B2B IN 15 l Episode 16 | Attention Precedes Conversion

Before you will ever get to a conversion, you need the attention of your prospect. You need a little window of time to tell somebody that you can help them solve their problems. You want to do that over and over and over again, so that at some point, when they need your solution, they think of you, right? To your top of mind as a solution, we call that niche fame hair a dapper. But yeah, before all of that, you need their attention. And to get the attention of your prospect, you need content. You need good content because people are very, very spoiled today. People are bombarded with content on different platforms. On Instagram, on YouTube, on LinkedIn, there's a constant flow of entertaining, funny, interesting, valuable content. So you have to wonder what type of content it's going to take from your side in order to get people to stop scrolling and look at whatever you have to say. Why on earth would somebody stop scrolling to look at your post or your ad? And the big problem is that most companies make content that their prospects does not want to read, watch or listen to you. I mean, look at the average LinkedIn company page and the shit that is posted on the average LinkedIn company page. Literally nobody wants to read that. So what I want to do in this podcast is I want to give you some ideas to level up your content. Hopefully for you to start creating content that your prospects will actually love and spend their attention on because again, attention precedes conversion always. So B2B in 15, let's go. Okay we're going to start off with a topic and that is talking head videos. I think within B2B, talking head videos are very big. I think it's probably looking at video content, the most popular type of video content and a very effective one because a lot within B2B boils down to thought leadership. And then when you put that in the video, it's oftentimes somebody talking about the topic that they are a thought leader in, right? Whether it's an individual in front of a podcast mic or two people in a room, get an interview style video, generally talking head videos are very popular in B2B. I would say the most popular video format. But by now we have all seen so many dudes with a podcast mic in a short for video content that I also think it might be losing some of its value. I still think it's very effective. We do it for ourselves a dapper and we still get most of our revenue out of that type of content and for a lot of our clients as well, but I do think that it might soon be losing some of its value and what I want to give you as a dip is to switch things up. So if you're making talking head videos, try to switch up backgrounds and environments to add some novelty and to make it interesting. So for my own videos, I try to switch it up constantly. Sometimes I create a video in the office. Sometimes I walk down the street while my videographer films me, but also sometimes I create these talking head videos in a coffee place or restaurant. And by adding this creativity, this novelty to every single video, it becomes something that really stands out on LinkedIn and it also becomes something that stands out compared to the previous video that I posted or advertised with. So what I try to avoid is have every setting look like each other. So I want to avoid my setting look like my previous settings, but I also want to avoid it to look like the setting of other thought leaders, right? So there's one setting with a podcast mic and a typical podcast background, some neon lights in the background, I think we're getting so used to that type of video that it might not attract attention anymore as effectively. But what I do think is that if you switch up the environment in the background constantly, you have this novelty and it does stand out. So I even did an experiment where I had three weeks in a row, a video with the exact same background. And when I saw is that every single week, the reach and engagement went down and I think it's because people think that it's the same video, right? While if it's a new background or a new environment, a new way of presenting it, a different outfit, it adds this novelty and people think, ah, I haven't seen this video before. So when you're going to make talking head videos and where you continue to do so in 2025, I would say try to at least switch up backgrounds and environment and other variables in the video that you can switch up, right? Then the second category, your theme so to say is entertainment, content that is entertaining. So what I see in B2B is that the past years, it has been very much evolving around thought leadership content. So most of the B2B content that was posted or is advertised with is very serious and has to show expertise, which I still think is very, very relevant and very important. But I see more and more B2B companies actually becoming effective and attracting attention with funny or relatable content, which makes it more entertaining than thought leadership content, right? And I see that B2B brands were less approachable and funny before. And right now, I see that humor or relatableness can be a great way to grab people's attention. So I have some examples. Clay is a company that is doing very well there. I feel like nobody knew Clay one and a half years ago and now everybody knows Clay and something that they did very well is include humor in their ads and in their posts. So I have an example in front of me now, which is basically a scene from the matrix where Neo and Morphus is that how I pronounce it Morphius, I think, are talking about the red and the blue bill, right? And instead of that red and blue bill conversation, it's basically Neo, which is now a guy from Clay talking to Morphus, but then Morphus is talking about Clay, right? Well, it's very hard to explain, and you just actually just watch the video. But it's something where it's in a format that that people know, everybody watched the matrix. And it's funny, it's edited in a way that is not very, very high production value, but it's just a very funny and entertaining video. So I myself, when I saw it on my timeline, I watched a full two minutes, which I don't do with most of the posts or ads that I see on my timeline, especially not when it's an ad. So I think that was a very good example of an ad that has entertainment value, but next to that, I also see a lot of meme ads nowadays. So I see that meme ads are increasingly popular and I see a lot of companies create video content and familiar formats. So game shows or barities on movies or barities on television shows, innovators in this space really learn how to think like media companies and even more so create content that is not only evolving around thought leadership, but also just around entertainment value. Not too long ago, of course, audience plus came into existence. I think they still have to launch, but I think these steps of innovations where you have a subscription on the content of companies will also lead to more content series that do not only evolve, evolve only around thought leadership, but also more around entertainment. Right now, the example is already that you can see an audience plus of series that they would have on their platform also have more entertainment value than the average B to B content. Then lastly, what else is he's that some successful LinkedIn influencers, LinkedIn creators also use humor. I see that this is really on the upright. So for instance, this guy, Tim Davidson, which gained popularity a lot in the last two years that got fruit while talking about B to B marketing and it's always funny. It's always something that grabs the attention, cutting a pineapple or a big watermelon, doing something absurd while talking about B to B marketing. So I think if you can evolve this entertainment element, entertaining element to your B to B content, this can really make it stand out on LinkedIn or any other platform and really help you to grab the attention because again, you need that attention to have that little window of time to tell your prospects that you can solve their problems. So entertainment value can be a very important one here. Alright, so the last theme, so to say, that I would like to give you some tips and tricks around is LinkedIn paid influencers. So what I see happening more and more is that B to B companies are using creators in their niche, creators or influencers in their niche to make and distribute content. So B to B marketing is always a couple of years behind on B to C marketing. Now it's a in this area, maybe even 10 to 15 years behind because influencer marketing and B to C is big and has been big for a very long time already. But within the B to B space, for some reason, it didn't really take off. But right now, I'm seeing that more and more companies are actually using paid influencers on LinkedIn, mostly then and it has a couple of advantages. First of all, if you see a creator that you're following or influencer, you will stop scrolling to check out their content. If you, if they already have your trust and if you, if you build this reputation of posting interesting stuff, if you see something that they post, even if it's promotional, you will stop scrolling to check out their content. Next to that, usually creators, B to B creators, make good content. So if you make them responsible for the creation of content and the distribution of content, I think that they're going to make good content and they're going to get a lot of people to stop scrolling to check out their content. Another example that I want to give here around B to B influencers, especially on LinkedIn is an example of Clay. Again, what Clay did very well is they partnered up with a lot of B to B creators and had them make one-minute clay books, which is basically a one-minute video in which that creator, that LinkedIn influencer specifically, talks about how they use Clay in around a minute. So I have an example here in front of me of Jen Allen Knuth. I hope I pronounced it correctly in which she just posted a video, even Clay branded with a little clay logo in the top left corner, in which she talks about Clay and how fantastic it is and how she uses it in one minute. And I saw this on the page of multiple B to B creators that I'm following. And right away, it signals trust, it signals authority. For me, it worked really well. Again, I have the feeling that nobody knew Clay one and a half years ago, and right now everybody knows Clay. I think a big part has to do with them using LinkedIn influencers, LinkedIn creators, whatever you want to call them, to grab the attention and to create high quality content around their solution. All right. That was it for this week. I really hope that I gave you some ideas to take your content marketing to the next level. Again, it's crucial to create content that your prospects will actually love and that your prospects will stop scrolling forward to actually check it out, which is harder than ever. But I hope these three teams gave you some ideas today to level up your content. If you liked this podcast and if you got some ideas from it, then please subscribe to the podcast every single week. I will post a new podcast next to the podcast. I also have a weekly email called B to B made stupid simple, which is a weekly email that is meant to make B to B marketing stupid simple. I'll also put the link in the description of the podcast. If you have any questions or topics you'd like me to cover in this podcast, please set me a message on LinkedIn. I'll also put the link in the description of the podcast to my personal LinkedIn B to be in 15. See you next week. [BLANK_AUDIO]