After last week’s Cannes Lions festival, you can bet that the next big thing is on every forward-thinking marketer’s mind. In the era of big data, artificial intelligence and rapid innovation, change is the only constant. While marketing has without a doubt gone digital, we are simultaneously seeing a revival in human-centric thinking — a shift toward catering to individuals with deeper empathy and care, though now at scale.
This evolution is especially pronounced in the business-to-business (B2B) industry. B2B technology has a reputation for being hard to use, and B2B branding efforts haven’t helped in changing this perception. However, in the past few years, a movement to democratize enterprise technology — and enterprise brands themselves — for the day-to-day consumer has emerged. In other words, consumer-grade enterprise tech is quickly becoming the norm.
Slack is a prime example of this trend — its person-to-person technology has taken the SaaS world by storm. And why not? It’s so easy to use that it almost feels like your grandparents’ collaboration tool. Additionally, the company is known for its millennial-friendly branding that doesn’t shy away from the playful, hip and weird. Slack upends all preconceived notions of what a B2B brand and product should be.
With trendsetters like Slack paving the way, B2B companies must fundamentally rethink the way they do business. Below are a few ideas on where to start.
Rethink the traditional B2B brand.
The B2B industry has typically adhered to dry, feature-focused marketing strategies. Few companies are willing to be expressive or different, and the outcome is brands that feel uptight, antiquated or too smart to be accessible. That approach may have worked in the past. But with an evolving customer base that demands thoughtful personalization and the emergence of forward-thinking competitors, being unimaginative doesn’t cut it anymore.
In today’s changing B2B landscape, it is important that traditionally buttoned-up companies incorporate bold personality into their branding efforts. The face of the B2B buyer is getting younger and expectations are adjusting accordingly. Leadership must be willing to take risks with creative decision making so their brands resonate with the next generation of buyers.
Let’s take a look at MailChimp, a B2B company widely known for its quirky branding and outside-the-box marketing efforts. Every company gives away swag, and it's usually boring. Not MailChimp. MailChimp approaches swag as an opportunity to give thoughtful gifts to customers rather than cheap freebies. Enormously successful giveaway campaigns run by the company have featured creative merchandise like MailChimp coloring books and Freddie-themed knit hats for cats.
Injections of character like this ultimately allow B2B brands to be more authentic, relatable and even, dare we say, fun. Fun and B2B? These two words need to come together a lot more.
Dream up content for humans.
With 94% of B2B buyers conducting research online before making a purchase, education trumps promotion in the B2B world. The problem is that many B2B companies push out bland or highly technical content because they claim that they are catering to businesses. In reality, nobody is actually marketing to businesses — they are marketing to people. And people want content that is helpful and won’t put them to sleep.
It’s time to engage in creative storytelling by using personable and expressive voices. Experiment with interactive content formats such as webinars, quizzes and video. Just writing a blog doesn’t suffice. Place an emphasis on eye-catching design that draws in your audience. Crunch highly technical content or data to make it universally digestible, then use it to deliver a powerful story.
HubSpot is an example of a B2B company that nails human-focused content. The company provides links to free ebooks, customizable templates and strategy workbooks for their customers (marketers) to learn more about the marketing discipline and do their jobs more efficiently. Looking at the numbers, this resonates. With over 400,000 subscribers and 4.5 million monthly visitors, the HubSpot blog has become the go-to resource for all things inbound marketing.
Keep your customers in mind in everything you do. After all, content is only successful if it is effectively serving your target.
Do the math: sales + marketing = smarketing.
Bridging the divide between sales and marketing is the key to generating growth velocity for B2B companies because it shortens the sales cycle and links return on investment directly to marketing initiatives.
Sales development representatives (SDRs) are the human component of B2B marketing campaigns. SDRs engage directly with prospects and create opportunities through meetings and demos. When they are segregated from marketing, the audience may receive conflicting messages -- that disconnect will negatively impact their purchasing experience.
Uniting these two teams also translates to collaboration opportunities that ultimately benefit the customer with a more personalized approach. For example, sales teams unearth real pain points that help marketing teams craft more impactful content. Marketing can help sales provide better education to customers by referring them to relevant materials across the sales stages.
However you look at it, when activities between sales and marketing are synchronized, more human-focused value is delivered and everyone wins. And having both teams focused on audience delight will bring more warm and fuzzies to your overall brand perception.
What is the future of B2B marketing?
Regardless of what business or technology you represent, modern customers expect brands to recognize them as individuals. At the end of the day, marketing isn’t about B2B or B2C, but H2H — human to human. Your job as a marketer is to not forget that human touch.
