B2B Marketing in a World More Volatile Than Ever
Today's B2B marketing leaders are facing challenges unlike any we've seen in our careers. But if the compounding crises of the 2020s have proven anything, it’s that the B2B marketing function is resilient, and its leaders are finding new ways to drive influence, impact and growth across their organizations.
The B2B Marketing Benchmark explores the global state of the B2B marketing discipline - with a lens toward equipping our profession with a data-backed roadmap for success.
The B2B Leaderboard
Benchmarking Today's B2Brilliant Brands
The B2B Leaderboard celebrates what effective B2B brand-building looks like. Brands on the B2B Leaderboard were selected using the B2B Index, a metric that leverages LinkedIn’s unique datasets across both organic and paid marketing efforts to evaluate and identify the B2B companies who are successfully marketing on LinkedIn.
Analysis of LinkedIn internal data in our B2B Marketing Benchmark was also informed by the B2B Index.
LinkedIn calculates the B2B Index by looking at three dimensions that signal strong performance on the platform:
- Brand Investment
(Examples: Paid Spending, Posting by Company Executives)
- Brand Creative Quality & Investment Effectiveness
(Examples: Dwell Time, Customer Outcomes)
- Brand Advocacy & Visibility
(Examples: Qualified Applications, Non-Employee Mentions)
Jim Habig
VP of Marketing, LinkedIn
"Our composite score takes into account the most important features of a strong B2B brand: creative quality, investment and audience intent. We're using this index to analyze best-in-class B2B work, and our leaderboard celebrates the organizations that stand out for their brand work."
B2B Budgets & Outlook
See how B2B organizations are spending their marketing budgets. How optimistic are they about the year ahead?
Despite economic uncertainty, B2B budgets are remaining steady – and in some cases even growing marginally.
6 in 10 senior B2B leaders say budgets have increased in past years, with two in three claiming budgets will continue to increase in the next year.
Ricky Abbott
President, Transmission
"We’ve seen success in always keeping brand spend at 54% of our allocation, while the demand budget should be split between very focused net new lead generation and upsell customer motions."
Exploring the State of B2B Marketing
Unlock valuable insights from industry-leading B2B marketing experts as they provide their perspectives on the ever-evolving B2B marketing landscape. Deepen your understanding by watching our exclusive video interviews.
Collective Wisdom: Conversations with Inspiring Marketing Leaders
The B2B Marketing Organization
The skills, practices, relationships and tools that B2B marketing organizations need to excel
As the influence of the CMO continues to evolve in the C-Suite, soft skills like problem-solving, innovative thinking and agility/adaptability are becoming more important for both leaders and their reports.
Skills
Leaders and their reports are embracing creative skills strategically and tactically.
Unleashing Creativity in B2B Marketing
Tap into invaluable insights from B2B marketing thought leaders as they offer their perspectives on harnessing creative skills within the realm of B2B marketing. Learn more by watching our exclusive video interviews.
Collective Wisdom: Conversations with Inspiring Marketing Leaders
Top changes to the role of CMO
Vanessa Cheal
Head of Brand & Creative Planning, Transmission
"CMOs offer an essential connection in the drive to remain competitive and agile; their ability to identify and guide the response to unmet customer needs, align long term brand value with consistent delivery of a core promise and ensure that brand experiences cut through the overwhelm of noise and choice are critical to success."
Exploring Evolving Leadership Trends in B2B Marketing
Discover valuable insights from B2B marketing leaders as they share their perspectives on how the role of the CMO is changing. Gain in-depth knowledge by watching our exclusive video interviews.
Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
Though diversity, equity and inclusion programs have grown, one-third of B2B companies still don’t have a formal DEI program in place.
5 in 10 say DEI is very important to their B2B marketing team and company.
Laurie Aquilante (she/her)
VP of Community-Led Growth, HubSpot
"Within my Community-Led Growth team, we embed DEI into our team culture, marketing strategies and customer experiences.
Doing so makes it impossible for us to divorce our DEI initiatives with how we go-to-market."
Prioritizing DEI in B2B Organizations
Discover valuable insights from B2B marketing leaders on how attitudes towards DEI in B2B Marketing are changing.
B2B Marketing Strategies
What are the most important avenues for reaching B2B customers and prospects?
B2B marketers are quickly realizing the importance of emerging technologies like AI in reaching their audiences. Though generative AI is not being used by a majority of B2B marketers, nor do many have a good understanding of how to use it, the majority of B2B marketers (75%) are excited about investing in generative AI in the next year.
53% plan to use AI to increase efficiency so they can focus on higher value work.
49% plan to use AI to create optimized and engaging content.
54% plan to use AI to generate more content in less time.
Arun Pattabhiraman
CMO, Sprinklr
"When properly integrated, generative AI empowers marketing and advertising teams to achieve near-perfect content and ideas with remarkable speed. By embracing generative AI, we unlock new dimensions of creativity and efficiency, propelling our marketing initiatives to unprecedented heights."
Leveraging Channels & Tools in B2B Marketing
Tap into valuable insights from B2B marketing leaders on how cutting-edge tools, such as generative AI, can empower B2B marketers to enhance creativity and craft compelling narratives with greater efficiency.
Collective Wisdom: Conversations with Inspiring Marketing Leaders
Further Resources
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