B2B brands shouldn’t fear rejection, but being unknown
91 percent of potential customers don’t actively reject any B2B brands, while increasing brand awareness remains one of the top challenge that B2B marketers face, as unawareness has significant variability by brand, according to newly-released report data from The B2B Institute. Marketing Week

“The marketing industry treats B2B like it’s some weird niche that we can just ignore. But B2B isn’t a niche — it’s a goldmine. Half the economy is B2B. And it’s the better half.” — Peter Weinberg of @b2binstitute Click To Tweet

Overheard at B2B World Fest: ‘Pursue passion and purpose, and profits will follow’
B2B marketing has taken a move towards offering more experimental content including sight, sound, and motion, while B2B organization employees are increasingly seeing improvements to their well-being as more important than career advancement — two of several findings of interest to B2B marketers shared during the B2B World Fest event, as The Drum examines. The Drum

5 Predictions For B2B CMOs To Win In 2023 [Forrester Report]
20 percent more B2B demand teams will report to sales in 2023, with 10 percent of marketing automation budgets moving from transformation to resilience, while 40 percent of firms will shift to cloud-native-first strategies — three of numerous findings of interest to B2B marketers contained in recently-released B2B CMO report data. Forbes

What’s Driving Budget Changes for B2B Marketers? [Survey]
43 percent of B2B marketers have said that their marketing budgets have increased since 2021, with 32 percent noting a decrease, with the top reasons for budget changes being inflation, the pandemic, economic recession, and world geopolitical unstability, according to newly-released survey data. MarketingCharts

Fifth of B2B marketers say proving effectiveness is their ‘biggest challenge’
56 percent of marketers have said that creativity is the most important skill required for navigating uncertain times, with 48.4 percent identifying return on investment (ROI) as the key metric to demonstrate marketing’s impact, while 30 percent noted that their organization doesn’t understand B2B marketing ROI — three of several findings of interest to B2B marketers contained in recently-released survey data. Marketing Week

Beware of sales calls, young B2B buyers say
74 percent of millennials and Gen Z will avoid more sales calls and outreach efforts than older B2B buyers, while 72 percent of overall buyers and prospects have indicated that they plan to consume more digital content along the purchasing journey — two of the statistics of interest to digital marketers found among newly-published report findings. Digital Commerce 360

B2B Demand Gen: Lead Qualifying Teams Are Common at Larger Enterprises
Top performing large organizations typically have a dedicated lead generation qualification team, as 77 percent of enterprise firms with more than five thousand employees report having such a team, compared to 48 percent of those with fewer than five thousand employees — two of several findings of interest to B2B marketers contained in newly-published survey data. MarketingCharts

B2B marketplaces are shaping the future of B2B ecommerce
B2B marketplace sales are expected to reach $130 billion in 2022, representing an increase over 5.3 times that of 2020, while B2B marketplace sales will reach 6.9 percent of all B2B eCommerce sales in 2022, according to recently-released survey findings. Digital Commerce 360

Most Marketers Report Increase in Marketing and Sales Alignment After Implementing ABM
28 percent of B2B marketers have indicated that they had significantly better sales and marketing alignment after implementing an account-based marketing (ABM) program, with 47 percent observing a moderate increase in alignment between sales and marketing, while some 53 percent noted that ABM generated greater revenue than other marketing efforts, according to newly-released survey data. MarketingCharts

“The best ABM strategies have a content component. When you combine ABM with content marketing, you’re doing account-based content marketing.” — Andy Crestodina @crestodina Click To Tweet

Report: 77 percent of marketers are planning metaverse experiments
94 percent of U.S. marketing decision-makers have said that they see the metaverse as a new opportunity for reaching potential customers, with 77 percent expecting to experiment with the developing technology, while some 73 percent said that social media was growing in importance, recently published survey data has shown. Mobile Marketing

What Delays the B2B Buying Process?
30.2 percent of B2B buyers have said that a business’ reputation both online and offline is the top factor when it comes to selecting a specific B2B service, with 20.9 percent pointing to online ratings, 18.6 noting price and service comparisons, and 14 percent who said client testimonials, according to newly-released survey data. Additionally, 29.3 percent of B2B buyers said that price disagreement was their top reason for buying process delays, the survey also found. MarketingCharts

2022 Video in Business Benchmark Report
2021 saw a 178 percent increase in the number of business videos created, with 80 percent being user-generated, recently-released business video report data has shown. Some 98 percent of business video users have said that video has a conversion rate that is the same or better than any other type of content, according to the report data. Vidyard

The Role of Data in B2B Go-To-Market Strategies
59 percent of B2B marketing and sales leaders have said that they see missing or incomplete information as their biggest go-to-market data challenge, with 56 percent pointing to poor quality data, while 40 percent noted disconnected or siloed data sources — three of numerous statistics of interest to B2B marketers contained in newly-released survey data. MarketingProfs

What should B2B marketers prioritize in 2023?
Brand purpose will see growing importance in 2023, while some 90 percent of companies in the customer-obsessed category have considered improving the employee experience as a top priority, with 72 percent of B2B buyers having said that they are more apt to purchase from socially responsible companies — some of the findings revealed in recently-published Forrester report data. SmartBrief

Cannes Lions Issues Annual Creativity Report
The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity recently published its annual creativity report, showcasing 76 pages of branded marketing and communications trends from this year’s event, which for the first time featured dedicated B2B marketing categories in the form of 11 Cannes Creative B2B Lions awards. MediaPost

Instagram remains the undefeated champ of influencer spend
U.S. influencer marketing spending has been forecast to hit $6 billion by 2023, an increase from this year’s $4.6 billion estimate, driven by digital marketers looking to turn towards more cost effective solutions, according to newly-released forecast data. Insider Intelligence

The Biggest Milestones in B2B Social Media History [Infographic]
From LinkedIn’s launch in 2003 and the eventual entrance of Facebook and Twitter on the scene in subsequent years to TikTok and others, a newly-released infographic takes a brief look at the history and milestones of B2B social media. MarketingProfs

This is the B2B century, and marketers will be the ones to lead it
With some 72 percent of U.S. businesses now primarily B2B, and B2B sales topping $9 trillion annually, The B2B Institute — LinkedIn’s think tank — takes a look at the next 100 years of marketing and how B2B looks to have an increasingly bright future. Marketing Week

Digital Advertising Hits $189 Billion In 2021, Global Forecasts Predict 5% Yearly Growth Through 2027
U.S. digital advertising revenue of $189 billion in 2021 was the biggest increase since 2006, including audio advertising with a leading 57.9 percent growth rate, and newly-released report data predicts that the audio ad market will see a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.07 percent that will continue on through 2027. MediaPost

Google Helpful Content Update Is Now Rolling Out
The latest updates to Google’s always-in-motion search engine algorithm look to emphasize content written more for people and less for SEO, as the search giant began rolling out its “helpful content update” as part of efforts to surface more high-quality original content, Google recently announced. Search Engine Roundtable

B2B buyers aren’t always happy campers when purchasing online [Report]
94 percent of B2B buyers have said that they prefer working with suppliers that have continually-evolving digital capabilities, while some 97 percent report having experienced at least one pain point during the online purchase process — two of several findings of interest to B2B marketers contained in newly-released survey data. Digital Commerce 360

B2B Digital Marketers See Content as Vehicle to CX Improvement
Some 42 percent of B2B marketers have listed investment in new content and creative assets as the top priority for improving customer experience (CX) over the next year, with 40 percent pointing to strengthening customer retention strategies, and 36 percent pinpointing better alignment of teams and tactics — three of numerous statistics of interest to digital marketers included in recently-released CX survey data. MarketingCharts