#67: Linkedin Funded a Think Tank Addressing Growth Gaps in B2B Marketing

Linkedin funded a think tank - The B2B Institute - to fill gaps by "pursuing conceptual R&D and experiment with new ideas for the whole industry."

They published a 38 page white paper - "The 5 Principles Of Growth In B2B Marketing". If you're a B2B CMO, CGO, CRO etc, WELL worth a read.

TLDR, 3 key takeaways:

1. B2B buying process isn't nearly as logical as you think it is

   1. "The power of emotional campaigns is strengthened by another important choice heuristic: the affect heuristic. Kahneman’s model suggests that if we like a brand, we will tend to hold positive beliefs about its benefits...And this is likely to have a knock-on effect on the ability of those brands to activate short-term sales; if buyers already believe a brand offers good products, they will be more responsive to messages that tell them to act on that belief now."

   2. Captain obvious here but the better your brand, the better your demand generation, the better your sales cycle velocity, the better your conversion rate etc etc. as the market will want to do business with you.

2. How a B2B buying committee feels about your brand is a big deal

   1. "Included amongst these emotional campaigns are an elite group that achieved fame: they got talked about and shared. We showed a strong link earlier between fame as an objective and effectiveness, so it is not surprising that B2B fame campaigns outperform rational ones by an even greater margin — around 10x".

   2. Need an example?

   3. I don't know exactly what @Fast does, but because of how @domm, @mkobach, @KyleTibbitts etc build in public, I want to be their customer.

   4. No doubt, if / when I'm in the market, it's @Fast's game to lose.

   5. Brand MOST DEFINITELY matters.

3. Zig when everyone else is zagging

   1. "Why does B2B marketing, an industry that is worth billions, seem to lack a coherent understanding of how brands create growth over time? To address this gap, we created The B2B Institute—a think tank, funded by LinkedIn...Binet and Field show that brand building is a long-term strategy that pays off in years, not months. And yet, according to our survey, only 4% of B2B marketers measure impact beyond six months.”

4%...this one is jaw dropping....

July 26, 2021 (Twitter Link)