What to do about the fabled 95% not in-market for your B2B service?
Events are the answer to an increasingly dehumanized B2B space argues Edward Low, CMO of We Are Group. The Drum’s B2B focus explores.
/ Dreamforce by Salesforce
Trezona & Cash’s B2B bible, Humanising B2B, suggests that the dawn of Salesforce and the SaaS pipeline over two decades ago caused the death of the B2B salesperson. The industry’s obsession with attribution and big data was paid for in human relationships when the world moved very quickly towards martech stacks. Salesforce software was cheaper than people, and marketers could finally justify elements of their hard work through reporting. But this move dehumanized B2B and totally killed the B2B customer/supplier relationship.
The irony here is that if you fast forward to today, Salesforce delivers one of the most successful human engagement strategies on the planet in the shape of ‘Dreamforce’, its annual partner and client event that this year attracted a staggering 45,000 in-person attendees from 140 countries across 25,000 sq ft of meeting space. Even a SaaS business of such magnitude relies on in-person events.
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Salesforce is onto something. Events are the apex B2B marketing channel because they engage not only the 5% of buyers who are already in-market, but also the fabled 95% who are not yet ready for you. When based on the assumption that every business wants to attract new customers while retaining and growing existing ones, B2B events can reach 100% of the audience by leaning into the B2B Holy Trinity:
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Brand building to a targeted and interested audience
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Demonstrating thought leadership to a targeted and interested audience
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Building relationships and networking with targeted audiences of interested people
With the advent of the ‘Experience Economy’ (Pine & Gilmore), and especially post-Covid where we started to hear phrases like ‘experience deficit’, we’ve seen a resurgence in experiences and events in both B2B and B2C. A recent Mintel report identified that high net-worth individuals - ergo: people who tend to be early cultural adopters - are now spending more on luxury experiences than goods.
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Perhaps one of the most convincing points for B2B events, though, is that the entire journey—from pre-event persuasion to post-event follow-ups—offers value.
Sure, the event itself is a highly effective branding and sales opportunity. But consider all the opportunities outside of the event, like using pre and post-event comms to build thought leadership and community engagement. From helping a B2B brand better understand its audiences through topic validation process and content building; to bringing their internal departments together to align on strategy, clarity, purpose, understanding and commitment; the benefits are manifold. This includes engaging all levels of seniority and departments; crossing and up-selling concepts and services based on insights from the topic validation process; attracting new, targeted and relevant customers; and meeting, networking, engaging and building in-person relationships with suspects, prospects and existing customers.
This whole journey creates and refines the currency of B2B marketing: content. With content being the undisputed king and context being queen, an insightful B2B event strategy hones the messaging while creating assets for the whole year.
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Grand conferences and thought leadership events are all very well for larger budgets and bigger, multi-disciplinary businesses. But what about smaller B2B organizations with fewer resources? The same principles apply. Every business, regardless of scale, should first and foremost explore the needs of its audiences to understand how they can be better served. These validated topics then evolve into insightful content with customer utility. They can be used to open conversations and grow brand engagement and awareness. Such ‘nurture programmes’ produce insights, content and build relationships that result in a valuable ‘event’. Be it a dinner, a roundtable or a one-to-one meeting, there’s something to suit every budget. Dreamforce or dinner, the principles remain the same.
As every B2B research report in town states, there’s no doubt the 5% of ‘active buyers’ will attend events. That’s the easy bit. But that 95% not yet in-market? They need to be excited and engaged. B2B marketing’s foundational principle insists that solution providers must create relevant and useful content. And it must be made available where it can be found organically, at the right time and in the right format. Infographics, videos, peer-reviews, reports, insights and opinion pieces; this is the B2B gold, mined from events, that keeps the 95% sweet and entices them to buy in the future.