Best B2B Voices: Part 3

A few days ago I mentioned I’d found 2 great B2B voices. Last week I talked about IBM (which still surprises me how well written their site is—though I should clarify that’s not because it’s sooo head-and-shoulders above the rest, but rather I still hold onto an apparently inaccurate IBM stereotype).

The other voice is TribalDDB.

In the agencies where I’ve worked (which is to say, not big ones), their agency website was always an afterthought since between billable hours and non-billable hours, billable is going to win every time. Apparently that’s not true for biggies. (Huh. Putting as much effort in your own site as you would a client’s. Smart. Maybe that’s why they got big.)

At any rate, what’s working in their voice? TribalDDB makes what they do sound exciting. They don’t overwhelm with too much information. And they speak in metaphor that distills the potentially dry service offering into something easily understood as beneficial. For example, describing SEO/SEM the headline is “Hey needle, time to burn the haystack.” SEO/SEM is spectacularly boring except to people who really understand its power. And guess what? That headline describes its power.

Why aren’t more B2B voices like that? Is the problem that TribalDDB doesn’t want to spend as much time getting to know it’s clients’ benefits the way it does its own? I sincerely doubt that. More likely clients won’t hand the reins over. They’re scared to be too different. And maybe it’s right to be afraid of being different. But standing out is also how you beat the competition.

Best B2B Voices: Part 2

So quite a while back I posted that I’m looking for great B2B
voices. They are hard to come by, in my experience. Over the course of the past few months I’ve looked and have 2 good examples, though I don’t think by any means this is the conclusive list.

Let’s start with the one I found first: IBM. I know, crazy, right? They have nicely humorous TV ads (which, as I mentioned, is where B2B often has fun), but who knew they could nail their voice on their website, too? If you’re interested in this stuff, which you must be if you’re reading this, seriously go to ibm.com.

They do a wonderful job of delivering the facts—which are of course heavy in technology systems and other topics that could easily become tangled, boring and jargony. They manage to avoid that very well. In fact, they are great at keeping it simple, warm and friendly—maybe not compared to a consumer product/website, but certainly compared with the competition.

The most important part is that they place a terrific focus on you.

The design (which is not my focus, but of course is relevant), is simple, clean and lets the content come through. Tabs at the bottom of the home page make for quick scanning of the volumes of info available on the site. Information on deeper level pages is also well divided into digestible chucks for the average scanning user.

Lastly, while their TV ads and website have a very different voice and look, it’s not too radically different. It feels consistent. IBM has a great UX and content team. IBM, give them a raise.

The Hunt for the Best B2B Voice Begins

There was a great article last week from MarketingSherpa entitled “Copywriting Lessons from Social Media.” It’s so good I won’t regurgitate it here, but it’s worth a read, both for writers and every marketer who makes a request from a writer. In short, an honest voice is so rare in copy that it sings when you finally see one.

Even rarer? A great B2B voice.

I can think of a few B2B TV ads (which air during the Sunday a.m. talk shows) that use humor to make the point about a B2B product. In web copy, we tend to get shy and return to our “innovative, industry-leading solutions” and other such gobbledygook. The trick for the copywriter is striking a balance between features and benefits. Obviously the B2B audience is less about having fun than getting useful information about your product. But that doesn’t preclude a great voice.

I am now officially on the hunt for the best B2B voices. Top 5 will be featured in a one-of-a-kind praise-ridden blog post by this humble copywriting blogger. Submit suggestions in the comments.