The World of B2B Marketing is Going Circular

The background

When marketing changed forever

ChatGPT made headlines across the world in 2023 and we all learned a new term “generative” AI.

Armed with tools like Canva, Vyond, Synthesis and ChatGPT, any person with some level of enthusiasm for marketing can produce a pretty convincing guide, white paper and video explainer—no marketing diploma required!  Content marketing has been thoroughly democratized, and in some ways that’s a good thing .. but it is a big change.

These factors represent a huge shift in landscape for marketing, leading the smart money to shift from transactional outreach marketing to community of interest value building initiatives.

Transactional marketing outreach doesn’t work. What next?

Practically every B2B marketing leader I know that doesn’t have the means to instantly satisfy customers with resources on their website is having difficulty in generating sales leads.

‘Ah,’ you say, ‘There are plenty of lead generation companies on LinkedIn and advertising online, why not use one of them?’ Easy answer. They don’t work, or, at least, if they can work, you should already be doing it yourself.

My conclusion is that marketing outreach doesn’t work.  Indeed, if the 2023 version of a marketing engine does work at all, it’s a sadly nourished poor cousin of the muscle-bound teeth-glinting sales lead generation engines of 1980, 1990, and indeed 2000.

Marketing has become ever-more transactional.  When you invest in a point-specific email or LinkedIn outreach campaign, or an event… or ad campaign., etc., it’s a moment in time.  Either it hits, or it doesn’t. Mostly, it doesn’t.  Your marketing spend is having to do ALL of the heavy lifting. 

But then, adversity is the birthplace of creativity. With the ‘cold marketing outreach’ door definitely shut, marketers are looking at new approaches problem solvers can use to find solution seekers.

You might think I’m going to launch into something about technology and AI, given the last two decades have made most of us assume anything in the world can be solved with an app and we’ve become ever more hungry for the next best app option. But no! The future of marketing is not whizzy software, it’s about winning your battle for communities of interest you care about.

Story Time

In late September 2023, I was at the Bloomberg Technology Summit in London. It was a typically miserable weather day in London. On arrival, I spotted the croissants and hot coffee and the draw was too great. Having equipped myself with my ‘recovery kit’ I went in search of somewhere to put my coffee down. The event networking area was scattered with bar tables and stools.

There was one that was largely free of delegates and headed across. I asked the sole user of the table I’d selected if I could perch next to him to touch down my coffee while I scoffed my croissant. He kindly agreed.

Moments later, a large Scottish man appeared at my shoulder. Without much tact, he charged into his sales pitch and my fellow coffee drinker had nowhere to hide. His exhausted reaction to this explosion of an elevator pitch was easy to spot. We have all been there, I simply smiled at him in support.

My newfound acquaintance offered a simple explanation that ‘it wasn’t him’ the salesman needed to speak to and, to move the conversation along, asked me who I was and what my interest was for attending the event, kicking off a long conversation with my new “best friend.”

This story serves as an example for the attitude we must adopt in the new age of marketing. With an onslaught of heavy handed communications fuelled by AI. It’s more valuable now than ever to have permission to approach potential buyers. This is why sellers need to become a part of the communities they serve.

Transactional versus Circular Marketing

For over 4-decades, the vast majority of B2B marketing spend has gone into fishing for sales leads through a largely transactional outreach approach.  You spend the money, and it is consumed instantly by marketing agencies, digital advertising, event organisers, etc. Within a few weeks of your investment, the money in burned.  If you haven’t converted spend into sales leads, nothing will bring that asset back.

For suppliers of products and services, if you are a member of your community of interest and you share an objective to achieve the same outcomes as your fellow members, you will create trusted sustaining relationships that give you ‘permission’ to sell.  Becoming a known and value-adding brand in your community of interest means you have many more opportunities to ‘be in the room’ and express your value when prospects surface their job challenges and buying needs.

For marketers, winning the hearts and minds of communities of interest is where the new battle for sales leads will come from.  Gone are the days of spray and hope transactional marketing. With modern circular marketing, any investment into communications activities is not instantly burned, but converts into community goodwill, new contacts, relationship credentials …and trust. 

Circular marketing offers an ‘ingredient-X.’  Successive marketing investments build, creating 1+1=4 value.  As members join, your audience grows and those members invest their own resources to build new value without your marketing budget being touched!

Final thoughts

With the shift in the climate for marketing, it seems clear to me that the way to keep a consistent flow of sales leads and satisfy your current customers is to build a deeper relationship with your community.

Ask yourself:
1.  Are you fully leveraging your communities of interest?
2.  Do know the size of your passive, active and actionable audiences?
3.  Do you have a strategy to WIN in the battle for communities?

If you don’t have the answers to these questions, you need to get moving with your circular marketing agenda. Otherwise, your competitors will be stealing your lunch in 2024.