What's Wrong with B2B Advertising? -- Not as Much as You Think
“We’re not saying all business-to-business advertising sucks – many achieve mediocrity and a few are excellent”.
Dave and Alex
A few years ago a pair of young advertising executives (Dave and Alex) rated 200 B2B print ads: only 5% were rated as excellent; one-fifth as mediocre and the large majority (79%) as poor. Dave is still around and is currently paired with someone called Eddy (of the Dave and Eddy show) but the evidence shows that B2B advertising has matured substantially in just a few short years.
Dave and Alex received a lot of attention for their opinions – but by their own admission they admit that their approach was not very scientific: they basically selected an assortment of ads from six trade magazines. Nevertheless business advertising executives would agree with a number of their conclusions about what constitutes a poor or mediocre business ad:
No creative concept
Business ads with a simple product photo shot and headline with a poorly worded selling proposition: Everything you need is a router at half the price...Why not cut costs without cutting corners. Compare these to another ad for a healthcare company targeting HR personnel in small companies: Cut costs, not coverage – a captivating headline in bold white copy or red background which meshes with the selling proposition.
The trite analogy
B2B ads riddled with clichés such as: canyons (symbolizing depth); geysers (dependability); lurking wolves (competitive threats); bouncing balls (flexibility).
The creative misfire
Usually refers to tasteless ads such as one targeted at the beef trade featuring a live cow over the image of a cooking fire with the headline: Smoke gets in your eyes.
Sponsors of the five excellent ads mainly included large and well known companies: Microsoft; EDS; Internet Security Systems to name a few. In most cases the production values tended to be described as competent and noted for their clarity: single message and easily understood; their creative indivisibility (where the headline and visuals work well together); their restraint (simple graphics and tight copy).
Reality check
Even though this study was conducted a few shot years ago, the measly 5% of B2B ads classified as excellent would easily climb to 40% or more today:
-B2B advertisers include some of the biggest companies in the world – Intel’s Intel Inside campaign continues to be regarded as one of the best campaigns of the 20th century; and the gold standard for B2B ingredient advertising.
-BtoB Magazine in its monthly feature called 'Chasers' probes into the mechanics of B2B ads and has no trouble finding both the poor and excellent examples.
-Chasers recently compared two airline ads targeted at business customers offering 'comfort': one featured a stylized visual of a woman blissfully at rest on a flight but the rest of the copy failed to exploit this theme; the second ad featured the business class section (of a new airplane) floating on clouds and displaying extra wide comfortable seating and luxurious in-flight service.
