Takeaways from our B2B Creatives event in Stockholm

Stockholm, May 28th, 2024.

The sun was out, the city was alive and, inside our HQ, Matilda Iwanson, our B2B Team Lead, was hosting her first event together with The F Company and LinkedIn to discuss how to make B2B creatives great (again?).

We get it. We’re also tired of the notion floating around in boardrooms that B2B content must wear a serious, buttoned-up facade. The reality is that your audience – yes, they’re professionals, but more crucially… they’re human. But with the never-ending amounts of content bombarding them daily, it’s all too easy for your message to vanish into the void, unnoticed. Good thing we gathered the best minds to find a solution to this issue 😏

Missed this event? No worries! Keep on reading for a summary of our key takeaways!

Demand generation > Demand capture, with creativity as the secret ingredient

The F Company CEO David Blinov kicked off the event and really laid it out for us: navigating the B2B customer journey is like decoding a complex puzzle with numerous (untrackable) touchpoints.

His strategy? Begin by educating and priming the audience.

• With 95% of the market not actively looking to make purchases but always eager to learn, engage them in a creative and impactful way.
• By crafting insightful content that addresses their specific jobs to be done and pain points, David’s strategy goes beyond mere information delivery.

This approach sets up a connection that primes potential customers for future buying decisions when they’re ready to engage!

The F Company’s Senior Growth Marketer Yuliya Salorenko built on this by rethinking the role of paid marketing. It’s traditionally viewed as a lead generation tool, but she saw it as a canvas for creativity.

Instead of the old playbook of buying attention with high costs and low engagement, Yuliya advocated for using paid channels to creatively enhance the visibility and engagement of your educational content. This approach isn’t just about reaching eyes; it’s about engaging minds.

She strongly suggested a shift towards valuing deeper engagement metrics such as content interactions, LinkedIn engagement, and website visits.

If that wasn’t convincing enough, these eye-opening stats from their deck will change the way you see creative strategy:

• 90% of advertising dollars are spent on lead gen campaigns, with an average cost of $172 per “lead”.
• The most popular call to action (CTA) on paid social media is downloading, but only about one-third of those who download actually read the content.
• 99.5% of the audience will never click on an ad, highlighting the inefficiency of traditional ad targeting.
• It takes over 30 touchpoints, most untrackable, for a B2B buyer to make a purchase decision.
• One case study mentioned a sales enablement platform that achieved 66% revenue growth in 2022 by better understanding customer needs and optimising content.

What creative practices work best on LinkedIn?

Raffaela Vota and Niclas Prenker from LinkedIn explained how to make the most out of the platform – and we loved every minute of it!

Following the engaging discussion by F Company on B2B strategies, Raffaela Vota and Niclas Prenker from LinkedIn detailed how to effectively blend creativity with demand generation to optimise LinkedIn marketing efforts.

Raffy shared 6 (actionable) Creative Principles from the platform itself, that are absolute gold:

• Keep content relevant: Focus on creating content that is not only fresh and timely but also tuned into current trends and cultural nuances. Including references to LinkedIn’s culture or office life can significantly enhance engagement, as posts that resonate with current cultural and visual trends tend to perform better in user interactions.
• Consistency rocks: Consistency is key in establishing a strong brand presence across all dimensions—consumer, corporate, and talent. A unified approach ensures that your brand is immediately recognisable, creating a red thread that connects all your communications seamlessly. This consistency helps reinforce brand recognition and trust.
• Touch their hearts: Emotional content that leverages humour, storytelling, or shared nostalgia can greatly enhance engagement rates. By connecting with the audience’s reality, you create an emotional hook that not only increases engagement but also fosters deeper brand loyalty.
• On-brand, every time: Strict adherence to your brand guidelines across all LinkedIn formats is essential. Being authentic and consistent with your brand’s message and visual style helps maintain a professional and cohesive image, which is crucial for building trust and recognition in a crowded digital space.
• Stop them scrolling: Switching from horizontal to vertical formats can increase your click-through rate by 1% and engagement rate by 31%, while square formats can boost click-through rates by 4% and engagement rates by 16%. Using bright colours and compelling copy also helps make your content more engaging and noticeable
• Be their go-to guru: Your business should aim to solve common pain points with insightful and actionable advice. Demonstrating strong opinions and robust expertise can attract the attention of 85% of LinkedIn users, with 60% of C-suite decision-makers willing to pay a premium to engage with brands recognised for their thought leadership.

The creative process in action – how it’s done at Precis

Here’s Ajit and Nicole minutes before their session

In the final act of the presentation, our home team showcased how the creative process needs to be structured to bring in results and they did it with a standout client case featuring Bokio, an innovative bookkeeping SaaS, designed to simplify business management.

Precis’ very own Ajit Deshpande (Senior Creative Strategist) and Nicole Viviani (Art Director) walked through the crucial stages of how Precis applied its creative process to deliver impactful results.

Here’s how they tackled it:

1. In 2022, the team assessed Bokio’s existing messaging. Though effective, it needed a refresh to maintain vibrancy and engagement.
2. They conducted a comprehensive analysis, examining how competitors presented their services on their websites and in ads. Discovering that no competitors were advertising a holistic solution identified a unique positioning opportunity for Bokio. Insights revealed that simplicity in managing business operations was not just preferred but essential for Swedish businesses, positioning Bokio as the ideal holistic solution.
3. Armed with fresh insights, a brainstorming session was convened, involving both the creative team and Bokio’s representatives. The objective was to generate a wide array of ideas.
4. After brainstorming, ideas were drafted and narrowed down to those that offered the greatest impact with minimal production effort.
5. A new marketing concept was developed based on the hypothesis that feature-led communication (A) would drive better performance than benefit-led communication (B). This concept underwent rigorous testing across different elements such as copy, pricing, emojis, CTAs, and formats.
6. After testing, the top-performing aspects were iterated upon to truly understand what resonates and drives conversions among their target audiences.

Due to the success of the campaign, by August 2023, Bokio were ready to launch their first full-funnel campaign with Precis!

So, what fresh perspectives did we challenge our audience to adopt about B2B creatives?

B2B Creatives and Marketers from Stockholm going “Why didn’t I think of that?”

• B2B is a marathon, not a sprint.
• B2B creatives don’t need to be stoic—in fact, they absolutely shouldn’t be.
• They should be engaging, and memorable, and creativity is key to achieving this.
• Don’t just take our word for it—LinkedIn is on the same page.
• Without this shift, you risk losing your audience’s attention when they’re finally ready to buy!

Let’s make B2B marketing anything but boring!

P.S. While our attendees left with goody bags, consider this post your virtual cheat sheet!

TL;DR

Here’s what all the presenters urged B2B businesses to rethink:

1. Shift focus from mere lead capture to educating and engaging with creative content that nurtures potential customers throughout their journey, building a basis for lasting relationships.
2. Rethink the role of paid marketing by using it as a platform to creatively amplify educational content, ensuring deeper engagement that goes beyond simple lead generation.
3. Adopt non-traditional content formats such as vertical or square videos, and utilize vibrant colors and dynamic copy to make creative content more visually appealing and engaging.
4. Infuse creativity into your branding by employing humor, storytelling, and relatable experiences that emotionally resonate, creating more meaningful connections with your audience.
5. Implement a strategic creative process involving detailed market analysis and innovative ideation, followed by rigorous testing of creative concepts, to deliver campaigns that effectively elevate brand awareness to brand fame.