B2B = B2P

04 Nov B2B = B2P

I recently had the privilege of attending and speaking at an industry conference that looked at the trends shaping the business-to-business (B2B) marketing landscape. Over the course of two days, we heard from various industry experts – academics, practitioners and agency folk – on what they deem to be the big bets that will influence and impact our industry.

The usual suspects were there: big data, content, mobility, social, storytelling, changing buying behaviours to name a few…

My biggest take-out? It’s about people. People drive commercial success.

Enter B2P – business-to-people.

Increasingly complex business models and disruptive technologies make it easy for marketers to lose sight of the basics. Who are we marketing to? What do they need from us a corporate organisation? What are the behaviours we want to drive?

When B2B marketers craft beautiful strategies to increase sales to business customers we can quickly become caught up in hype and buzzwords. The bottom line is that we are marketing and selling to people. Do we take the time to understand our own salesforce – whether direct or indirect – or what drives our customers to buy?

Enter a proviso. Technology, data-driven insights, analytics, competitive intelligence…they all play a vitally important role in successful commercial marketing plays. It’s important to understand, however, that it’s not one or the other that’s going to deliver the results your business leaders require.

As you finalise your planning for 2015, remember that it’s about people. Your marketing strategies need to reflect this. Take the time out to stop and gain the insights into the men and women that make your business successful. The most dangerous thing you can do is to continue operating on assumptions. That you assume you know what the people in your business need and want. It’s about gaining the real insights and not merely paying lip service to the notion that people matter.

In the words of Sir Richard Branson, when it comes to business success it’s all about people, people, people!