their world. Content that speaks to their specific industry, challenges, and terminology.
- Real expertise. Insight from people at your company, not just promotional posts.
- Evidence. Case studies, customer stories, and specifics that back up your claims.
- Consistency. The same story on your website, LinkedIn, review sites, and sales conversations.
- A fast response. When they finally reach out, they expect to hear back quickly. Here’s why lead response time matters so much.
How supply chain companies can show up where buyers research
- Keep your LinkedIn company page current. Update your description, services, locations, and featured content so it matches your website. For logistics-specific guidance, see how to use social media in transportation and logistics.
- Get your experts posting. Posts from real people at your company often reach more buyers than company page posts. Your team members can be some of your best brand ambassadors.
- Invest in short video. Facility walkthroughs, project highlights, and quick tips from your team give buyers a reason to stop scrolling.
- Ask happy customers for reviews and referrals. Make it easy for satisfied customers to vouch for you on Google, LinkedIn, and industry directories.
- Show up in industry conversations. Comment on trade publication posts, participate in association groups, and share takeaways from trade shows.
- Connect social to your pipeline. Track how social and AI referrals turn into website visits, leads, and opportunities in your CRM.
Questions we’ve gotten about B2B buyers and social media
Q: Which social media platform is best for B2B supply chain companies?
A: For most supply chain, logistics, and manufacturing companies, LinkedIn is the top priority because that’s where buyers, partners, and candidates spend time professionally. YouTube is a strong second for video content like facility tours and demos.
Q: Do B2B buyers really make decisions based on social media?
A: Social media rarely closes a deal on its own, but it shapes which vendors make the shortlist. Since buyers do most of their research before contacting sellers, your social presence often forms their first impression of your company.
Q: Should our employees post on LinkedIn or just the company page?
A: Both. The company page is your official presence, but posts from real people, especially leaders and subject matter experts, tend to earn more engagement and trust.
Q: How does social media affect AI search?
A: AI tools draw on information published across the web, including professional profiles, reviews, and industry mentions. A consistent, active presence helps AI tools understand what your company does and makes it more likely you’ll be recommended.
Want to reach more buyers where they research?
Fronetics works exclusively with supply chain, logistics, and manufacturing companies, and we help clients build a presence on LinkedIn, in search, and in AI answers that turns researchers into buyers. Get in touch to talk about where your buyers are finding you.
Related posts:
by Elizabeth Hines | Jan 16, 2019 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Supply Chain
Updated February 4, 2025
Digital marketing for the supply chain has become necessary to position your company to not only be found online, but also to be researched and to be compared to your competition.
Highlights:
- Digital marketing uses your website, related social media, and other online industry channels to showcase your industry knowledge and experience.
- Thought leaders are the informed trusted sources in their field of expertise.
- Supply chain and logistics industries need content marketing to achieve confidence and relationship-building with buyers.
Today’s B2B buyers are researching, evaluating, and coming to conclusions about companies without a single contact with a team member or salesperson.
This kind of B2B buying landscape requires cutting edge marketing strategies to showcase nut-and-bolt industries that have survived without them for many years.
Digital marketing for the supply chain
Digital marketing for the supply chain uses your website, related social media, and other online industry channels to showcase your industry knowledge and experience (rather than trying to convince people of it with a marketing message).
With inbound digital marketing, you publish relevant, informative information to adds value to every stage of a potential customer’s buying journey.
It is the content that you publish that walks them through the initial stages of the sales process.
What should you publish? A good content marketing strategy is about understanding the questions and concerns that are particular to your customer base, and offering quality information and analysis that answers those needs.
Showcasing thought leadership through digital marketing
Discovering and meeting the needs of your customers that go beyond your products and services will catapult you in their minds as a knowledgeable, helpful “thought leader” in your industry.
Thought leaders are the informed trusted sources in their field of expertise. They have innovative ideas, can showcase their thinking, and can replicate their successes again and again.
Consider it: Your business has so much more to offer than its primary product or service. You have a team of people with a tremendous aggregate of experience, expertise, and perspectives.
Allowing your customers this sort of access to your team’s experience and knowledge provides them with tremendous value outside the sales funnel, which builds trust and cultivates lasting, fruitful relationships.
Why digital marketing?
In this B2B buying landscape, supply chain and logistics industries need content marketing to achieve a level of confidence and relationship-building with buyers that used to come from face-to-face meetings. Potential and current customers will view your company as a valuable resource for everything related to not only your products and services but to the industry as a whole.
No time to execute?
The downside? Content marketing requires significant time, labor, and resources, and it can take quite some time to start reaping benefits. Feeling overwhelmed and like you and your team can’t possibly add on more marketing? Outsourcing certain key marketing tasks allows insourcing your core competencies while delegating specialized tasks to external experts.
This post originally appeared on EBN Online.
Related posts:
by Elizabeth Hines | Nov 1, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Manufacturing & Distribution, Marketing, Supply Chain
Case studies are a perfect way to organize and present hard facts about your products and services — and they continue to be one of the most effective types of content out there.
A recent study shows that case studies far outperform other types of content. The DemandGen 2017 Content Preferences Survey Report found that 78% of B2B buyers used vendor case studies as part of their purchasing decisions in the past 12 months. 89% of B2B marketers consider customer testimonials and case studies to be the most effective kind of content to convert buyers.
Buyers are looking to “benchmark their own experiences against others who’ve tackled similar challenges,” concluded DemandGen’s report. Data is powerful stuff, and buyers know it. In fact, DemandGen’s survey indicated 48% of buyers not only prefer case studies but find them to be the most valuable type of content for research. 57% even said that they would register and share information in exchange for case studies.
Why the case study?
Beyond the obvious answer that data is important to buyers, why do they respond so well to this type of content? According to Frank Cespedes, Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School and author of Aligning Strategy and Sales, ultimately, buyers are less interested in theory than practice: “Buyers, especially B2B buyers, want to know what others are doing with your product, not what they might do to improve productivity or other outcomes.”
As a side-note, before you jump ship on aspects of your content marketing strategy, like blogs, social media, webinars, etc., that focus on sharing ideas rather than just data, consider this: even the most impactful case study is only as useful as the totality of your brand’s content. In other words, yes, case studies are highly effective, but their success is predicated on your reputation as a thought leader and source of knowledge and expertise.
What makes a case study effective?
Not all case studies are created equal. Data presented in a confusing or incomplete way, for example, doesn’t pack the kind of punch needed to demonstrate exactly how your products and services help your buyers. A good case study should prompt the reader to explore your brand and the rest of your content. Ultimately, the goal is to show your prospect that making a change in their process will lead to better results.
As you design a case study, think about giving buyers the tools to present your products and services to decision-makers within their business. “Especially in B2B contexts,” says Cespedes, “buyers must justify a decision to others in the organization who have competing priorities for limited funds.” This is where a compelling case study comes in. Show your potential buyers how other organizations benefit from your offerings, and they have the tools to make a case for your business.
Case studies are proven to be well worth the time and energy needed to produce them. Recommendations and data from real customers have a powerful impact and should continue to be a significant component of your overall content marketing strategy.
Related posts:
by Elizabeth Hines | Aug 27, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
Repurposed and repackaged, your existing content is a valuable asset for your sales force throughout the buyer’s journey.
If you’re a supply chain marketing professional, it’s likely that you spend a tremendous portion of your day researching, creating, packaging, and disseminating content. Your hard work is all about growing brand awareness and building your reputation as a trusted industry thought-leader — all with the goal of having that work eventually convert leads.
But, consider this: When it comes to engaging prospects and clients, only 20% of salespeople actually use content. When we know that potential buyers are far more willing to engage with someone offering them information and insight, why are B2B businesses abandoning content as soon as prospects are handed over to sales?
B2B buyers prefer content throughout the buying journey
According to DemandGen’s 2018 Content Preferences Survey Report, “Buyers are becoming increasingly more selective in the content they are consuming,” relying more on “trustworthy sources, industry influencers, and their peers to educate themselves.” And furthermore, 88% of those survey respondents want less focus on product specifics and more on the value that product can bring to their business.
And on the other side of that coin, according to HubSpot writer and marketing expert Bethany Cartwright, sales reps spend about 15% of their day leaving voicemails, and only about 20% of all sales emails are ever opened. “This means 80-85% of sales outreach efforts are going unnoticed by those prospects you’ve worked so hard to capture with content,” writes Cartwright.
It’s time to start leveraging your content throughout the buyer’s journey by arming your sales force with content. Before you panic at the idea of creating reams of new content, take a breath. It’s more than likely that you can repurpose your existing content, optimized to give your sales force the tools they need to close deals.
So how do you go about repurposing your content and giving your sales force the best possible tools with which to convert prospects to buyers? Web Profits co-founder and author Sujan Patel suggests “mapping content generated by your marketing team to each stage of your customer’s buying journey.” We’ve created the infographic below to help you optimize content for each of the three stages of the buyer’s journey.
Infographic: Delivering content throughout the buyer’s journey
(Made with Canva)
Related posts:
by Elizabeth Hines | May 3, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
If you’re looking to grow brand awareness fast, here are 8 tricks to boost your efforts.
Have you ever noticed how some brands seem to have crept into popularity overnight? You’ve never heard of them, and then, all of sudden, they’re everywhere.
Their brand awareness has sky rocketed, and they’re achieving every company’s ultimate goal: Customers know about them. So what’s their secret?
Here at Fronetics, we don’t believe they have a secret. We believe that they took advantage of content marketing and its many benefits — growing brand awareness included. They were able to scale their growth in a short amount of time, a true success story for the digital era. Companies like Uber and Yelp have used these tips to implement small changes that yielded large results.
Remember, in order to grow brand awareness, you need to be proactive. It’s time to steer away from some of the traditional marketing methods, which don’t take into account how modern B2B buyers research vendors. Start putting your content marketing strategy to the test.
If you’re looking to increase your brand awareness fast, there’s no better place to start than with content marketing. Check out these 8 tips for using content marketing to grow your brand awareness fast.
Infographic: 8 ways to grow brand awareness fast
(Made with Canva)
How do you grow brand awareness fast?
Related posts:
