B2B marketing: Humanise the B2B brand

This article discusses the need to humanise business to business (B2B) brands, in light of research which suggests many decision makers choose suppliers based on personal value.

B2B marketing: Humanise the B2B brand

Jeremy Katz and Andy JonesOgilvy & Mather

Two iconic B2B companies – IBM and DuPont – are using content marketing to create a human connection to their brands, reflecting the insight that business consumers are influenced, and act similarly, as when shopping for themselves.

In their new book Absolute Value, two well-known marketing thinkers, Itamar Simonson and Emanuel Rosen, make the case that the hegemony of the brand is coming to an end, due to the widespread availability of information. Brands, they argue, took the place of perfect information and gave...

Not a subscriber?

Schedule your live demo with our team today

WARC helps you to plan, create and deliver more effective marketing

  • Prove your case and back-up your idea

  • Get expert guidance on strategic challenges

  • Tackle current and emerging marketing themes

We’re long-term subscribers to WARC and it’s a tool we use extensively. We use it to source case studies and best practice for the purposes of internal training, as well as for putting persuasive cases to clients. In compiling a recent case for long-term, sustained investment in brand, we were able to support key marketing principles with numerous case studies sourced from WARC. It helped bring what could have been a relatively dry deck to life with recognisable brand successes from across a broad number of categories. It’s incredibly efficient to have such a wealth of insight in one place.

Insights Team
Bray Leino

You’re in good company

We work with 80% of Forbes' most valuable brands* and 80% of the world's top top-of-the-class agencies.

* Top 10 brands