B2B Marketing Benchmarks You Need to Know in 2024

B2B marketing benchmarks provide insights into the effectiveness of your B2B digital marketing strategy, helping you identify areas of success and make the most of your marketing budgets.

B2B marketing benchmarks are key performance indicators that provide insights into the effectiveness of marketing strategies and campaigns in the business-to-business sector. These benchmarks typically include metrics such as lead generation rates, conversion rates, customer acquisition costs, and return on investment (ROI).

This article explains what B2B marketing benchmarks are, why they are important, and how to use them to optimize your sales funnel and make informed decisions.

What Is a B2B Marketing Benchmark?

A B2B marketing benchmark is a standard used to measure how well B2B marketing efforts are doing compared to others.

These benchmarks typically include key performance indicators (KPIs) and metrics commonly used to evaluate the effectiveness of marketing campaigns, strategies, and tactics within the business-to-business sector.

B2B marketing benchmarks provide insights into industry standards and trends, allowing companies to compare their performance against competitors or established norms.

By analyzing these benchmarks, B2B marketers can identify areas of strength and weakness, set realistic goals, optimize their marketing efforts, and track progress over time.

Continue reading this page to get familiar with important B2B marketing benchmarks and KPIs.

Email Marketing Benchmarks

Email marketing benchmarks are key performance indicators used to evaluate the effectiveness of email marketing campaigns. These benchmarks provide insights into how well email campaigns perform relative to industry standards or best practices.

Here are some common email marketing benchmarks:

• Open Rate: The percentage of recipients who open an email out of the total number of emails delivered.
• Click-Through Rate (CTR): The percentage of recipients who click on links within an email out of the total number of emails delivered.
• Conversion Rate: The percentage of recipients who complete a desired action, such as purchasing, after clicking on a link within an email.
• Bounce Rate: The percentage of emails not successfully delivered to recipients’ inboxes due to invalid addresses, etc.
• Unsubscribe Rate: The percentage of recipients who opt out of receiving future emails.
• List Growth Rate: The rate at which your email list grows over time, typically measured as a percentage increase.
• Click-to-Open Rate (CTOR): The percentage of recipients who clicked on a link within an email relative to the number of recipients who opened the email.
• Forward Rate: The percentage of recipients who forward an email to someone else after receiving it.
• Spam Complaint Rate: The percentage of recipients who mark an email as spam or junk.
• Revenue per Email: The revenue generated from a specific email campaign is divided by the number of emails sent.
• Inbox Placement Rate: The percentage of emails that successfully reach recipients’ inboxes.

These benchmarks can vary depending on factors such as industry, target audience, and the type of email campaign.

By tracking and analyzing these metrics, email marketers can gain insights into their campaigns‘ performance and optimize their email marketing strategies for better results.

Website Traffic Benchmarks

In the B2B context, website traffic can provide insights into potential business customers‘ interests and engagement levels.

By tracking website traffic over time and analyzing trends, B2B marketers can assess the impact of their marketing campaigns, content strategies, SEO efforts, and other initiatives to drive website traffic.

Website traffic benchmarks include:

• Total Visits: The total number of visits to your website within a period.
• Unique Visitors: The number of distinct individuals who visit your website within a period.
• Page views: The total number of pages viewed on your website within a period.
• Pages per Session: The average number of pages viewed during a single session on your website.
• Average Session Duration: The average time visitors spend on your website during a single session.
• Bounce Rate: The percentage of visitors who navigate away from your website after viewing only one page.
• Traffic Sources: The channels through which visitors arrive at your website, such as organic search, direct traffic, referral traffic, social media, or paid advertising.
• Organic Search Traffic: The number of website visits originating from unpaid search engine results.
• Referral Traffic: The number of visits to your website from external sources, such as other websites.
• Direct Traffic: The number of visits to your website that come from users directly typing your website URL into their browser.
• Social Media Traffic: The number of visits to your website that originate from social media.
• Mobile vs. Desktop Traffic: The proportion of website visitors accessing your site from mobile devices versus desktop PCs.
• New vs. Returning Visitors: The percentage of new visitors to your website versus those who have visited before.

Social Media Benchmarks

B2B marketing benchmarks for social media refer to key performance indicators used to evaluate the effectiveness of social media marketing efforts within the B2B sector.

Here are some common B2B social media marketing benchmarks:

• Engagement Rate: The rate at which your audience interacts with your social media content, measured by likes, comments, shares, etc.
• Click-Through Rate (CTR): The percentage of users who click on a link within your social media post out of the total number of users who viewed the post.
• Follower Growth Rate: The rate at which your social media following is growing over time.
• Reach: The total number of unique users who see your social media content within a specific period.
• Impressions: The total number of times your social media content is displayed to users, including repeat views by the same user.
• Social Media Shares: The number of times users share your social media content with their own networks.
• Lead Generation: The number of leads generated directly from social media channels.
• Conversion Rate: The percentage of social media users who complete a desired action after clicking on a link within your social media post.
• Brand Mentions: The number of times your brand is mentioned or tagged by users on social media platforms.
• Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT): The feedback expressed by followers on social media, measured through comments or direct messages.

Lead Generation Benchmarks

B2B marketing benchmarks for lead generation are critical metrics that help evaluate the effectiveness of lead generation efforts within the B2B sector.

Here are some common B2B lead generation benchmarks:

• Lead Conversion Rate: The percentage of leads generated that ultimately convert into customers or clients.
• Cost per Lead (CPL): The average cost of generating a single lead.
• Lead Quality: The level of qualification or readiness of leads to engage with your sales team.
• Lead Volume: The total number of leads generated within a specific period.
• Lead-to-Customer Conversion Rate: The percentage of leads that ultimately convert into paying customers.
• Lead Response Time: The average time it takes for your sales team to follow up with leads after they have expressed interest.
• Marketing Qualified Leads (MQLs) and Sales Qualified Leads (SQLs): The number of leads that meet predefined criteria and are deemed ready for marketing or sales engagement, respectively.
• Lead Engagement Metrics: Metrics such as email open rates, click-through rates, website engagement, and content downloads indicate the level of interest and engagement among your leads.
• Lead Attribution: The process of assigning credit to different marketing channels for generating leads and understanding which channels are most effective at driving leads.
• Lead Funnel Conversion Rates: Tracking conversion rates at each stage of the lead funnel (e.g., awareness, interest, consideration, conversion) helps identify bottlenecks and opportunities for improvement.

These benchmarks may vary depending on the industry, target audience, and specific campaign objectives. By tracking and analyzing these metrics, B2B marketers can assess the performance of their lead generation efforts, identify areas for optimization, and make data-driven decisions to improve results.

Final Considerations

The B2B marketing benchmarks on this page guide you on how to track your marketing performance and budget. However, you need to assess other marketing KPIs, too, such as B2B content marketing institute, B2B SaaS marketing, account-based marketing, cold calls, etc. Using data-driven strategies and the latest technological innovations, B2B SaaS marketers can effectively navigate the evolving landscape and achieve their business object