The results bring together the views of nearly 100 senior B2B marketers and compares what they think works with the view of the people they are targeting –224 buyers in business and professional services, financial services, engineering and manufacturing and technology and telecoms.

Whilst overall there are many indications that marketers are getting it right, some surprising results have emerged in terms of what really makes the difference between success and failure.  In particular the divide between buyer and marketer on social and mobile is wider than we might have thought.

The document pulls out some of the statistics in four key areas – business relationships, thought leadership, the role of digital and spend vs effectiveness. The full research is a veritable Aladdin’s cave of data which we’ll be sharing in more detail over the coming weeks.

Many thanks to all who took part, and to our partners at The Marketing Society and Circle Research for their invaluable input.  If you’d like to receive copies of the data charts that back this up click here.

We will also be presenting two webinars with further details on the research on Tuesday 29th of May at 10am (GMT) and 2:30pm (GMT) –

The premise of the Account Planning Group’s session, Worlds Collide, last week was to ask people from entirely different walks of life to talk about how they approach strategy. So a campaigner for Peace, the former Commander of Her Majesty’s Forces, a modern day Mad Man and a political spin doctor took the stage – and approached the subject from entirely different directions.

The audience was the thinking end of the advertising industry – account planners. Urbane but slightly arty, dressed with understated casualness. Not a track suit in sight. Odd that the people who are meant to represent the consumer’s point of view in our industry should all be so incredibly similar. Presumably they spend half their lives in focus groups and the rest listening in on social media to work out what non middle class, University educated, white 30-somethings think.

I had a dream

The debate itself kicked off with one of the most passionate diatribes you are likely to hear this side of the US presidential elections. Jeremy Gilley had a dream, to make Peace One Day a reality. He has worked tirelessly for the last 10 years, flying round the world (courtesy of BA, who came up trumps early on in his campaign) to get everyone to sign up to the idea. And everyone includes the Taliban. As a result of his awesomely impressive efforts, for one day a year violence, both political and domestic, reduces (by 70% in Afghanistan in 2008). And remarkable things happen as a result. When peace arrives, art flourishes. Vaccination (3.2 million children vs polio) can happen. Possibilities open up like flowers in the desert. Inspiring.

Ends. Ways. Means.

Then General Sir Mike Jackson talked us through his military version of strategy. It’s a bit more sophisticated these days than Ready, Aim, Fire – but has the same simplicity. Ends. Ways. Means. In other words, identify your goal, work out how you are going to get there. Then do it. He also raised the important point that you need a Plan B, and probably a Plan C, up your sleeve. “Just in case Her Majesty’s enemies try to ‘rot you up’”. Impressive bloke.

Work out why anyone would give a ****

Third up was David Droga, the charmingly Aussie, much decorated creative – over from New York. His work (at least the work that he showed) is really lovely – no wonder he’s won so many Cannes Lions. He talked ably about the need to identify why anyone would give a stuff, matching that to the real heart of the brand, and using that to inform the strategy. He didn’t mention planning once – you rather got the idea that the creatives do all the planning at Droga 5 – but no-one in the audience (of planners) seemed to mind. I was impressed by the impact of their work in creative terms, but I was also left wondering whether the ‘R’ in their ROI might not have been so considerable had the ‘I’ not been so substantial.

A word, a phrase, a speech

Finally, Alastair Campbell stood up and showed us all how it’s done. I wanted to dislike him, after all Ian Hislop patently loathes him and I like Ian Hislop; but I just couldn’t do it. He was quite frankly, brilliant. Sharp witted, amusing, passionate, knowledgable, helpful (enjoining us to crystallise our strategic thinking into ‘a word, a phrase, a speech, a book’). Ok, he name-dropped for Britain, as one grumpy Tweeter complained – but if he wasn’t so well connected he wouldn’t have been half as interesting. In fact he’d probably have been as interesting as the person moaning about him from the auditorium.

What’s the answer?

It was a good concept, but didn’t entirely achieve its objectives. The idea was to explore the role that strategy plays in the delivery of various initiatives. All the speakers said that it’s the clarity of the goal that matters. Once that was identified, by an idea, a logo, a word or phrase, it’s easier to devise a strategy. But, as General Sir Mike Jackson said, strategy is about the most misused words in the English language. And truthfully, they all used goals and strategy interchangeably, and strategy morphed into tactics without anyone noticing. When one bright spark (told you it was the thinking end of the ad industry) asked them to nominate their best strategy, they mostly couldn’t.

Jeremy had no strategy, just a passionate commitment to making it happen. The General of course had a strategy – but his talk was really more about leadership as most of his strategies seemed to be predicated on him making decisions about what to do. David Droga enjoined us to keep asking what the strategy was, but was vaguer on how to do one. And Alastair Campbell quoting Lance Armstrong’s “Losing or dying – it’s the same thing”, was equally passionate about having a goal and not letting go of it, even if someone is trying to take you out in the process. His most relevant comment on strategy was probably this – “it’s the bit where you have the arguments”.

The key to strategy? To know where you’re going.

It was the General that had the last word, when asked to define strategy. “Where do I want to be and how do we get there over the long term” was his answer. And he also offered this example. Not his, he admitted, but impressive just the same. He was talking to a British soldier, the night before the second Gulf War kicked off in 2003. ‘The way I see it’ said the soldier, ‘is that we’re going to go over the border , kick the buggers’ arses and get home for some beers’. “That” said the General, “is a strategy”.

You know it’s a good lecture when, at the end of the talk, you want to throw up your job and go work for the person who spoke or, as Amanda McKenzie, President of the Marketing Society hinted, have their babies.  And so it was with Monday night’s Marketing Society lecture, given by Paul Polman, CEO of Unilever.

Mr Polman is clearly not one to avoid challenging convention.  For a start, the ambitious goal that he set for the company was to double profits whilst halving their environmental impact in 10 years.  No mean target, but they are well on the way to that goal.  But the behaviours he has put in train in order to get there are equally remarkable.

For a start he announced on his first day in the job that he was not going to report on a quarterly basis to shareholders.  His argument was that his strategy was clear and his goals longer term.  And that he had better things to do.   Admittedly he did say it was a risky position to take – but reckoned his first day in office was the day in which he was least likely to be fired.  Unilever’s share price has since risen by 68p.

Second he is categoric on the need to work with the competition, not against them.  Clearly Unilever alone can have a huge impact; 1 in 6 people on the planet uses a Unilever product. But ‘If we have achieved all our goals but no one else has changed their behaviour, we have failed’. He acknowledged however, that this is a new challenge for leaders to get used to, particularly those brought up in the dog eat dog world of FMCG.

Third he is evangelical about the need for corporate transparency.  Businesses, in his view, are less trusted than ever before; the consumer is in charge, able to use the powers of social media to overthrow errant businesses in a nanosecond.   But far from being brow beaten by this, he feels it’s the best time for responsible business to fill the void.

To do this, he argues, businesses need to communicate their business models not just with shareholders but with the community.  For him, businesses should have a deeper purpose, beyond simply selling stuff, and he believes that the ones that do will be rewarded, not just in heaven, but by sales.  ”Consumers will choose not just brands but companies that behave responsibly.”

And, in his final piece of remarkable advice, he sees Marketers as central to the whole thing – to galvanise a force for good.

For Mr Polman, the impact we make on the future of the planet is the right measure of our effectiveness. Perhaps Marketers should take a leaf out of his book and refuse to chase short term ROI, in the same way as he refused to chase short term share gains.

Fran Brosan

It was a really imaginative idea – to bring together experts all of whom influence the workplace in different ways: Sevil Peach who designed the Microsoft Offices in Amsterdam, Philip Ross, the office technology expert, as well as people like Alan Bainbridge who is overseeing the BBC move to Manchester. Each speaker approached the challenge of what the workplace of the future will look like from their professional discipline.

Omobono spoke on social media. We started with ‘social business’ – the idea that social media is having a transformational impact on business far beyond marketing. Our view is that social media can help organisations create and share value (externally and internally) by making all the expertise within the four walls of the organisation 100% visible. The example given is that if a prospective buyer knew everything about the great work you do and the expertise you have – they’d almost certainly buy from you. Social media is having an impact  everywhere already – enhancing customer service, product development, monitoring risk and deepening customer relationships. Social Business is happening now. We’re delivering it – such as the private social network we built for farmers in Vietnam.

The contentious point we made was around the rise of the ‘Influential Individual’ – the idea that our own reputation does not really have a measurable impact on the work we win and the promotions we receive. Social media might just help make this happen. Already people are trying to improve their Klout scores, LinkedIn connections and Twitter followers. Imagine if there was an accepted measure of reputation. It will change the balance between the individual and the employer. More people may choose to be independent, working from anywhere and from home – lending their experience to organisations (which start to look much more like federations). Creating a workplace suddenly becomes much more important – organisations will have to really attract people to their workspaces, we heard from Alan Bainbridge, Portfolio Director of the BBC who showed us the efforts the BBC is going to in Salford to achieve this. They will have to consider branding their online workspaces and even reach into people’s homes where no doubt we will have smart walls and other digital spaces that employer brands have yet to reach.

Discuss!

What can the digital world do to help us work more efficiently? Can it make us happier, more contented workers? Does giving the modern workforce the choice of working from home or office really improve productivity? Apparently the answer is yes, productivity is on average 30% higher in those working from home. This was just 9am on the first day of the Melcrum Digital Summit and we were already getting right into it – no holding back.

Aimed at internal communications experts, the Melcrum Digital Summit successfully made the (commonly perceived) ugly sister of external comms, significantly more attractive. A range of global and UK based companies were represented including Adidas, BT, IKEA, Lexis Nexis and IBM were all there to share their experiences of the digital communications world and what it can do for your internal communications function.  A lot as it turns out. Speakers ranged from the ethereal to the pragmatic and opened our minds to the true possibilities of using social platforms to breakdown longstanding silos, increasing the brand value of your CEO, encouraging international, inter-disciplinary collaboration and generally getting better at everything!

The likes of Yammer, Jive, IBM Blue IQ were all discussed, never compared but always championed. These social business platforms (as some called them) all have so much potential that for many of us, it can be a case of catch up. However, key themes soon emerged:

• Introducing your social platform to the business requires unsurprisingly, good executive sponsorship. However, if you can engage your senior execs at the very start, get them using it, posting, sharing and discussing, not only will their leadership gain more exposure but they are far more likely to become long term champions.
• Explaining why this ‘social thing’ is so important is vital. Contextualising the value of it within the culture and future of your organisation will help position the tool as something that can lead ultimately, to increased revenue. In one global auditing company’s experience, use of their ‘social thing’ became mandatory so as to become an absolutely integral part of the business.
• The democratising power of the internal social platform is not to be feared – yes, it’s a good idea to have someone manage it but generally, people regard it as a digital workspace, not a place to moan about your boss’s latest request/the quality of your morning coffee.
• The social workplace site, run by Elizabeth Lupfer of Verizon,  is a hive of opinion sharing, statistic sharing, advice giving and general internal comms loving – try it.
• Openness and collaboration are to be celebrated. Information no longer needs to be cascaded, it can just live in one place, accessible to all (or certain groups if needed). Views can be shared, opinions heard, work can be repurposed, and new alliances formed. The possibilities for improved working relationships and processes are seemingly endless.

Lastly, should you wish to embrace the possibilities of an internal social platform, you can say a not-so-sad farewell to endless internal email trails, newsletters e-zines and memos that permeate your daily existence.

Emilie Cumming

And, as these things are wont to do, it set me thinking.

This year, I’ll have been in the workplace for 25 years. Like many people, I now feel defined by my work. Not only does it describe who I am, it’s also the benchmark for my self-worth. I do well at work; I feel good about myself. I don’t do so well; I feel less of a person and the black dog takes a bite.

But with new life proliferating all around, it’s perhaps a chance to step back.

Ultimately we are all hostages to biology. Everything else – work, success, owning ‘stuff’ – is a construct. The only true constant in life is the requirement to replicate ourselves, to continue our genetic journey into the future. The only thing that really matters is people.

And here’s the point – our work is no different. Technology changes, delivery channels change, marketing theory changes.

But at the centre of it all is people. And what people want hasn’t change that much in a millennia. At the core of it, we’re all still driven by the bottom tiers of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

As marketers, there’s a tendency to overcomplicate, to want the next new thing because it’s new, to elevate the needs of the business over that of the customer.

So simply remembering that we’re talking to wonderful, fragile, happy, sad, funny, scary people might be the best place to start with our communications.

And we might remain relevant to all these new lives bursting into the world.

A suitable candidate should be a good team player, keen to develop their skills in a busy development team and work well under pressure.

You’ll likely be a recent graduate in computer science or similar and be looking for your first or second role.

Essential skills

• Proven skill in HTML, CSS and JavaScript
• Understanding of current web trends
• Understanding of Adobe products including Dreamweaver and Photoshop

Desirable skills

• PHP / MySQL
• .NET
• WordPress
• Mobile web development
• SQL

Experience & education

• Degree educated is preferred although all candidates would be considered
• Must have strong understanding of programming principles
• Excellent communication skills.

If you think you’ve got some or all of the skills we would love to hear from you and see some examples of your work. Please email sarah@omobono.com.

All week we have been informed that India “takes a long time to crack”, “you need to be here”, “you need a partner” – but most of all that it is all about relationships. (Note to Purchasing – Our USB cards bearing the slogan “Relationships drive your business. We drive your relationships” have been going down a storm).

Our day started on the Outer Loop – a large, local auditing company were kind enough to share their experiences with us. Outside as we waited for our taxi we met the first of the many entrepreneurs that live in Delhi – Rahul the TukTuk driver. Rahul can’t afford the $1,000 to by a Delhi TukTuk licence – so he rents his TukTuk at a cost of about £5 for 24 hours (his brother, clearly a lightweight, pays £4.50 to have one 12 hours a day). Rahul eats, works and sleeps in his TukTuk. His pitch was charming, not too pushy “Give me one chance” he said.

Our first pitch of the day was in Noida – an hour’s drive outside Delhi – along a toll road with a cattle grid at its end to stop the, yes, cattle interrupting the traffic. Our first meeting could have been a dead end – they were a top 50 Indian business  - but potentially the chap was not quite right. But we talked and eventually he suggested a colleague in another office. Could we see her? A call later and we were in a cab crossing Delhi. An hour later and we had learnt a huge amount about the comms business here, how this company procures services like ours and an insider’s perspective on how business is done. This contact then said that in the next door building was one of India’s most famous companies and their Corporate Comms Director was a very influential figure.

Outside on the street (with Rahul) we rang him. There was a pause but then he said we would see us in 15 minutes. We met and for 20 minutes the conversation was a little forced. As I thanked him and stood to leave he motioned for me to sit: “Have a cup of tea” he said. We had just passed the first test of Indian business. We spoke at length, shared ideas and secured a return invitation – perhaps to speak on social media to a large Indian PR network. All three people in this little chain are due a big thank you – but it was a hugely instructive lesson into how things are done here.

We packed more into the day – research with some delightful and impressive Durham Business School MBA Alumni and then a networking do at the High Commission with the British Business Group. There we met local agency folk, local business people and then we met Ian (hello Ian).

We learnt a lot from Ian. And we also went to the spectacular Veda curry house which serves the biggest Bangladeshi prawns we had ever seen. Eating them breaks most of the rules of visiting India but they were delicious. Veda sits on the Outer Loop – our day ending, 18 hours later exactly where it began.

We have listened and learnt a lot – and most of all that a cup of tea can get you a long way.

The obvious obstacles to creativity – and their obvious counter arguments as Joel saw them – were as follows.

• B2B isn’t sexy because it sells functional products not those to which you aspire. Well, truthfully, insurance is hardly aspirational.
• B2B decision makers make rational not emotional decisions. Hmmm. But B2B has brands, strong ones. And brands are all about emotion. And let’s not forget that 100% of business decision makers are human.
• The budgets aren’t available. B2B budgets do tend to be smaller than consumer budgets it’s true. But the key to creativity is about experimentation, not expenditure.
• Creative talent is lacking in B2B agencies. Or is the truth actually that the client relationships don’t engender the trust needed to allow for experimentation.

The less obvious ones – which get closer to the truth – then run:

• B2B organisations are too sales led. As a result, marketing isn’t given the respect it might achieve in a B2C organisation where it’s critical to achieving the business goals.
• Marketers aren’t brave enough.
• Good ideas get filtered and diluted as everyone tries to second guess their boss.
• International pressures mean that cultural nuances get stripped out, leading to generic, homogenous approaches.

I think there’s a thread running through this. It stems from the thought that marketing often doesn’t have the respect it receives in B2C firms. Whilst it may be true that B2B marketers aren’t good at taking risks, even calculated ones it’s also true that agencies don’t challenge briefs enough. Why is this?

Could it be simply that client agency relationships aren’t as well developed in B2B as they are in B2C? This is partly because budgets are smaller and therefore the on going retained relationship that might exist in FMCG isn’t available to B2B ‘accounts’. Roster arrangements exist but are often used to pit one agency against another on a cost basis. It’s also partly because if marketing as a discipline isn’t respected within the organisation, then the agency will tend to be seen as a supplier rather than a partner. In this environment clients don’t work with their agency so much as pit them against senior management. Where’s the trust in that?

As a result, agencies aren’t in a position to challenge briefs because they are worried they’ll lose the gig. And the lack of a true partnership either means they won’t get the data they need from the client because they’ll be reluctant to share it (why is that?!) or, because of the lack of investment in marketing, the client doesn’t have the data anyway.

So in fact, clients lose out because the thing that agencies are good at is coming up with value added ideas that have sprung up on them meerkat like when they are thinking about something else. And because their agencies will only be able to come up with the first idea if they are constantly pitching competitively, rather than being able to bin that and develop something off the back of it. There used to be an adage that pitch works never runs because it’s not right. Nowadays it seems that clients expect pitch work to run because they don’t want to pay for additional ‘development’ time. As a result, the work’s not necessarily right. But look on the bright side – the lack of really big creative ideas which span a number of years, go across geographies and products are so remote that it doesn’t matter if the work’s not right – it’ll be binned and replaced by a new idea in a few months anyway.

Of course it is not fair to blame the clients themselves (and I’m not). For a start none of this can make up for the fact that if the agency isn’t good creatively it won’t have good ideas. But this more is about organisational norms which pervade B2B companies. I think it’s the climate in which B2B marketing operates that means good ideas get stifled at birth.