The Objectivity Trap

On the biases and misconceptions that cause us all to undervalue B2B marketing

The Objectivity Trap: On the biases and misconceptions that cause us all to undervalue B2B marketing

“Rory’s highly original report reminds us that marketing is a mindset, not a cost-center; human beings are not rational, so magic is often preferable to reason when solving marketing problems. There is tremendous potential for innovation and reinvention for our industry in an improved understanding of behavioral science. As B2B marketers, we can all benefit from Rory’s wisdom and wit, and we all need more magic in our lives.”
- Jann Schwarz, Director of the B2B Institute

Rory Sutherland, Vice Chairman of Ogilvy and co-creator of the Ogilvy Consulting behavioral science practice, in collaboration with think tank The B2B Institute, are proud to share this new research paper challenging the status quo of a purely rational approach to B2B marketing.

B2B Marketers can use behavioural science to provide a new, more nuanced framework for understanding behaviour, elevating the value that creative and experimental marketing mindsets can have on solving problems and unlocking opportunity.

The Objectivity Trap

B2B Marketers can use behavioural science to provide a new, more nuanced framework for understanding behaviour, elevating the value that creative and experimental marketing mindsets can have on solving problems and unlocking opportunity

There’s another map

If you can understand what others assume to be true but actually isn’t, you’ve already found a means to differentiate yourself

Marketing is a ‘mindset’

While a technological advantage can be copied in months, the injection of a marketing mentality can help companies to innovate and grow by suggesting new psychological forms of differentiation lasting years

We don’t rationalise or calculate. We avoid blame

Explore innovative approaches to price and risk-sharing especially in groups. By helping to make a smaller commitment before a larger one, we can do much to reduce fear in the B2B marketer

Playing the long game is key, particularly in B2B

Short-term interventions work, but only in the short-term. With the right mentality, greatly heightened by the development of behavioural science a single marketer can provide spectacular and lasting value in unexpected places

If you want growth, avoid reductionism

Brand fame vastly increases a business’s success by presenting opportunities that would otherwise have been impossible to predict. For enduring, open-ended growth B2B marketers must look to probabilistic not deterministic definitions of success.

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The Objectivity Trap

On the biases and misconceptions that cause us all to undervalue B2B marketing

The Objectivity Trap

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