The Problem With B2B Marketing

Mat Morrison, co-founder of Digital Whiskey, media agency for the professional services sector, joins us to discuss the challenges of breaking free from entrenched B2B marketing orthodoxies. In this episode, Mat shares his insights on why traditional approaches to B2B marketing—rooted in performance metrics and short-term gains—are holding companies back from true growth. He tackles the persistent struggle to balance brand building with lead generation and offers fresh perspectives on how businesses can rethink their strategies to drive long-term success.Key talking points:The Problem with Performance Overload: Exploring the common over-investment in lead generation and performance marketing at the expense of brand building, and why this short-sighted focus hinders growth.The Brand Advertising Leap of Faith: Why it's so difficult for businesses to invest in brand advertising when it's hard to see immediate returns—and how to navigate that challenge.The 95% Rule: Discussing the reality that 95% of your target audience isn’t ready to buy at any given moment and the dangers of over-targeting the small percentage that is.Rethinking Attribution Models: How current attribution methods, like Google's, often skew our understanding of what’s truly driving long-term business growth—and what we can do about it.If You Build It, They Won’t Just Come: The myth of content marketing as a 'build and they will come' strategy, and why today’s market demands more than just publishing reports or creating content hubs.The C-Suite Obsession: Why too many B2B marketing strategies focus solely on the C-suite and overlook the wider decision-making unit, and the importance of reaching all influencers in the buying process.Authority Content as a Starting Point: How B2B brands can leverage in-depth content like reports and thought leadership pieces, not as end goals, but as catalysts for broader, sustained marketing efforts.The HubSpot Effect: A look at how HubSpot’s success in content marketing has influenced B2B strategies and why it’s time to rethink the rigid content-first approach.This episode is packed with actionable insights for marketers looking to break free from outdated practices and embrace more effective, holistic strategies for long-term brand growth.

Emma Clarke, founder of community-building consultancy CUSP, explores the challenges of building effective B2B communities. Drawing on her experience working with brands like Soho House, Soho Works and 180 Studios, Emma explains why community building is essential for fostering authentic customer connections, but also outlines why many B2B brands struggle to implement it. She discusses the shift from top-down marketing to customer-led engagement, and offers strategies for overcoming internal resistance, maintaining engagement, and measuring success.Key talking points:The Shift to Authenticity: People crave genuine connections, especially post-COVID, and B2B communities can meet this need.Top-Down vs. Community-Led: The outdated model of brand-controlled messaging versus the benefits of empowering customers to connect with each other.Why community strategy often isn’t prioritised in B2B marketing and how to make the business case for it.The difficulty of sustaining customer participation, and how to build communities that offer real value without feeling like an obligation.The importance of internal champions and a dedicated community lead to drive engagement and sustain momentum.How to assess the success of a community, and why “fuzzy” metrics like testimonials matter.Links and references:Emma ClarkeSoho Works: Community-driven workspaces Crafty Counsel: An example of a successful UK-based B2B communityOliver Wyman Forum: Another firm that excels in community-building for business leaders

Nick Andrews, Partner and Head of Commercial Marketing at Knight Frank, delves into what he calls the "B2B Blandemic"—a term borrowed from designer Thomas Heatherwick to describe the wave of uninspired, forgettable content in B2B marketing. Drawing from his experience, Nick breaks down why so much B2B messaging fails to resonate and outlines actionable strategies to stand out without resorting to gimmicks. He also explores the implications of over-investing in performance marketing at the expense of brand building, and the importance of balancing short-term gains with long-term value creation.Key talking points:The B2B Blandemic: The overwhelming prevalence of generic, forgettable content in B2B spaces and the need to move beyond this trend.Standing Out Without the 'Jazz Hands': Why B2B brands struggle to differentiate and how to create authentic, memorable messaging.The Real Cost of Blandness: How dull content results in significantly higher media spend to achieve the same level of cut-through as more creative, engaging campaigns.The 80% Engagement Problem: A staggering 80% of B2B content fails to engage, with ads seeing a similarly high rate of neutral responses.Performance Marketing vs. Brand Building: The risk of over-investing in performance marketing and neglecting brand-building efforts, and why this imbalance can lead to long-term consequences.The 95/5 Rule: Why 95% of your target audience isn’t ready to buy and the dangers of focusing exclusively on the small percentage that is.Customer Orientation: The importance of shifting from a product- or sales-oriented mindset to one that prioritises customer needs and market insightsKnight FrankPeter Weinber and John Lombardo - The Principles of B2B Marketing 

Lucy Ferguson, Content and AI Marketer, and former Head of B2B Content at Google, discusses the problem with Thought Leadership. Focusing on the common mistakes she has seen over the course of her career across media owner, agency and platform roles, we discuss how and why B2B brands are turning clients and potential customers off with content that's more 'inside-out' than outside in. Lucy shares insights on how to develop the content your customer needs and the huge ROI potential from taking distribution seriously, including a practical view on how AI can make this better (or worse) depending on the approach you choose. Key talking points:How Google’s lens of ‘Helpfulness’ shapes the content the business creates and “helps the user to do their job better”How to plan thought leadership content effectively when 95% of your audience isn’t ready to buyThe importance of moving on from a campaign / “one and done’ mindset to creatie once, using everywhere.The case for long term investment in brand platforms and owned IP to grow ‘mental availability’Internal vs. External Influencers: Deciding who to partner with externally and how to “help the voices inside the organisation become more vocal."Authenticity Matters: The importance of asking "Is this the best use of your brilliance?" and finding ways to channel what individuals are genuinely passionate and knowledgeable about for creating effective expert contentGenerative AI in Content Marketing: Avoiding the risk of anodyne content: "The problem... is using AI in a way that just churns anodyne content... it wasn't written with love… and anything that moves us away from really understanding our audience, really helping people, and sharing new knowledge is going to be a problem." But harnessing the possibilities; "use it as a hypothesis as a test, alongside existing content and compare how it works”Links and references:Google FirestartersGartner on the Rise of Buying Committees2024 Edelman-Linkedin Thought Leadership Impact Report