Cos Mingides on making the business case for brand investment in B2B

His opening remarks will set the tone for an event, hosted for the first time in both London and Chicago, that aims to empower B2B marketers to seize the moment creatively and technologically and arm them with the tools to make the best possible case to their C-suites to invest in their brands. (Find out more about the speakers, agenda and how to attend.)

Having helped shape our agenda as a member of this year’s steering committee and enjoyed a front-row seat to industry trends as a returning juror at The Drum Awards for B2B, Mingides caught up with us about the big opportunities and challenges in B2B right now and how we’ll be tackling them at World Fest.

Cos, you’re going to be establishing the tone for the day with your scene-setting remarks on ‘The Age of B2B Effectiveness’. Can you give our readers a little taste of what to expect?

I’ll be setting up the day with an overview of how the B2B marketing landscape has changed over the last 30 years and talking about the incredibly privileged position we now find ourselves in. More B2B-specific research on effectiveness has been produced in the last five years than in the previous 50 combined. We’ve entered a new era for the category, inspired by technological innovation and greater understanding of what drives sustainable business growth. And when you put it all together, it represents a massive opportunity for brands to take a lead in their respective categories.

You’re also participating in our big Oxford Union-style debate on the motion ‘Brand is more important than demand in B2B’. We are, of course, deliberately provoking an intellectual tussle here, but why do you think brand v demand continues to be a divisive subject for the industry?

I think it’s becoming less divisive than it was in the past. If you speak to anyone in B2B, there seems to be a common understanding around the value of brand building now – and the need for a balanced approach. The challenge is that demand continues to be the primary focus for a large percentage of B2B organizations due to the immense pressure to deliver short-term results. This is often at the expense of brand investment which is why it’s important to continue having these debates. I’m really looking forward to this one – the debate-style format will be a lot of fun.

Brand has undoubtedly become a bigger part of the B2B narrative in recent years. But how does investment in brand marketing compare to the amount of rhetoric about it? How are you seeing priorities play out in reality?

We’re still nowhere near where we should be in terms of brand investment. Despite all the great conversations and the empirical evidence to support it, B2B brands are significantly underspending and there’s a lot of headroom for growth that remains untapped.

It’s important to remember that marketers are often fighting against a deep-rooted sales culture within their organization, so making the case for increased investment for brand building is not always easy. The people they need to persuade to invest in it, prize objectivity above all. They will only invest resources in things that will result in tangible, visible improvements to their businesses, so it’s not enough to talk about changes in awareness or consideration.

We need to find ways to forecast the value that brand investment will return. We do a lot of work with our clients to help them build a business case to the CFO, which aligns brand investment back to business outcomes such as revenue and market share growth.

There are many legitimate reasons, of course, why some organizations may favor and find more success with a demand-based approach. But some are also nervous about brand representing a leap into the unknown. How can effectiveness principles and measurement help overcome that concern?

The key to instilling confidence lies in measuring what matters – business value. Demand activity is easy to measure and easy to track to a sales outcome. So, it feels like a very safe bet. Brand building on the other hand is harder to track back to sales, so it’s critical that the right metrics are in place to ensure we are capturing its value. We need to be measuring more than the awareness and attitudinal changes we get from brand studies. For example, share of search has become an incredibly valuable metric and we’ve now proven it aligns closely to market share in multiple B2B categories – some of which are very niche. I’m also a big advocate for econometric modeling being included in any robust measurement framework. It’s the only way to measure the holistic value of the entire marketing mix.

What are the most common questions you are asked by marketers seeking to prove the efficacy of marketing to the C-suite and/or their budget stakeholders? And what advice would you give them about doing so?

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The need to ‘speak the language of the CFO’ was something we talked about a lot during our steering committee conversations and is a subject we’ll be tackling at the event. Where do we get it wrong in terms of making the case for marketing and what are the core principles of finding a mutual understanding between the CMO and their CRO or CEO counterparts?

I think it starts by building more empathy for the CFO and the challenges they are grappling with on a day-to-day basis. Education and awareness on both sides is crucial to building a more positive and collaborative relationship. It’s not rocket science to understand that they want to see a profit return from your marketing investment – but too often we report back with metrics that are very difficult for the CFO to take anything meaningful from. We need to work more closely to understand the metrics that matter to the board and ensure we are reporting back on those terms. We’ve got so much data and empirical evidence on effectiveness to support these discussions now, so we should be getting it right.

As well as your involvement in World Fest, you have been a long-time supporter and judge of The Drum Awards for B2B. That’s given you a great vantage point to observe how B2B work is progressing across the industry. What are the most notable trends you’ve observed and how do you assess the state of B2B creativity today?

I feel really privileged to have been on jury for the last few years and have a front row seat to witness the evolution of the category. The creative bar is rising at such a fast pace and it’s so great to see. More and more brands are understanding the value of creativity. We are seeing a higher volume of bold, fame-driving ideas, but also a significant uplift in production values. The competition to win a Drum Award has never been fiercer and I believe this will have a snowball effect, leading to an increase in creative ambition from more and more brands. It’s a really exciting time to be a B2B marketer.