According to a new report by Google, just 40% of senior marketing decision-makers believe that their organisation has a clear marketing effectiveness goal, and just 20% agree on how to actually measure it. In Google’s words, “This misalignment brings real commercial risk: when CMOs can’t demonstrate the full impact of their work, marketing investment can suffer, ultimately undermining business growth.”
Nowhere is this more prevalent than in the gap between brand and demand.
Speaking to B2B marketing leaders, it’s clear that a seamless journey from brand to demand, with sales and marketing effortlessly slaloming in and out of customer conversations still isn’t happening. Let’s be clear. This isn’t just an intellectual exercise that only concerns those looking for perfect integration for integration’s sake. It’s serious business, with an unquantifiable amount of revenue being left on the table.
In a world where marketing budgets are being squeezed and pressure continues to pile on B2B marketers to hit short-term results, it’s critical that B2B marketers get smarter about how they close this gap. Ultimately, if we can do this, we’ll be helping our businesses drive revenue in both the short and the long-term.
The question, therefore, is as follows: “how can B2B marketing leaders close the space between brand and demand to increase impact?” This was the subject of our latest B2B Marketing roundtable in association with Redwood BBDO – B2B agency for Google, Nokia, Vodafone Business and Thread, to name just a few.
This roundtable was conducted under Chatham House rules, so no one speaking at the roundtable is named here, but this blog shares just some of the key findings.
What’s gone wrong?
If the question is “how can B2B marketing leaders close the space between brand and demand to increase impact?”, the logical starting point of discussion might be to ask: why is there a space in the first place?
Well, there isn’t a simple answer, but to name just some of the reasons raised in the roundtable:
- Organisation structures: Marketers at start-ups and scale-ups might thank their lucky stars they don’t have to deal with this problem, but, for those marketers working in large multinational organisations, it appears that the sheer size of the work to be done has led to marketing being segmented in a fundamentally unhelpful way. With large budgets to handle, looking at a traditional marketing funnel and splitting up the budget according to the various sections of that funnel might be a convenient way to plan. However, this has now separated brand marketers from demand marketers, with little overlap and a lack of strategic alignment.
- Misalignment with sales: Although not all participants felt there was a lack of alignment with sales, it’s clear that many still do see this as an issue. In the same way that brand and demand marketers are often kept apart, marketing and sales aren’t always targeting the same people at the same time. In fact, according to one LinkedIn study from 2023, marketing and sales are so misaligned that they’re targeting just 16% of the same prospects.
- The pigeon-holing of marketing into ‘promotion’: Remember the four Ps? We do! In fact, most marketers do. Unfortunately, it does appear that there’s been a trend towards many marketing teams being primarily responsible for promotion, with little input on place, price and product. As long as B2B marketers are not included in those conversations, they’ll be unlikely to bridge the gap between brand and demand, and will remain focused on tactics and execution.
How do we close the gap?
Education is key
Marketers may understand the value of a strong brand, but that’s not to say those in sales or finance do. After all, we have a deep understanding of what ‘brand’ means and why it matters, but, if we can’t translate that into clear commercial language that means something to someone who isn’t an expert in marketing, then we’re never going to get the buy-in we need to invest in ‘brand’, and to close the gap with demand.
Commercial metrics matter here, with shorter sales cycles and increased sales price both raised by participants in the roundtable, but so do some ‘less commercial’ metrics, such as high search rankings and increased website visitors. As we’ve just seen, your CFO probably doesn’t want to hear about clickthrough rate and dwell time, but using some of the more immediately ‘obvious’ metrics can help to tell a story, and help to build trust and influence at board level. The key is getting the balance right.
Demonstrate that you are a true ‘commercial marketer’, and not a ‘promotion-only marketer’, and you can start to have more mature conversations with the senior leadership, gaining the trust (and budget) you need to invest in brand.
Focus on those in (and out) of market
If only 5% of your prospects are in market at any given time, does that mean you should only focus on that 5%? As marketers, we know the answer is a resounding ‘No!’.
Although there might be a few salespeople still out there refusing to acknowledge the value that marketing brings through its long-term marketing efforts, we know that the majority of salespeople do see the value of this long-term approach, and do see the value having a clearly differentiated brand in the marketplace.
All that being said, sales are still ultimately driven to hit short-term targets, and so it’s critical that marketers demonstrate how brand impact the short-term, as well as the long-term.
As when speaking to finance, therefore, it’s critical that B2B marketers speak the language of sales, and demonstrate that, although brand-building is helping the business in the long-term, it’s also helping to clinch those deals in the immediate future too.
Connect the dots with content
So, beyond having better, more strategic conversations, how can we start to close the gap between brand and demand? Content can play a powerful role connecting the dots. But to unlock the value of content, Nick Duxbury, Executive Creative Director at Redwood BBDO, argued that ‘big ideas’ need to be designed to better integrate efforts end-to-end.
Speaking with us after the event, Nick said: “Too often, there’s a yawning gap between brand ad campaigns and “in-the-weeds” demand gen content. To solve this, B2B brands need to start thinking about how big, unifying ideas can be designed to work harder for more audiences in more spaces, places and channels. Because the truth is, we need creative ideas that cut-through the B2B sea of sameness everywhere – in ABM, thought leadership, event keynotes and Sales collateral – not just in our brand ads.
“When you get that right, content can become an aligning force, and combined marketing efforts work much harder. Demand gen campaigns can help to build brand, and brand campaigns can help drive demand. That’s when you can start reducing the cost of sales.”
Be a leader!
Ultimately, the key takeaway here is about the importance of marketing leadership. It’s down to marketers to understand their business’ commercial goals and build strategies that drive long-term brand growth, whilst also helping to meet short-term demand. Closing that gap requires marketers to take ownership of the situation, build bridges between internal teams, insist on the value of brand building, and ensure that they’re producing great content throughout to build a healthy pipeline.
Is that going to be easy? Probably not. But the rewards for the commercial marketer that can tackle that challenge and demonstrate their value to the board are huge.
