Phoebe Gunning Head of People
Phoebe was one of the first writers to join Shelf in 2020. She is a veteran of SEO copywriting and has been writing primarily for the supply chain logistics and FinTech industries during her tenure. She also really, really likes Pink Floyd. Connect.
—
I know what you’re thinking about this heading. Clickbait-ey? Maybe. True? Indisputably so. If you’ll forgive the Orwellian doublespeak (Clickbait is Truth! Truth is Clickbait! We good now, Big Brother?) I’ll explain my motivation for believing the undeniable creativity crisis in B2B marketing is a perfect storm of possibility for all of us. We need it. Our clients need it. And, most importantly, B2B as an industry needs it.
The case for a creativity autopsy in B2B
It’s been a long-held belief within the conceptual parameters of B2B that the more succinct the messaging, the more likely the messaging is to hit a home run (“home run” depending entirely on the underlying purpose of the messaging).
There’s traditionally been very little room for bold, creative thinking and (dare I say it) almost a smidgeon of contempt for it among B2B marketers, simply because we’re so metrics-driven, focused on measurable results that can be quantified and analysed using software to discern sentiment. Emotive drivers have always taken a back seat in the B2B machine.
But, has that ROI and MQL-constructed hill we’ve always died on become the hill where our creativity has come to rest, too? And, more importantly, does that metaphorical resting place warrant an excavation in the interest of self-reflection?
Do we need to perform an autopsy to understand why we’ve shied away from creativity, opting for a “facts, not feelings” approach to B2B marketing?
Many thought leaders and (ironically) the data would say yes. Who says you can’t fight data with data?
Cause and effect: the contenti-sation of creativity
In his think piece titled “Creativity in Crisis”, Dean Oelschig makes a case for the reinvestment (both spiritually and financially) in creativity as a driving force in our society. Not so fun fact: Oelschig points out that in 2022, the ten highest-grossing films in the world included eight franchise sequels and a Batman reboot.
The motivation behind this, Oelschig theorises, is simply a desire to replicate success by replicating the same formula. While that in itself is not necessarily a bad or immoral thing, what happens when this replication attempt is co-opted by everybody? What happens when everyone begins playing the imitation game, intending to yield the same impact safely quantified by measurable results?
It’s part of the larger phenomenon of what journalist Kyle Chayka terms the “flattening” of culture across society as discussed in his book “Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture”.
He writes, “Attention becomes the only metric by which culture is judged. And what gets attention is dictated by equations developed by Silicon Valley Engineers. The outcome of such algorithmic gatekeeping is the pervasive flattening that has been happening across culture.”
He goes on to explain the real-life results of this cultural shift that prioritises data over creativity.
“The least ambiguous, least disruptive, and perhaps least meaningful pieces of culture are promoted the most. Flatness is the lowest common denominator, an averageness that has never been the marker of humanity’s proudest cultural creations.”
In sum, when data dictates creativity, creativity is flattened, moulded, and shaped into products, services, and messages that exist solely to keep feeding that data and replicating its results. It’s both the cause and the effect of the contenti-sation of creativity.
But data is not the death of creativity
Our first natural defence might be to say that all of the above is happening on a macro level but, the truth is, it has trickled down into every industry — including and especially B2B marketing.
Our second defence would be, “Well, duh. We’re creatives but we also run a business. It’s in our interest to harness tried-and-tested marketing techniques instead of opting for open-ended, artsy, ambiguous and utterly immeasurable messaging tactics.”
I hear you. I’m not pretending that I’m any different.
But, here’s the thing: as B2B marketers, we love data and we don’t need to be apologetic or remorseful for doing so. The data unequivocally demonstrates that there is a very real and urgent necessity for creativity in the B2B space.
At the 2023 B2B World Fest held in November last year, Drum facilitated several sessions on brand creativity, disruption and potential within B2B. One of these sessions, titled “Funnel Vision” focused on the core value of leveraging “Brand to demand” as a B2B marketing strategy.
Across the panel of marketing directors invited to share their insights off the backs of their extremely successful brand awareness campaigns, the consensus was watertight: the B2B industry needs to harness creativity to reach consumers, especially as data and privacy laws become more complex, stringent and punitive.
The Brand to demand strategy is evidence that creativity and data can (and should) co-exist in B2B marketing. This has been proven. Running brand awareness and acquisition campaigns is six times more effective than only running acquisition campaigns.
Creativity in crisis, or opportunity unrealised?
If you read my previous article about what would happen to B2B marketing if all digital channels failed overnight, you’d know that I’ve already spoken about B2B’s tendency to over-rely on the machine of marketing and not enough on its heart.
Here’s where the creativity crisis lies and, within it, our opportunity to reflect on where and how we can do better in injecting creative heart into what we do. Forget segmentation. People respond positively to creativity, whether they’re buying software or a soda.
For too long, we’ve underestimated the importance and inherent value of creativity in B2B branding and marketing. We’re in a creativity crisis — but it’s a good thing. Because we’re finally recognising that, while we can leverage imitation, data and metrics to reach people, we cannot rely on them to move people.
We need to incorporate more creative, risk-taking, difficult-to-measure strategies that can’t be quantified by machines in our quest to reach people, to really reach people — not just their inboxes.
Creativity is creativity. Data is data. They both have an important role to play in B2B marketing.
Wait, hold on.
Creativity is data! Data is creativity! We good now, Big Brother?
