In reality however, anyone outside our industry is going to struggle to understand and gain real value out of what we’re talking about. They cannot relate with content that is only relatable to people who are in the marketing world.

As Switch, we fell into this trap for quite some time. We were creating excellent content, but we weren’t gaining as many real business leads as we would have liked, considering the effort we were making. Eventually, we realised that while we were creating great content, that content made way more sense to other marketers, rather than our real target audience – business leaders that need help with their marketing.

It’s not just in the marketing industry

This applies to almost any industry. For example, tech companies will often load their website and social media with content regarding the nuances of the specific technologies they work with. They’ll talk about how they have so much experience with angular front-end development and javascript frameworks, or how their knowledge of Azure can help businesses with cloud data warehouse solutions.

All of that will make sense to an IT expert – they might even be impressed! But if you’re the owner of a growing SME and you need help with your IT infrastructure, you might as well be speaking Klingon.

How do we solve the problem?

Start by placing yourself in the shoes of those who will eventually sign the check if they decide to work with you. What kind of content would they actually respond to? 

Let’s take the IT example again.

It’s quite unlikely that that business owner will respond to the technical jargon we talked about earlier. They will respond however, if they come across a piece of content that relates specifically to their own situation. If they see communication from an IT company that addresses a real business concern, such as IT scalability for SMEs for example, they’re more likely to stop and take notice.

In reality, the exact technology or method the IT company uses is quite irrelevant to decision-makers in comparison to the direct business benefit they will receive as a result.

Should you always target the decision-maker?

Not always.

You also should consider those within your target industry that can influence decisions internally. For example, the marketing industry is full of high-quality tools that can help with the technical side of every-day work. Tools such as the ones provided by Semrush, Hubspot, and Ahrefs can be invaluable to marketing departments.

In this case, it’s definitely worth trying to understand the daily struggles of those who are doing the everyday marketing work, and create content that appeals to them as well. Marketing tips & tricks, free tools, templates – all these can make their target users’ lives easier.

That said, the people using these tools are likely not the same individuals that will make the decision to pay for it. But one of the only ways these decision-makers will hear about it is internally. That’s why the three companies I mentioned earlier create excellent content consistently for those who actually use the tool, and not just those who will end up paying for it.

Here’s an example from the marketing world – brands such as Hubspot and Semrush do an excellent job of creating content that strategically targets individuals all across the decision-making process within potential clients.

To sum up

Always keep in mind the golden rule of content strategy – you are not your target audience. While you love what you do, and you find what you do extremely interesting, it’s likely that your real target audience is only interested in the benefit of what you do – not the nuances of how it works.

Talk about benefits to the decision makers, and provide real value to those who influence the decision makers. That way, when the time comes for a company to make a purchasing decision within your industry, all the selling has already been done.

The post How to Identify B2B Audiences Strategically appeared first on Switch - Digital & Brand.

Fortunately, group chats can help a little with that. 

It’s not the same. Walking into the office and finding someone at a water cooler, in the lunchroom, at their desk watching the latest ad, has a spontaneity that’s difficult to recreate virtually. With a group-chat, whatever gets shared is shared with intent. 

With real life, everything is shared, and it leads to some of our most excellent ideas. 

But, until we go back to the office full-time, group-chats are a good way to work around the distance. 

It’s not the same. Those conversations at the water-cooler are hard to mimic when it’s virtual, and when everyone is busy juggling life and work in the same location, switching to something different takes a conscious effort. 

And then there are those ads that make that effort easy. Those ads that start a conversation spontaneously. 

Those ads that make it feel like we’re all back at the office, working on the same page. 

Talking Shop

Marketing is a constantly expanding, changing, advancing field. We’ve written a little bit about how: there’s always more to say, but to summarise it all – what we see being made today has nothing to do with the way marketing happened a year ago, five years ago, ten. What we’re going to do today will not look anything like the marketing that will happen tomorrow, a year from now, five years from now, ten. 

It makes it hard to predict. 

It makes it fun to talk about, take apart, and analyse. 

Right now, we’re seeing a lot of advertisements talking about ‘going back to normal’. As shops open and countries get ready for the predicted summer boost, retailers are trying their best to coax people back outside, back to their shops, and back to buying.

Most of those ads follow a pattern. They’re understated. Very little reference is actually made to the pandemic, like an apocalyptic movie where half of the beginning is accidentally erased. ‘WELCOME BACK’ is usually the phrase of choice, bolded and centred. 

It gets boring after a while. 

Then EXTRA came out with this: 

From the music to the very specific key beats to the bearded wildmen rejoining society, the EXTRA gum ad took a very staid format and made it vibrant, eclectic, and interesting, all over again. It stood out. 

Naturally, it made its way to the group chat. 

The general consensus: the EXTRA ad works. It stretches the point of believability but it works because the stuff they’re talking about – meeting the people you love, going back to work – is something we’ve all felt at one point or another. 

Whether it’s because you can’t face another Zoom meeting or because you miss the noises of a coffee shop just starting to gear up in the morning, the EXTRA ad feels a lot like coming home. 

Ernesta made an interesting point – its intended effect is to make people laugh, but can it go too far? For Ernesta and for Kim, although they enjoyed the ad, it’s overshadowed by the current situation many of us are facing, and by the understanding that there will never really be a ‘back to normal’. Even when the shops open and the masks come off, COVID-19 made us aware of unsanitary conditions, if nothing else. 

Breaking that habit will take time. 

Thomas Camilleri has this to say about the ad: 

Both adverts immediately harken back to days gone by with tracks that are heavy with nostalgia. It’s all coming back to me now by Celine Dion in the Pepsi ad, unmistakable from the first strains, and Tomorrow, from Annie The Musical, also an instant flashback to our childhoods and a track all about hope and new beginnings.

Out of the two, there’s a clear winner for me, being a sucker for a terrific story and a healthy dose of suspension of disbelief. The sweet spot between leaving reality behind and taking a story into the realm of the ridiculous is a sweet one indeed and one where the Extra ad is happily floating around in.

The Pepsi one is also a good ad because it reminds us of what a disgusting species we are and makes me want to start the lockdown all over again. Actually, maybe that’s what doesn’t make it a good ad, but it’s certainly memorable – for the wrong reasons, perhaps? Yes, we’re gross and *wretches* eat chicken wings before sticking our fingers full of the detritus of poultried saliva into bowling balls, but do we really need to remember this? Can’t we rejoice at how the pandemic has introduced everyone to hand sanitizer and social distancing?

Will these ads make me reach for the brands next time I need chewing gum (maybe) or a cola drink (never)? Possibly not, but with brands of this size, it’s not all about direct conversions anymore and in terms of shareability and memorability, Extra is the clear winner.

*Hits the Enter key*

*Looks at keyboard*

*Sanitises hands*

Pepsi 

And then there’s Pepsi: 

Thematically, both of the ads are similar. They’re both about mess. They’re both about going back to a different normal. 

They’re both chaotic. 

But the Pepsi ad didn’t ring as true for most of us as the EXTRA gum ad. Despite using the same keynotes, the same concept, a lot of it fell flat. 

There were the outliers who liked it – Ernesta, who found the EXTRA gum ad too exuberant and silly, liked Pepsi’s quieter take on ‘going back to normal’. Luke and Thomas disagreed: while the Pepsi ad had the same message, the overdone flair of the Extra ad gave it a charm that is missing in the Pepsi ad. In Luke’s own words, it just reminds me of how unsanitary people can be. 

Kim said it with a little more detail. 

Ultimately, most ads are a case of personal taste. Even across an agency where we try to be impartial, the reality is that some of us will like an ad more because it speaks to us in a way that other ads don’t.

What’s interesting is the journey we take along the way. Seeing how other people react.

It helps us see what other people see. 

It makes us better at what we do.

And it’s really fun.

What more do you need?

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