Richard Bush, Managing Director, Base One Advertising.

The quality of B2B Direct Marketing creative is improving although the majority of it is still formulaic, weak, apologetic and usually ineffective. But that's just my opinion. And it's the subjective nature of creative output that makes writing a chapter on 'how to make B2B creative work' difficult.

The process is made up of three key stages:

• the briefing process
• creative development
• assessing the creative

But before addressing these phases it's useful to look at the issue of integration - a philosophy that can either help or hinder your direct marketing creative depending on how you interpret it.

Integration

It is worth considering integration, as the wish to integrate sometimes influences the creative much more than it should. It is often said that any DM campaign should 'integrate with the current press advertising', sometimes meaning that you might even use the same images and even the same headline. It is wrong for a start to say that the direct marketing should integrate with the advertising. Surely they should integrate with each other?

Integration in business-to-business is more important and usually more complex than in FMCG because of the decision-making unit and the often protracted buying process. For true integration, each element has to be created to perform its own particular task, for example:

Press and radio advertising	Awareness building
Inserts and postcards	Identifying prospects
Direct mail and email	Generating leads
Telemarketing, direct mail and email	Generating appointments
Telemarketing, direct mail and email	Post sales support
Email and web	Repeat purchases

It is clear from this list that each communication will have different objectives and that the call-to-action used for each will be different. They will all therefore need different propositions at least!

To ensure your various activities work in unison, here's a list of the elements that should be common to all within the campaign, along with those that should be specific to each activity:

Element	Common or specific
Style and tone	Common
Creative idea	Common
Underlying promise	Common
Creative execution	Specific
Proposition	Specific
Format	Specific
Call-to-action	Specific

 

Key principle: Integration is important in B2B, but it should not result in all communications looking the same and saying the same thing. Some elements must be consistent, but the proposition will usually be different for each communication.

 

 

The briefing process

The creative brief is the point at which the planning stops and the implementation starts. As such, it is a critical phase, but sadly one that is not given adequate emphasis. The main task of the brief is not to pass the problem to the agency or even from the account planning team to the creative team, it is to inform and inspire those who are responsible for developing creative that ensures the plan is successful.

As such, the process has to include four main elements to communicate:

• the purpose of the campaign
• a clear understanding of the target audience
• what we want them to do
• the message to be used to persuade them to act

The imprecise and often complex nature of these elements means that to impart this information effectively and with the required inspiration it needs a face-to-face briefing rather than just relying on the written summary document that is the creative brief. It's also rare that this can be done in a single stage, usually a couple of meetings are required, the first to provide the basic understanding and to allow the brief to be interrogated and then the second either for further interrogation, to check understanding or even to discuss possible alternatives to the proposition.

Key principle: The main task of he brief is to inform and inspire those who are responsible for developing creative that ensures the plan is successful.

Keeping it brief

One of the things that often stands in the way of a good creative brief is too much information. If it's not relevant to the target audience then it shouldn't be included. The transition from campaign plan to creative brief is where information that's not directly related to the target audience should be filtered out.

This is particularly difficult in B2B briefs where the temptation is to fill the brief with product or technical detail, or company information that you feel differentiates you from your competition. However, if it's not relevant to the target audience doing what you want them to do, then it should be left out. It may be needed later in the creative development process, but at the ideas stage it should be removed.

Key principle: If it's not relevant to the target audience doing what you want them to do it should be left out.

The essential elements of the brief

Many clients and agencies have a set format for briefing, often using a briefing form and insisting that every box is completed before the briefing process can start. Whilst this can help ensure that all the necessary thinking has been done before the briefing starts, it can also be a barrier to an inspired briefing process. It is this need for inspiration that leads me more to a freeform approach to briefing as long as essential information is included:

Why are we doing this campaign?

A succinct explanation of the commercial situation, how this campaign contributes and what we are trying to achieve.

What are the objectives?

Clear, quantifiable objectives against which the campaign will be measured. This is as important to the creative team as it is to the account team. Usually briefs contain a number of objectives, in which case they must be prioritised and only the first objective should be used as a judgement of success or failure.

An example would be a DM campaign to launch a new product to major accounts. The objectives might be:

• To generate 100 on-site demonstrations
• To generate 500 requests for more information
• To ensure that our major accounts are aware that we have launched this new product

These objectives are obviously related. People can only request information if they are aware that the new product exists, and the more people that request information, the more demonstrations you are likely to set as a result. However, in the context of a DM brief they are quite distinct objectives. Therefore, the creative to drive on-site demonstrations would be very different to one designed solely to increase awareness. So in this instance, if these were the given objectives, in this order, the brief should be to focus on achieving 100 on-site demonstrations. If the resultant creative is compelling enough to encourage interest from people not ready for a demonstration but wanting to receive information then all well and good, but the creative should be focused on driving demos.

Key principle: For briefs containing a number of objectives, they must be prioritised and only the first objective should be used as a judgement of success or failure.

Who are we talking to and what do we know about them?

This is the second most important part of the brief (after the proposition) and it must not only provide a profile of the primary target audience, their job titles, job functions, likely gender mix, typical age and their responsibilities, it must also provide insights into the types of people that are most likely to respond, along with details of the problems they face that this communication can help solve.

The natural tendency is to make this part of the brief inclusive and to cover the range of people who make up the target audience. It is, in fact, better to focus on the 20% that are most likely to respond. They may be the younger group or those least risk averse, or perhaps those most familiar with your brand or even those that use a particular competitor at the moment. By focusing on these in the brief you ensure that the resultant creative is also focused on those most likely to respond and will deliver more responses accordingly.

Key principle: If the brief focuses on those most likely to respond, then so will the resultant creative and it will deliver better results accordingly.

Why should they do what we want them to do?

(The proposition) If this were an awareness campaign or ad advertising brief, then this part of the brief may well be headed "what's the creative idea we want to communicate". However it is a DM brief and the primary objective of the communications is to encourage someone to do something.

In Chapter 8, Campaign Planning, step 7 explains the importance of the proposition being centred on the benefit to the recipient of taking action. For this to be effectively expressed in the resulting creative, it needs to be the focus of the brief.

The brief may also include additional things we might use to persuade them to do what we want them to do (i.e an offer) or indeed to do it now (i.e a time-limited offer) but these are not essential and they are often best left until the initial concepts have been agreed. That way you are free to ensure that the offer used fits comfortably with the creative route, rather than relying on a free pen or a 10% discount.

How are we going to reach them? (Media, format and quantities)

Your plan (chapter 8) would have identified the media mix, and the allowable cost per contact. This information is valuable to the creative team, not to act as a barrier, but to give direction to the limits of the resulting campaign. The plan should, however, remain flexible in order to accommodate creative ideas that require a change of media or even an increase in allowable costs, as occasionally an inspired idea opens up all sorts if possibilities that achieve the objective in a better way.

A case in point

Base One was tasked to launch a new telecommunications service to banks and other financial institutions, located within the square mile of the city. The brief that was set aimed to deliver 30 appointments at a maximum cost per appointment of £1000, giving a total budget of £30,000, and using a combination of press and direct mail.

The creative team came up with a high impact, 3-part mailer program with telemarketing follow-up that we knew could deliver on the objectives, but would do so more quickly and with more control over who the appointments were with. It raised the cost per contact to almost £100 and we could therefore include no more than 300 contacts.

The client was persuaded and the campaign delivered 72 highly qualified appointments, many with companies they thought would never entertain them as a supplier. In this instance it was the creative idea that opened up the opportunities and required a change of plan.

Creative development

How different is B2B creative?

If you were to collect together 100 creative pieces split evenly between B2B and B2C, and then to ask your peers to identify which was which, without looking at the brands or product names, the sad fact is that they would be right 95% of the time. In business-to-business direct marketing there is a tendency to be formulaic. To lead with the same propositions - 'makes you more efficient', 'saves you money', 'increases your profits' etc - and to include pictures of busy executives in boardroom meetings with the odd stylish, external office shots. And then to offer the latest research or a white paper that shows how you'll make significant returns on your investment.

This would not be such a crime if it was a formula that worked, but most of the time, it doesn't.

I even read recently that in B2B direct mail 'you must include a business benefit in your headline'. Why should this be so? In consumer direct marketing there is no rule that says you must include a personal benefit in the headline. The truth is that the principles behind effective B2B creative are little different to any other creative. It is the situation in which you are applying those principles that determines how different the creative might be.

The structure - AIDCA

Any effective communication needs a structure and the best structure to use for DM is AIDCA. It is the basic structure taught on selling and telephone skills courses everywhere:

Attention - make an impact, grab your reader's attention

Interest - present your proposition

Desire - build up the benefits and introduce offers

Conviction - overcome doubts and objections with proof

Action - call-to-action with incentives if necessary.

How AIDCA is represented will depend largely on the media or even the combination of media. For example, a high impact direct mail piece may do the 'AID' - grab attention, create interest and even go as far as developing the desire - but it may be left to the follow-up telephone call to handle the 'CA' - direct discussion to instil conviction as well as handling the call-to-action. 

Is the creative appropriate?

How appropriate something is can be difficult to judge. It is obviously subjective, and what is appropriate to one person may not be to another. It depends on attitudes and values, things that we rarely consider in B2B, and certainly not variables we store on our databases. However, your brand will appeal to a certain section of the target audience, whoever it's made up of. Some people will be attracted by security and a business that appears to be the 'safe option', others by the possibility of a better way of doing things and a business that's the 'innovative choice'.

It is true that relevance and 'appropriateness' are similar, and your communication has to be both to be effective. Relevance is judged at a rational level, appropriateness at a more emotional one.

To check appropriateness, consider whether or not the creative is:

Appropriate to your target audience?

Consider who you are talking to, the types of companies, the position of the contacts, their responsibilities and their status. Would they feel the creative was inappropriate?

Appropriate to the task?

This is more subtle, but easier to judge. Is the creative over the top? Too subtle, too serious or too flippant given the subject and what you want them to do as a result?

Appropriate to the medium?

You chose the medium because it was best suited to the task. Here, the question is whether you are making the best use of the medium. For example, if you are doing an on-line advertising campaign, is the creative making the most of the interactivity? If it's an off-the-page ad, are you trying to say too much? If it's a mail pack, are you making the best use of personalisation and using the space available to overcome possible objections?

Appropriate for your brand? Does the creative approach fit comfortably with your brand? Does it reflect your core values and your position in the market? Think carefully about this one, as the tendency is to be ultra-safe.

Key principle: If a direct marketing piece is unsuitable for the audience, the task, the medium or the brand, it will produce disappointing results. Appropriateness is subjective, but easy to judge if you consider it from the recipient's perspective.

Direct mail formats

If your media of choice includes direct mail or inserts, then there is an additional creative decision you have to make - the format. Do you choose a postcard mailing, a full mail pack or a high impact three-dimensional piece? This is a creative decision, not a planning one, and the purist within me says that you should choose the format that best communicates your message. The reality is, however, that the way the message is communicated is often as important as the message itself.

Modern printing techniques have opened up the options for printed formats, and these have been put to good use in consumer marketing, where the volumes tend to be higher and where there is competition to get noticed on the doormat. In a similar way, in B2B the environment in which the mailer is received provides many answers as to what format to use.

The first challenge is always to get noticed and the second, to be read. Many people favour the 'under the radar' approach, using tricks we do not recommend such as printing 'Private and Confidential' on the envelope. Others prefer to begin with an intriguing message on the envelope so that it is opened and read with some anticipation.

It is a fact that the more people who read a mailer, the more responses will be generated, which is what makes high impact mailers so effective. By sending a three-dimensional item to convey your message, you dramatically increase your chance of being read. And if the targeting is accurate and the messaging compelling, response rates of 50% and above are not unusual.

Impact however, is not a direct function of size. A recent piece targeting brand managers gained a 70% response rate by containing pictures of people using each recipient's own branded products. The impact here was created by the appropriateness of the creative, along with the obvious effort required to produce individually relevant content.

Key principle: Selecting the right format is important, as there is a direct correlation (for a given list) between the number of people reading your mailer and the number of responses generated. The format can have a dramatic impact on how many people read your communications.

Assessing the creative

Assessing and judging creative is one of the most difficult things we do as marketers. No matter how much time we put into the planning and briefing process, for some reason, when faced with a creative execution we become amateurs again. We forget what we're doing and we favour the creative that appeals to our own preferences, even though we are not the target audience, and are probably not facing any of the issues that they face.

Assessment of creative proposals should begin by you taking on the role of the people you are targeting. Imagine you're of the same profile - age, gender, profession etc - and that you do the same job in the same type of organisation. Imagine that you're facing the same pressures, and share the same ambitions.

Become one of them (or if you're too close, get someone else to do this for you) and expose yourself to the direct mail piece, or the banner, or the telephone call or whatever it is. But do it as realistically as you can. Use a mock-up of the mailer, paste the advert into the magazine it is being placed in, sit at your desk and take the telephone call rather than reading the script. Then complete this assessment checklist:

Creative idea

• Did the creative idea grab your attention?
• Were you compelled to find out more or read on?
• Does the messaging feel relevant to you and your situation, or relationship with the brand?
• Does the creative idea feel consistent with what you would expect, and from what you know about the brand?

Format

• Does the feeling of wanting to act increase as you go through the communication?
• Is the benefit of acting clear and unambiguous?
• Are your natural objections to responding pre-handled in the main copy?
• Is the call-to-action easy to find and understand?
• Can you respond in the way that feels most natural to you?
• Is there a natural flow from the headline to the call-to-action?

Media choice

• Does the creative approach work within the chosen media?
• Does the creative approach make the most of the media?

Style and tone

• Is the style and tone appropriate for the brand?
• Is the style and tone appropriate to what you are being asked to do?
• Is the style and tone appropriate for the people that make up the target audience?

Key principle: When assessing the creative presented to you, imagine you're of the same profile as your target audience - age, gender, profession etc - and that you do the same job, in the same type of organisation. Imagine that you're facing the same pressures, and share the same ambitions.

Research and testing

There is often debate over the relative merits of research and testing to find out whether a campaign is going to work or not. Advertisers will recommend research, which makes sense as their work is primarily designed to change attitudes, and you can only find out whether it works by asking.

Direct marketing however, is all about action and surely the only way to find out whether recipients will take action is to test it. If you research it, they will always say one thing and then act differently.

A further factor with business-to-business will always be the small target audiences. And the more targeted and focused you are, the smaller your audiences become. This makes testing under statistically relevant conditions almost impossible, so how can you tell if your creative will work? And if it doesn't, how can you find out why?

Research

There are two types of research that are particularly useful in business-to-business:

1. On-line pre-research

Researching propositions and creative ideas before you implement them can save money and avoid wasted opportunities. It is worthwhile because of the points we made earlier about judging creative ideas from the target audience's perspective. Often that is difficult. Do you really know what appeals to an IT Director in a bank, or the HR Manager within a local authority? Rather than taking an educated guess, place the creative ideas on-line, send an email to a small sample and ask them to score your ideas. This is best done anonymously and independently especially if you are including your existing customers. It costs little and you can have a result within a matter of days.

2. Telephone post-research

Post-research can be invaluable in direct marketing as it enables you a better understanding of why some people responded and why others didn't. Again, take a small sample, split evenly between responders and non-responders.

Call them and ask why they did/didn't respond, what got their attention, what was particularly interesting to them, whether they found it easy to read, was it obvious how to respond etc?

You need to keep the sample representative of the total mailing so that the answers they give are unbiased.

Key principle: Research can be used to help you select a creative approach. It can also be used post-campaign, helping you to understand why people acted the way they did.

Testing

Because of the small sample sizes, testing is rare in B2B, but there are two types of testing that we feel can contribute to better results:

1. Control testing

To be able to use control testing, you need to be running an ongoing program of communication. It might be your lead generation, or your customer newsletter, or your statement run. This allows you to include a cell (of say 20%) where you try a different approach.

The most valuable things to test in relation to the creative are:

• headline
• format
• call-to-action
• the offer
• incentives
• envelope messages (if used)
• letter copy.

Any of these has the potential to increase your response rate by 10% or 20% - i.e. from 2% to 2.4% - providing significant improvements on the return. Get them all right however, and your response rate could double. It's important to remember though, that you must only change one variable at a time.

2. Pre-testing

Pre-testing is useful when you are unsure about a campaign or are trying a new approach. It involves rolling out the activity to a selected sample before committing to the cost of the entire campaign. It is useful in B2B, not so much because of the savings in mailing or telephone costs, but more because of the cost and organisational impact of distributing and following up poor quality leads, or perhaps organising a series of seminars and then discovering that you can't get anyone to attend.

Key principle: Testing has a lesser role to play in B2B than it does in B2C. However, control testing can be used if you are running an ongoing campaign, and pre-testing is useful if you are trying a new approach.