10 learnings from 10 years of B2B marketing

As Embrace recently celebrated ten years in business, we thought it’d be a great time to reflect. We’ve learnt so much from working across a wide range of B2B organisations, small to large – from healthcare and technology to manufacturing, construction and professional services. Each organisation presents its own variations and challenges in what works best to achieve key objectives and ROI, but there are definitely some key themes which are often present.

In this ten-year anniversary blog, our MD, Becky Reardon, shares her top 10 B2B marketing learnings from the last decade.

1. It all starts with strategy

Jumping straight into tactics with no clear strategy almost always leads to wasted time, effort and money. Setting relevant, focused and achievable targets backed by a clear plan, with an expected measure of ROI – aligning on expectations from the start – is always the best approach. Working from the target first helps to create a meaningful plan for fulfilling the strategy – e.g. we need to achieve X amount of marketing qualified leads (MQLs), which means we need X amount of web traffic that converts at X%.

2. Ad hoc marketing doesn’t work

This is a trap I’ve seen both small and larger organisations fall into. They have a flurry of activity to support sales and then the marketing becomes less of a focus; and the short- and long-term impact is less engagement, traction and conversion. Often, it’s forgotten that only around 5% of the B2B market at any given time is ready to buy now. That means that consistent brand awareness of key messaging is essential. If people don’t know you, they won’t enquire.

3. Brand is underutilised

A powerful company brand should enhance the performance across the entire business. Often, a brand sits in a marketing department and is viewed simply as a visual identity – a logo, colour palette, look and feel. When utilised to the full, a brand vision and mission should inspire the entire organisation.

A brand value proposition – including your purpose, differentiated approach and what you do – alongside your brand values, should guide your full team every day. All communications should be aligned to your brand promise, with the brand experience (operational teams) in alignment with this. If your brand can inspire and guide the entire organisation, with all communications and actions proven to be joined up and consistent, the entire business performance is elevated.

4. Clarity always beats complexity

Don’t create pages and pages of brand and marketing strategy that never leave a Word document or PowerPoint deck. It has to be meaningful and actionable by the team. Messages should be clear and punchy. Anything that even feels slightly long-winded is too much, whether it’s a vision, a mission or a marketing piece such as a social media post or emailer. Less is more. We’re all consuming so much content and information every day and are time-poor. Keep it to the point. What are the couple of things that you really want to be taken away?

5. You have to differentiate

Being the same as your competitors isn’t an option. If you’re the same, then you’ll likely only be chosen if your offering is less expensive. Differentiation raises the bar in your industry and increases your value to your audience. Many organisations don’t know what makes them different. If you’re in that situation, here are a few things I’ve noticed over the years:

• The organisations that continuously innovate are usually more able to differentiate, which also gives them more meaningful thought leadership content to communicate to their audience
• Having a strong focus on your brand experience, and how you can elevate and add value at every step for the customer, can help to identify the gaps that your competitors currently have and how you could stand out for doing something differently
• The answer to what makes you different can usually be found through primary market research – in-depth interviews with a third-party consultancy (such as ourselves!) help to reveal how customers and prospects truly perceive your brand

6. Emotional connection is underrated in B2B

I always think of the study by renowned neuroscientist Antonio Damasio, who assessed patients who had damage to their ventromedial prefrontal cortex (a brain region in the frontal lobe that integrates social, emotional and cognitive information, playing a key role in decision-making, emotional regulation and social cognition). He found that, without the ability to apply emotion to decision-making, patients couldn’t make even very simple decisions, such as what socks to wear that day.

Applied to brand and marketing, emotion is at play in all decisions. We need the rational to help inform choices; however, everyone, across all industries and roles, always applies emotion when making decisions, whether they realise it or not. This is a major floor for many B2B brands that only have rational messaging. The B2B organisations who weave emotion into their brand value propositions and key messages, alongside the rational, make more instinctive and compelling connections with their audiences.

7. Short-term thinking = short-term results

This leads back to the point that only around 5% of your audience is ready to buy now, which means that brand awareness is key – so when a customer need arises, they think of you. Short-term thinking might deliver the odd quick win – but the real win comes through long-term strategy that maintains a consistent long-term pipeline.

8. Never make assumptions

I always remember the saying “Assumption is the mother of all f***-ups”, which Kevin Roberts, Chairman of Saatchi & Saatchi, shares in his book ‘64 Shots: Leadership in a Crazy World’. Every day, everyone makes assumptions – but in brand and marketing, this can have costly implications. I always find it’s best to ask “Why?” a good few times, to keep diving deeper: “Why do we think that?”, “Why did they say that?”, etc.

9. Evidence is essential

The former point leads nicely onto how important evidence is in informing decision-making. We’re fortunate, in our data-rich era, to be able to find many helpful industry benchmarks and market reports freely available. There’s also a host of tracking tools to help pull insights in real time, so we can quickly gain a picture of what’s driving most traction and conversion. Often, organisations typically don’t conduct primary quantitative and qualitative research; yet this can reveal so much about what the target audience truly does, thinks and feels to help bring to life ideal customer profiles (ICPs).

10. Standing still is never an option

The world is becoming increasingly fast-paced, so anything that feels even slightly outdated needs addressing straightaway. If it isn’t, your competitors will get there first. Constantly keep reviewing your brand value proposition, your ICPs, your offerings, innovation and customer experience, while understanding the gaps and opportunities.

Get in touch!

Send us a message if you’d like to discuss any of these learnings; or to discuss an upcoming brand, marketing or website project.

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