Strategic events are often one of a company’s largest, annual recurring investments as part of their broader engagement programs. And of course, the global pandemic has changed the stakes and expectations for such events as organizations pivot to engage employees, customers and partners in a virtual setting, using the opportunity to reinforce key brand messages, strategies and experiences.

But, what exactly do we mean by “strategic events?” Events can range from annual sales conferences to investor days to customer appreciation events to events with a shared goal of shifting the beliefs and behaviors of the attendees to the desired state of engagement and alignment.

Yet, far too often the desired outcome isn’t achieved by one, standalone event, which means the price tag of it usually outweighs the benefits. And measuring ROI? Don’t even think about it—especially when buy-in, attention and attendance are hindered in a virtual environment. A day out of the office at an offsite location? Why not. Step away from your job demands to be on Zoom for 8 hours straight? A harder sell.

5 Principles for Increased Success at Customer & Employee Engagement Events

But that doesn’t have to be the case. Companies that follow the five essential steps outlined below are much more likely to come out of a strategic event with more engaged employees, customers and partners. We’ve found that these five principles lead to the strongest levels of employee engagement and ROI at events:

1) Build a digital program, not a digital event

Events have a shelf life. They can generate short-term enthusiasm, but often not sustained engagement. To combat this, companies should design events that connect to a broader virtual engagement program. In shifting perceptions and behaviors, people evolve along a curve of hearing, understanding, believing and living. It is difficult, if not impossible, to go through each of these phases in a single event. Long-term programs, on the other hand, employ a steady drumbeat of communications and experiences that reinforce core messages and behaviors of the event over time.

2) Start with insights

Too often, we see organizations use events to communicate to an audience based on what they want to tell them. Just like customer research before launching a new product or service, it is vital to find out what’s on the mind of the target audience and shape the content and experience based on that insight. What is most important to them right now?  What questions and concerns do they have? What type of experience are they expecting? Go on a listening tour of your audience, and even take them through the early stages of the content and event plan to get their feedback.

3) Define the core idea and story arc

Most events are like an all-you-can-eat buffet of ideas and messages. Content, more so as we work remotely, gets developed in silos and, at best, may be connected together by talented speakers. But more often than not, the audience is left having to piece together the messages and determine the universal takeaway themselves. Instead, companies should start with a well-defined idea or belief and integrate it throughout the virtual event, from the messages of individual speakers to the event experiences. This core idea is more than a high-level event theme. It is a through thread that creates a compelling story arc and breaks down silos so everyone can hear, understand and apply the main point of the strategic event.

“Companies should start with a well-defined idea or belief and integrate it throughout the virtual event.”

4) Modulate the experience

Many events overly fixate on the “main stage” talks. These are great for inspiration but fall short on application. It has been proven that adults learn best when they are given multiple ways to access the content. The best-structured events do not rely on a single format like the main stage; they create experiences with multiple formats. This could be smaller “Zoom breakout” group labs or workshops, small group experiences, or an exposition where attendees can interact more intimately with experts or artifacts – like a live Q&A. The bottom line is, mix it up. Create a diverse experience that stimulates the audience in various ways and strengthens customer and employee engagement.

5) Put culture at the center

Employees, customers and other stakeholders are increasingly attracted to organizations with a clear purpose and strong culture. However, too many companies still treat strategic events strictly as a “business meeting.” At Prophet, we have found that core messages and desired behaviors are more easily retained when the company’s culture is reflected at events. This means keeping things light, having moments of fun, surprise and recognition and celebrating heritage. Just like the story arc, spend time crafting the emotional arc of a strategic event and figure out when, where, and how to infuse signature stories, recognition and fun into the agenda.

Think about the last time you ordered a cup of coffee. Did the barista who took your order smile and welcome you? Or was it clear she was ready for his shift to be over? How about the last time you needed to speak to a customer service manager? Was the manager reading robotically from a script, or did she take the time to ask questions and empathize with your situation?

How your business leaders, managers and employees show up has always been a critical input for how customers feel about your brand. And when you have customers interacting with your brand weekly, daily, or even hourly – consistently positive interactions can drive trust, loyalty and repeat business, while even just a few negative interactions can cause customers to jump ship and head to a competitor.

This is nothing new – experiences have been built, and brands have grown through the way employees treat customers. What’s new is how important these brand behaviors will be as the world adjusts to its new normal. We are being thrown, without warning, into new ways of interacting with customers. Brands that lead with care and purpose will build trust. Brands that are careless in their actions run the risk of losing out.

A New Normal for Brand Behaviors

Brands with well-defined brand behaviors or service styles have a competitive advantage over their peers. There’s a reason why Team Members at Chick-fil-A always respond with a “my pleasure” and a genuine smile when you say, “thank you.” It’s core to who they are and how they serve, and it’s ingrained in every employee from day 1.

“Consistently positive interactions can drive trust, loyalty and repeat business, while even just a few negative interactions can cause customers to jump ship and head to a competitor.”

Something as simple as greeting a guest with a smile, or taking a few seconds to ask how their day is going will always be strong examples of Brand Behaviors that build loyalty. But think for a minute about the new behaviors that might drive trust in a post-COVID-19 world:

• An employee wiping down a touchscreen after every customer
• A cashier being empowered to give a nurse a free cup of coffee
• A manager knowing how to empathize with a customer who can’t make a monthly payment because he’s been furloughed

Now, the stakes are higher – the presence of positive, on-brand behaviors will build trust and loyalty, while the absence of these behaviors will force customers to go elsewhere. As a leader, it’s a great time to revisit the standards for how your employees interact with customers and how your brand is experienced.

Building Brand Behaviors

Implementing a set of on-brand brand behaviors is an intuitive, yet careful process with many critical milestones.

1. Clarify the Ambition

Well before jumping right to “what do I want my employees to say or do”, it’s important to start with an ambition. At the end of the day, Brand Behaviors must be thought of strategically in the context of what your brand stands for and link back to the priorities of the business.

• What is core to our brand purpose and which aspects of our brand do we want employees to bring to life?
• How do we want our customers to feel?
• Why is this important to the overall growth of our business?

2. Define the Behaviors

With the ambition in place, you can translate the strategy to behaviors for customer-facing employees; behaviors that will be recognized and appreciated by your customers, and easy to learn and display without disrupting the roles and responsibilities of frontline employees.

• Where are the moments that matter most in the customer’s journey and experience with our brand?
• How can our employees bring our brand to life in these moments in simple, memorable ways?
• Are there exemplary on-brand behaviors happening already that we can share more broadly? And which new behaviors will our employees be excited to display?

3. Codify and Share the Behaviors

Even they go nowhere without thoughtful planning to share and create buy-in with those expected to display them. Here it’s all about simplifying the ask and telling a compelling story that gets employees excited to play a role.

• Why are we asking our employees to display these behaviors?
• What will get our team excited and incentivized to display these behaviors?
• How will these behaviors empower our team to serve our customers better, while being authentic to themselves and to our brand?

Getting Started

Defining and implementing Brand Behaviors is a journey, but it’s a journey that can get started with a few simple steps:

1. Reflect on how you want your brand to show up, especially in this uncertain world
2. Think of the simple but memorable behaviors that will bring your brand to life and stand-out from the competition
3. Connect your team to the bigger why and make it easy for them to exhibit new behaviors

In just a few weeks, businesses and societies have been upended by COVID-19.  This is a defining moment for leaders to steward their organizations, themselves and their families through a crisis of this magnitude and come out stronger on the other side. For nearly a decade, we’ve had the pleasure of working with Mark Miller, Vice President of High-Performance Leadership at Chick-fil-A – working on projects like NEXT (their annual company event), Leadership Development and Customer Experience projects. Mark is a best-selling author of books including Chess not Checkers, Win the Heart, and The Secret. I recently caught up with Mark (virtually) and he shared some timely advice for leaders.

How is Chick-fil-A’s business doing, and in particular, the Operators and team members in the restaurants?

I’ll speak to what will probably become a theme throughout this piece: We have a lot to be thankful for. Obviously, it is a very challenging time for our Operators and their team members with closed dining rooms and mall restaurants; but overall, we are thankful we can continue to serve our customers.

You have about 2,500 restaurants around the country.  What are the leadership demands being placed on the Operators of those restaurants right now?

The demands are multi-faceted. We want to do everything we can to protect our team members who continue to serve customers. We don’t want to do anything to spread the virus. As it relates to Operators, they are trying to serve our customers under these challenging circumstances.

What are the pitfalls facing leaders right now in the middle of this crisis?  What should they avoid?

Self-care or the lack thereof is a big concern at any time, but especially now. Rest is important; so is exercise. Connection with others is also vital – even if virtual. Call a friend, text a colleague, schedule a Zoom call. Stay rested, connected and fit to lead. Regarding what to avoid, my encouragement is to avoid dwelling on what is out of your control. Don’t deny it – just don’t dwell on it. I would suggest leaders focus their time, energy and best thinking on things you can control (or at least influence). There’s too much to do to waste effort on things that are out of your control.

How do you think about the difference between an “effective leader” and a “typical leader”?  What are the defining traits?   

Thanks to the hard work of the Prophet team, we are now forming a point of view on this topic. It has proven to be a fascinating and complex question! Most people would agree on the things leaders do: Communicate vision, build teams, drive innovation, build strong relationships, produce results, walk the talk, etc. We are trying to crack the code on what the most effective leaders do differently. The work is still underway, but I feel confident that our final conclusions will include a couple of important things. One, the best leaders appear to value and create margin more than “typical” leaders. These women and men understand it is in this space where they clarify their thinking, sort out everchanging priorities, evaluate current strategies, assess the effectiveness of current plans and re-center themselves around what matters. Without sufficient margin, we have found many leaders “stuck in action.”

You mention “creating margin.” How is that more important during a  crisis and how can leaders make time for that? 

The more complex the challenges, the more demanding the circumstances; the greater the consequences, the more margin matters. Leaders attempting to navigate in crisis need every possible resource at their disposal – beginning with the time, energy and space to think. Margin enables leaders to do their best work when it matters most.

What’s the other key trait that distinguishes “effective leaders” from “typical leaders”?

Another characteristic we’ve discovered in the most effective leaders is they believe they can! This is not an unbridled optimism, but it is a boundless belief in their personal ability to affect positive change. Our psychologist friends would call this an internal locus of control.

How might an effective leader demonstrate care to their teams during the crisis?

In my book Win the Heart, I outline four elements required for a person to feel cared for. All apply in pre- and post-COVID-19.

Connection – Stay connected. Yes, it is harder today, but never more important. I have made this part of my “shelter in place” daily routine. Who can you connect with today?

Affirmation – People want and need to feel seen and valued. Look for ways to affirm them and their value as a person. Again, you may find this difficult under our current circumstances, but this is vital. Many people are anxious about the future – their health, their loved ones, their finances, their job. Who can you affirm and encourage today?

Responsibility – Sharing real responsibility has always been a great way to demonstrate trust, but is often overlooked as a way to raise someone’s level of care for their work. What work, or better yet, what decision, can you delegate to someone today?

Environment – This is a broad category reflecting everything from physical and psychological safety to the proper tools and training required for the task at hand. In today’s world, many of our organizations are cutting expenses, as we should. However, are there any tools or resources you can provide for remote work that might prove helpful? When leaders enhance the work environment, it communicates care.

Bottom line: When leaders and organizations provide the elements of CARE, people care more.

What should leaders be doing right now to stay focused on what matters most / in the future?

A: My advice is to do what the best leaders always do: stay grounded in the things that will not change — your brand’s purpose, vision, values— and hold the rest loosely. As my friend Jim Collins popularized years ago: protect the core and stimulate progress.

What resources can leaders tap into right now?    

Please don’t overlook your own team members. We are seeing unprecedented levels of creativity and innovation within our own team. If you have a coach, use them. If you don’t and now doesn’t feel like the time to hire one, consider creating a peer learning group. I am part of a group that’s been meeting twice a month for over twenty years. Our topic for two decades? Leadership. We’ve conducted our last two meetings via Zoom. The only thing required is a few folks willing to get together with the explicit intent to help each other grow. It’s been a game-changer for me.

Read all the books you can. If reading is not your thing, use Audible. Pick an area you want to know more about and dig in.

“This is a defining moment for leaders to steward their organizations, themselves and their families through a crisis of this magnitude and come out stronger on the other side.”

Customer Experience is increasingly at the center of the conversation around growth. While it has rapidly become a competitive advantage and focus of investment for retail and consumer products businesses, B2B organizations have been more reticent to jump in. Unsure of where to start, how to measure impact, and the challenge of aligning complex organizations, B2B businesses have tended to take a narrower, more opportunistic view of their customer experience.

From our view working with some of the world’s strongest B2B brands, we’ve seen a different approach- and these B2B growth leaders have found a way to balance long-term CX strategy with short-term wins and proven impact. These leaders have done this with a relentless focus on the ‘moments that matter’ to their customers.  We define these moments as the intersection of a company’s distinct capabilities with an important decision and perception of the customer.

“These are decisions about how to make a strategic shift with new needs and requirements, what the universe of solutions to their challenges could look like and how to implement it into their complex business.”

Note, we’re not simply talking about the buying decision. These are decisions about how to make a strategic shift with new needs and requirements, what the universe of solutions to their challenges could look like and how to implement it into their complex business.

B2B businesses often focus their commercial efforts on the actual buying decision, relying on a strong sales force and product engineers to win the deal.  There is no question, that the actual buying decision is critical.

3 B2B Customer Experience Moments That Matter

Let’s take a look at the other ‘moments’ of the B2B customer experience to understand where organic growth largely comes from.

1. Strategic Re-Definition

In the B2B customer experience, particularly for industrial and technology businesses, this part of the journey is too often untapped and misses significant growth opportunities.  This step of the process is often invisible.  The customer is looking to make a pivot: from a traditional approach to a new one to address an opportunity or threat in their market.  They’re looking for ideas and approaches.  These are often driven by top-down strategy and pursued by cross-functional teams.  These ‘moments’ can take months, even years, to take shape.  However, disproportionate growth happens when you’re the partner there to help your customer make this transition.

Look at Alcoa, the global aluminum supplier, who did exactly this with the Ford F-150 lightweight truck.  Ford knew they needed to significantly reduce the weight and carbon footprint of this truck but were unsure of the technical design and operational implications of such a shift.  They needed unconventional thinking and they needed it early before truck design even begins.  Rather than focusing solely on the existing aluminum applications in Ford vehicles (think wheels, bumpers, and engine blocks), Alcoa stayed close to Ford’s upstream advanced engineering teams and was able to work with them on very early-stage testing to go to an aluminum-intensive vehicle.  The collaborative approach led to the development of the world’s first aluminum truck built at scale and a significant growth source for Alcoa.

2. Shaping the Customer’s Consideration Set

This is the step in the journey where customers have a clearly stated ambition and defined set of requirements, but they have not precisely determined how to pursue it.  While the ambition is clear, they are actively looking at alternative approaches to get to the end result.  They’re looking for a thought partner to show them a better solution or perhaps a better way to do business.

An approach to this moment played out in recent years in the world of agriculture.  When growers were looking for smarter, more effective ways to maximize their yield, a global seed provider was there to help them think differently about their alternatives.  Growers needed more than seed, they needed the confidence of how to manage their business over the full year to optimize their yield.  We helped this global seed company bring advanced technology solutions and insight to growers that helped them approach the planning, planting, growing, and harvesting seasons differently with more precision and personalization. This led to dramatic improvements in yields and risk management and helped this business shift how their business was seen- from quality seed provider to business partner.

3. Delivering in the “first 90 days”

From industrial products to technology and business services, perhaps the most critical moment is what we call the “first 90 days” from selection to implementation.  The actual length of time varies by market, but invariably we have seen this play out across markets and it is a big determinant of future growth.  When the first 90 days go well, your B2B customers are confident. They ask you to do more for them, they invite you in earlier to solve more problems and give you the position of primary supply.  However, too often, we see this part of the journey is siloed, underfunded, and reactive.  This step of the journey goes beyond traditional implementation and setup.  It includes training, communications, a readiness assessment, and on-site transition and technical support.  Too often, companies take a short-sighted view of those as hard costs, not a growth investment.

This isn’t about troubleshooting or retention- this is a growth moment.  For example, when we worked with a leading B2B facilities services business, we saw the correlation between the first 90 days and long-term share of wallet.  The more seamless the first 90 days were, the more services customers added over the next several years.  As a result, this business invested heavily in the implementation and onboarding stage to ensure a uniform rental customer had a great experience which opened up opportunities in janitorial, safety, and document management.  From relationship coordination to communications and syncing up with the customer’s business flow, the companies that do this well significantly outperform their peers on long-term growth. In B2B markets where the inertia and cost of switching providers is high, this can turn into a huge competitive advantage for the businesses that do it well.

How B2B Customer Experience Moments Lead to Growth

Time and time again, from materials to software to business services, these are the moments that we see driving disproportionate growth.  So, what does the process look like to get started?  When we look at B2B growth leaders, here’s how they’re approaching it:

Map the full journey from the customer’s perspective.

It’s critical to look at their complete journey, not just where they have touchpoints with you.  Then, through research and analytics, determine what matters most to them, where pain points are most significant, and where your business has capabilities it can exploit.

Define your CX principles and strategy.

Rather than going after fixes and quick wins, start with an aligned vision of the type of experience your business can and will deliver.  Define the principles that will become a signature for working with your business, and the strategy to tie all of the moves and important initiatives together.

Sequence the strategy with chain-link moves.

As you envision the future state experience and the strategy to get there, think about how you’ll establish momentum and the sequence of moves to get there.  CX strategy is never done, it requires waves of interdependent initiatives and agility to fully execute.

Include everyone.

Particularly in B2B organizations, CX includes virtually everyone.  Sales, Marketing, Technology, R&D, Engineering, Operations, Service, and Finance should all have a shared understanding of the customer journey and their role in bringing the enhanced experience strategy to life.  Engage each group early, get their perspectives and ideas, and ensure they have a seat at the table when it comes time to prioritize and design the future state.

Companies that sell directly to other businesses have long debated the importance of a distinct brand strategy. And many still argue it’s a waste of money and effort: They say customers base their purchases on functional decisions like cost, quality and availability, not the emotional pull of brands. We couldn’t disagree more: With major forces like globalization and digital commerce upending markets, we’ve got a front-row seat to the many ways business-to-business (B2B) branding is more critical than ever.

How B2B Branding Differs from B2C

Of course, B2B markets are distinctly different from those that sell to consumers. The buying cycle is usually longer, the requirements are better defined, more people are involved and the stakes are typically higher. These are functional decisions: On the surface, there’s no comparison between American Airlines buying $12 billion worth of jets from Boeing, for example, to a kid shelling out 89 cents for a bag of Skittles.

But the truth is, there’s a difference between rational and functional buying. B2B transactions are typically heavily weighed and considered purchases. Functional requirements must be met. But there are higher-order elements in play as well. While attributes like competitive pricing, delivery and technical support drive sales, there’s much more to your customer’s decision.

“When you’re easier to do business with, your customers feel it. It makes their work more efficient and predictable. They are more confident and less anxious. They see you as a partner to their business and an ally in their struggles.”

Mike Fleming

These higher-order traits also drive buying decisions and are much harder for competitors to replicate. When you’re easier to do business with, your customers feel it. It makes their work more efficient and predictable. They are more confident and less anxious. They see you as a partner to their business and an ally in their struggles. When you bring your customers fresh insights and ideas, they feel that, too. They come to you more often not just to buy products, but to help solve problems.

This is precisely the power of brands. Instead of just relying on superstar account executives to carry this message one meeting at a time, the strongest B2B companies create brands that do it for them.

How to Build a Successful B2B Brand

Smart branding makes it easier for the marketing, sales, product and technology teams to do their real work: Develop and provide solutions that help customers grow. For this reason, we’ve outlined some of the most important considerations:

Use Brand Stories to Reinforce Business Strategies

Look closely at the fastest-growing B2B businesses, and you’ll see they are all propelled by a brand story that supports their business strategy. These brands, like Salesforce and XPO Logistics, have defined their business around the benefits they provide to customers, not the products and services they offer. They intentionally link brand and strategy in a way that makes it easier to move into–and even create–new categories. The brand is purpose-built for the company’s mission and also for the commercial opportunities they see coming.

Yes, B2B brands need a story. Your customers want to know what you believe, what you can do, and where you can go with them. For inspiration, spend a little time watching the masterful ways Getty Images is injecting its mission into new products, or Adobe’s award-winning story of creating lost masterpieces.

Remember Your Brand is Experience and Experience is Your Brand

Experiences, not messages, define brands. You can have the most compelling brand message in your category, but it doesn’t matter if the experience isn’t reinforcing it. For B2B businesses, it’s increasingly important to start with the experience your customers want as you define your brand.

The strongest B2B brands build highly relevant and hard-to-replicate experiences. From the first impressions they make in the relationship building and early evaluation phase, how they integrate with their customer’s business, the expertise and problem-solving they bring, it is all connected back to their brand.

Are the employees designing products, services and customer touchpoints all starting with a shared understanding of the brand, and what makes it relevant and distinct to customers? The strongest B2B brands have achieved their positions by ensuring that everyone understands the brand attributes and how those traits show up throughout the experience. Every interaction, at each step of the purchase process and beyond, makes it clear that they are not just vendors, but partners. Companies like American Express and MailChimp are succeeding because they take this partnership so seriously, creating steady streams of content and interaction that inspire and inform experiences.

Your Brand Goes Far Beyond Customers

While a strong brand identity helps B2B companies grow faster than generic competitors, it can also cement relationships and connections with other key audiences.

Employees and prospective employees also benefit from stronger brands. Increasingly, people care about the story of who they work for and expect a clear purpose and strategy. They want leadership to articulate that brand and create a team they believe in. Brands play such an essential part in making sure a company’s talent is engaged that many companies are now defining an “employer brand” that works in concert with the “customer brand,” treating it as two sides of the same coin. The businesses that use their brand as a storytelling vessel for current and prospective talent are winning the intensifying recruiting wars.

“The businesses that use their brand as a storytelling vessel for current and prospective talent are winning the intensifying recruiting wars.”

Mike Fleming

It’s no surprise that the largest and most competitive B2B companies, like IBM, Microsoft, Cisco, GE and UPS, continue to invest so carefully in branding campaigns: Their workforces are enormous and recruiting and retention are essential to maintaining their edge.

Wall Street is another critical audience, and well-defined B2B brands can give investors and analysts a view into the business that financial statements and forward-looking guidance alone cannot. How do you want analysts to value your business’ growth prospects? What peers do you want to use as benchmarks? Strong B2B brands have found out how to connect their story with investors in a way that is both credible and compelling. When UnitedHealth Group wanted to shift how investors viewed their business, from a carrier to full-scale health services, it changed the narrative.

B2B businesses continue to embrace the value of content marketing to position their brands, products, and services in more relevant ways with customers and prospects. In fact, B2B companies are ideally positioned to benefit from content marketing, given the inherent nature that expertise plays and the high degree of consideration and complexity that goes into buying decisions.

However, while many B2B businesses have compelling content, most lack a clear understanding of what should drive their content strategy. Every company needs a clear focus on the kind of content they will create and who it is intended for. We call these content archetypes. These archetypes are important because they bring focus, consistency, and scalability to content in a way that gives B2B brands a distinct voice, purpose, and platform on which to speak.

In our experience, the brands that take an approach like this make stronger connections with the right audience and get significantly better returns on their investment in content marketing.

Identify Your Brand’s Content Archetype

Altimeter, the research arm of Prophet, recently published a report, “Key Elements For Building a Content Strategy” that uncovers five distinct content archetypes that guide the content strategies of the strongest B2B brands. Before diving into each, it is important to note that the best companies pick one, maybe two, archetypes as the primary focus of their strategy. Driven by their core marketing objectives, they commit to this archetype for a period of time (maybe 1-2 years) while evaluating how they are doing and evolving their approach as needed.

The 5 Content Archetypes

Let’s take a closer look at these five content archetypes:

1. Content as Presence

The first is Content as Presence. This type of content is about engaging a broad audience while promoting brand awareness and brand health. It’s typically best used to help reposition a brand in a target’s mind or expand what customers think they know about the business.

For example, IBM has done a great job using Watson content to convey a more progressive and analytical IBM, to expand what customers think IBM can assist them with, and to demonstrate how Watson is already helping a wide array of customers.

2. Content as a Window

A second archetype is Content as a Window. This type of content is about giving customers and other audiences, such as prospective employees, a view inside the company that they otherwise would not have. This content is best used for businesses that want to humanize their brand or those that believe showing how they work is a key part of their brand promise.

The global shipping and logistics business, Maersk, is a great example of this archetype. It has built one of the best B2B content positions with its focus on giving people an inside look at the company, its operations and its people. By taking down the walls around its business, Maersk provides customers, regulators and prospective employees a view into its capabilities, purpose, and global scale.

“The best companies pick one, maybe two, archetypes as the primary focus of their strategy.”

3. Content as Currency

The third content archetype is Content as Currency. This is for brands that want to be seen as subject matter experts. This type of content helps consumers make better decisions for their business. It is particularly beneficial when used to augment the expertise of a sales team, who can educate customers on the right questions to ask, provide insight into how other companies are dealing with similar challenges, and help them move forward with a complex buying process.

GE, with its Industrial Internet platform, is an excellent example of how to deliver content that helps customers move forward. With self-assessments, relevant case studies, and points of view, GE is helping businesses understand the Internet of Things and what it means for their company.

4. Content as Support

The fourth archetype is Content as Support. This one is all about helping customers extract greater value and utility from the solutions you provide. It is best used in highly technical categories when product usage is complex, and ongoing loyalty and share of wallet of existing customers is marketing’s top priority. B2B companies following this strategy should focus on educating customers and partners about how to get the most out of their products by sharing tips on installation, product usage, troubleshooting and integration.

Schneider Electric, a global provider of energy management and automation solutions, is one of the leaders with this content archetype. It publishes content about design, installation and how to lower the total cost of ownership that is helpful to both its contract partners and end-customers. This strategy enables Schneider’s sales and service teams to stay as productive as possible by giving its customers an alternative way of accessing their expertise.

5. Content as Community

And finally, we have Content as Community. This content focuses on fostering a community of customers or other stakeholders with similar needs. This approach is best suited for B2B brands in highly collaborative categories such as healthcare and technology, or those with extremely engaged and loyal customers who can serve as brand advocates.

American Express, with their OPEN platform, used content to build a community of small and medium-sized businesses. For more than 10 years, it has served as a destination for entrepreneurs to learn from American Express, and each other, about what it takes to grow and run a healthy business. OPEN is a great example a content community that creates value, without explicitly selling.

Questions to Ask When Determining the Best Type of Content for Your Brand

As you think through what archetype is best suited for your business, consider the following:

1. What are your top marketing priorities? What part of the purchase funnel is most important to you right now – increasing awareness, winning more business or driving greater loyalty?
2. What content will your customers find most relevant? What information do they need to help them better run their businesses?
3. What type of content platform could you build that reinforces your brand’s promise? How can your content strategy work in concert with your sales and operations departments to drive more efficiencies and value for your customers?

Too many companies fall into too common of a trap: mistaking the difference between an insights function and an insights system. Far too often, companies invest in an insights or research department, or function, only to have its value limited because they are not connected to the broader business.

And more than ever, companies are investing in primary research but getting mixed results. Don’t get me wrong. Primary research is core to being a more outside-in, customer-centric business. However, that’s just one tool – it’s what happens with those insights and who is using them that make the difference. Far too often, this primary research is conducted, summarized to a select set of stakeholders, and then put on the shelf.

An insights function is critical to bringing expertise, discipline and execution to the gathering of insights. However, what sets high-growth companies apart from their peers is having an insights system. An insights system is not bound by functional areas or business units. It is not project-based. It is not a one-way flow of information. Far too often, insights are left at the customer level, not the market level. Or even worse, they are never shared at all.

It is by definition a system. An insights system has on and off ramps for insights. A wide range of stakeholders access and contribute to the system, well beyond the insights or research function. This includes sales and marketing, innovation and R&D, service, engineering and operations, and even partners and principals. Each of these groups has key insights into customers’ needs and behaviors, competitors and ideas for growth.

So, how do you start to build out the system? Market leaders such as UPS, 3M and Microsoft have built their systems by following these proven strategic steps: