What does it take to be a B2B rockstar? Jessica McGreal investigates what we can learn from this year’s B2B Awards winners
The B2B Awards winners have hit the stage, received their gongs and celebrated their ‘B2B rockstar’ status with champagne, bumper cars and Guitar Hero. So, now in the cold light of day, we take a look back over the record number of entries to discover what trends connect the winners, and reveal what this means for the future of B2B marketing.
Creative idea
In the past, B2B marketing has been criticised as boring, uninspiring and – ultimately – uncreative. So, it was great to see that creative campaigns were more successful in this year’s awards.
But, creativity doesn’t just mean launching an image-led campaign. Rather, “It comes down to your definition of creative,” says Richard Parsons, MD of True agency, winner of best use of creative and the grand prix awards for its campaign for Micro Focus. “For us a creative campaign is something that is effective. How do you become effective? You need to be compelling. The two things we look to create in campaigns is to be entertaining and/or useful.”
True’s ‘The elephant in the room’ campaign for software technology brand Micro Focus featured some of nature’s largest animals – including the elephant, gorilla and rhino – being incredibly agile. By likening the huge beasts to Micro Focus’ mainframes the campaign highlighted how the tech company could increase business agility. Parsons sheds some light on the importance of creativity in B2B: “Only five per cent of the market is in the market at one time because of the long buying cycle in B2B. As a result, you need to be remembered when the prospect is ready to purchase. To be remembered you often have to dramatise the articulation of the core proposition or message and to dramatise it by definition is to be entertaining or useful.”
Knowing your customer
In order to produce work prospects will find useful B2B marketers have increased their focus on customer centricity. The majority of successful campaigns employed research projects. The data collected from such projects allowed marketers to understand where their customers were, what they wanted and how their brand could deliver it, allowing them to create valuable content.
Adobe’s ‘creative week’ won best use of digital techniques and technologies with the help of its agency DNX. The brand targeted specific UK users interested in creative industries to ensure its marketing was targeted and effective. Drew Nicholson, MD of marketing communications agency of the year DNX, stresses: “We have to stop being so rational, and we have to engage with people like people even if they are business people. Box ticking is not the future, creative ambition for marketers is the way.”
Socialising
However, B2B is not lagging behind when it comes to social. This year’s award winners squashed the notion that social media doesn’t have a role in the industry.
Winners of best use of social media, Lafarge Tarmac’s (LT) ‘@LoveCement – unlocking the passion through social’ campaign created by Bell Pottinger Business & Brand, proved just this. With 75 per cent of LT’s core demographic using social networks, the brand needed a new way to engage with them on a deeper level. As a result, the ‘Love cement’ campaign did away with corporate updates and gave the brand a new ‘tongue-in-cheek’ voice, allowing it to connect with its prospects to form a new community. LT used Twitter to share creative imagery and videos, promote its expertise, run competitions and spread news. Since its launch, @LoveCement has amassed nearly 1000 followers and created a community that has grown 20 per cent per quarter. More impressively, independent social media influence measurement tool Kred awarded @LoveCement a score of 603, putting it in the top 20 per cent of accounts on Twitter. Pretty impressive results for what once was believed to be a wholly B2C channel.
Meanwhile, Xuber’s ‘Stirring the city’ campaign by Birddog highlighted the relationship between live events and social media. Targeted towards key decision makers within top insurance firms, the activity involved hand delivering freshly brewed coffee in branded cups to early morning commuters at key locations around London. Xuber drew attention to
the campaign via social media, and as a result its social following, across five channels, rose by 538 per cent in the month post launch.
Channels of influence
However, this year’s winners did not only focus on social promotion but communicated with their audiences across multiple channels. The case studies highlight the importance of a multichannel strategy, showing it ultimately ensures your brand’s message is seen and remembered.
Winners of best multichannel campaign, ‘Taking the guesswork out of the EU Gender Directive’ by Moreish marketing for LV, made use of a plethora of channels, including advertorials, microsites, webinars and live event sponsorship. All were used to ensure its audience understood upcoming legislative changes while promoting its brand as a protection expert. This integrated approach resulted in LV generating more protection business than any month in its 170-year history, with a year-on-year increase of 25 per cent.
Marketing loves sales
A love affair between marketing and sales is now accepted as the basis of any successful B2B campaign.
Sales and marketing alignment was at the heart of O2 Enterprise’s winning campaign. The brand understood marketing campaigns don’t exist in isolation. As a result an ‘inside sales team’ was set up to liaise directly with marketing as a core communication channel between the departments. Its ‘O2 Enterprise team campaign’ created by The Marketing Practice scooped best integration of sales and marketing as the project exceed its target of 240 sales leads, delivering 304.
Steve Kemish, MD at Cyance, winner of best website and highly commended for its lead generation work, calls attention to the importance of sales enablement: “With ever-increasing pressure on budgets, marketing has had to work hard to be as accountable as possible, having often been the easy scapegoat, it’s reassuring to see that both sales and marketing are now beginning to take equal responsibility (or blame) for this alignment change.”
Over the last 12 months there have been huge developments in the B2B industry. Last year many marketers finally had the guts to step away from outdated business marketing concepts, making B2B a fresher, more vibrant place to be. Although some traditional staples remain, such as case studies and whitepapers, this year’s awards winners have illustrated that marketers have become more confident. But more importantly, this showcase has proven the most successful campaigns are customer centric – appealing to the human buyer, not the faceless business.
