B2B Creativity in the Age of AI: Reuben Webb on Originality, Influence, and Breaking Free of Boring Marketing

Hello and welcome to the Beyond B2B Marketing podcast. I'm your host, Leo Oden, CEO of Top Rank Marketing. And today our guest is someone who has been on the frontline of creativity and B2B marketing for well over 25 years. He's a champion of big, long creative ideas and putting B2B marketing cliches to rest. Of course, I'm talking about Ruben Webb, B2B editorial lead at The Drum. Welcome to the show, Ruben. Thanks, I'm delighted to be here. It's great to have you. ah So you've had an impressive career in B2B marketing over last 25 years. You've been at Stein IAS and I'd love to start at the beginning. And this is something I like to ask everyone that comes on the show. What's your B2B marketing origin story? Like, like how did you get into marketing in the first place? Yep, yep, it's a good place to start. Well, like all the best stories, it's about a girl. And so I met this lovely girl at university and we went traveling the world together. And when we got back, um her dad, a guy named Tim Hazelhurst, wanted wanted us to settle down and quite rightly so he's like you guys need some grounding here you can't be traveling for the rest of your lives and and she was far too proud to take a job at her father's company but I wasn't and he he offered me a job he offered me a job there as a junior copywriter and I you know really what I had was was an English literature degree from from university so you know that kind of qualified me and I've spoken to quite a lot of people since and that kind of qualified them to get into copywriting as well. And so he was running uh an agency called IAS in Macclesfield and IAS stands for, and this is interesting bit of B2B history right here. It stands for Industrial Art Services. Now that was Tim. Tim's articulation of B2B marketing before the term B2B marketing had been invented. So he started that agency in 1973, the year I was born. I started working there as a junior copyright in the year 2000. And yeah, and the rest is history. But it was, so it was an accident. It was a very generous act. of an absolute B2B marketing legend, the way, Tim Hazlehurst. got an incredible pedigree and he taught me many of the things that I still espouse today. So that's it. story. Love it. Love it. That's a great story. fast forward to today and you are B2B editorial lead at The Drum. Can you share a little bit about, and I can't imagine who wouldn't know about The Drum, but could you share a little bit about the publication and then about your current role and how you made the decision to go from the agency side of things where you were quite successful and now over to the successful role on the editorial side of things. Yeah, sure. so the drum is a, is a media platform that has always covered marketing and they, they started off as a, and it's still, it's still a family run company to this day. They started off as a, as a small startup in Scotland. and they were part of the Scottish advertising universe. um which is small and everybody knows each other and it's great fun and I know I've met a lot of that universe in my time. I still work with many of them today. And essentially, I think the success of the drum is due to their, for want of a better word, I want to call it a slightly punky attitude to journalism and media. And I think they have built a really good reputation for people who are happy to say yes to ideas that other people might not. And actually that is what has drawn me to it. Because it's funny actually, I'm just preparing a presentation for next week to do to the company. to thank them for bringing me in. And I'm going to tell them this, I'm going to tell them that the reason I've joined that company is because they have always across their history, let B2B be what it wants to be. And so I'm getting loads of really good pitches from people who want to be in the drum on the B2B side, because we're investing heavily in our B2B offering now, we're taking that up a level. Again, no coincidence that I've arrived there to uh be a part of that. What I see is one of the fantastic opportunity. And so people come to the drum because they know they can say things that traditionally in B2B and other places in B2B, they probably couldn't. Just through... other editorial approaches and other attitudes to creativity. So what did I cut? Did I answer your whole question there? Was there a picture? question. You described the drum and then what caused you to come over from the role you had before in your long-term ah experience at Stein IAS. Yeah, yeah, cool. think, yeah, we can, you want more on that one, we can come back. But so, so actually, yeah, that covers it. Let's crack on. Well, so, you know, in, I want to talk about an industry level question too. B2B marketing itself has spent many years fighting this sort of boring to boring stereotype, right? But, you know, you kind of alluded to this already. Earlier in your career, you really recognized that B2B marketing was a much bigger creative opportunity than many other people did. And I'm just wondering from your perspective, What are some of the creative principles or concepts in B2B marketing that you found in your career to be timeless? Yeah. So when I've always loved, when I realized, you know, as I started in my job, as I've alluded to, I didn't know what B2B marketing was. um I didn't really appreciate what B2C marketing was either. I was, you know, I was a literature student and I just arrived from traveling in Asia for, for years. And I was like, what is all this stuff? But anyway, as I started to appreciate what B2B marketing was and how it was different to consumer marketing, why I stayed with it is because of the principle that it is all about the fabric of society. so, and I liked exploring the fabric of society and as a marketer within that, stitching together all the things that make up civilized society, from the bricks to the cables to the roads to the technology to the waterways to all these things that hold us together as the civilized world. I like, I feel I'm part of something noble and that when I help people do things within that space, I feel like I'm making a positive contribution. And I always felt that. And I felt it as compared to particularly as I started to realize, oh yeah, I'm being advertised at all the time. And some of the advertising I see, I don't necessarily agree with, you know, and I realized that I wouldn't want to be a part of that. And so, you know, selling sugary cereals to young people. I don't want to get up in the morning and do that. I don't want to sell. don't want to sell the there's a lot of there's so much uh gambling advertising in the UK in particular. And again, I'm like, you know, I don't want to sell gambling to people who might develop a gambling problem. So I felt really vindicated working in B2B marketing and um And I'm not saying it's like holier than thou because every B2C company has a B2B angle, right? uh But I just felt enough distance from marketing things that I didn't really want to be involved with. And I just felt really, I felt proud to be a B2B marketer. that's, that doesn't really answer the creative principle thing, but don't worry. We'll talk a lot more about creativity. um as we go through this. you know, I just think, yeah, yeah, why not? Yeah, perfect. it was a little bit ago, 2013, you published a book, 101 Clichés, right? That called out industry and agencies sort of safe and repetitive habits. And now, you know, I'm wondering how much progress do you think B2B marketing has really made creatively in that time? know, especially in the context of AI. I knew you were going to ask this question, which is why I grabbed the copy of the book off my shelf. Now this, this I think is, it, was it, this one was the first one that we did at IAS, 2008. So yeah, this is 2008 when we reduced the first one. And for those of you that, don't know what this is. It's, it's 101 B2B marketing cliches in a book. Number one is the light bulb, which stands for an idea. And you see that still in every PowerPoint presentation around the world that you do. it's, and it goes on from there to talk about various other cliches like the baton. I still see that one out there today. So, so why, why I wrote that in 2008 was because I was starting to get annoyed with how just how bloody cliched B2B marketing uh can be. And so you're asking me how much progress have we made creatively? Well, that is a really interesting question because I would say that we have made progress. And I think you can look at the moment, there was a key moment, which I think everyone in B2B was aware of when the B2B Lions were introduced at the Cannes Festival of advertising. that's like three or four years ago, I think it is. And, you know, I went to Cannes for the first time because of that. I went with my great friend, Tom Stein, and we had the best week. And it was really exciting. And I think that, for me, was a real key moment. However, I think it was a sugar rush, right? Because if everybody started to talk about it like... this was a renaissance actually happening. that B2B was now going to be as creative a force as B2C and we'll never look back from here. And that was kind of how excited people were getting about this moment. And the truth is that business, big business, is the institution that is B2B doesn't change overnight. You know, it's the same as countries and governments trying to introduce new policies or trying to get new policies through. It's that big a beast that no one is just going to snap their fingers and suddenly everyone in B2B has drank the Kool-Aid that they need to be as creative as B2C is and treat people as the emotional beings they are and have really great fun in their advertising and be entertaining. Okay. And I think B2B is having a bit of an identity crisis with this. Social media has arrived to change the game completely. And this is for me what made B2B people confront this reality that B2B people like to be entertained just like other people. because they are those people and they're on social media and they know what they're looking for and interested in and everybody's sharing everything from around the world. So you've got this huge view of what entertainment looks like and what holds the attention and everybody is starting to make their own conclusions about that. And I think that is the most powerful force that has affected B2B because it's exposing the people that are then going, right, yeah, but I don't want to be entertaining. This is too serious for an entertainment. Okay, that's fine. But on your head, be it, because guess what? People are going to look at the stuff that entertains them and you're going to get less of their attention. Now, so the arguments are obvious and the arguments are clear. And I totally believe I'm back every single person who is fighting for a more creative B2B approach in marketing. I back everyone to the hill and every argument I hear, I agree with. But I would say that this is an oil tanker, right? Let's take a big B2B thing. Let's take a big B2B thing like an oil tanker. They take a while to turn around. And the idea that we're going to turn this ship around and everybody's going to be celebrating B2B creativity for forevermore as the best thing in marketing. It's naive, frankly. And so I think B2B's got... We are fighting the good fight. And so my message to everyone is don't stop fighting the good fight because you need to fight. This fight is way from won and it needs campaigning. B2B needs to be continuously campaigning to get this message across until it starts to stick. um know, hunt it down everywhere, complain about it, tell everybody, show everybody, Ruben wrote a book in 2008, we're still using the crap in there today. It's true, we are, you know? So B2B is no way off the hook as far as creativity goes. So in B2B marketing, there's this, I don't know if it's a real or just people manufacture these debates for attention, but there's this brand versus demand conversation that continues to occur. And I'm wondering from your perspective, where does creativity fit in that brand versus demand equation? mean, can't great creative drive both? Yes. The short answer to that question is yes. It absolutely can. And I think, you let's start at the easy end. The end that you've heard from lots of people. And that is the good brand work, good creative brand work that engages people, that highlights the meaningful difference of your company and itself is meaningfully different. that will help people recall you at the point when they actually start to look for a product in your category. That is a really good idea and everybody should do it. So in other words, brand is future demand. Right? So that is true, but that's not new and everybody's, there's a lot of people talking about and I back them all to their hill. I believe that. passionately. So now let's look at the difficulty then. The difficulty is taking a really good, strong brand idea and weaving it in seamlessly, effortlessly to the content that sits at the demand end of the funnel. So, Can you take your brand story, your brand idea, and can you make it manifest in a sales calculator comparison tool or your white papers or your case studies? I think the answer is yes, but I think it's a very hard thing to do. It's a very hard thing to do from an organisational point of view. to actually for someone to have the vision and the will to make that happen in an enterprise, all those touch points ladder up to what the brand is about, which is also what the product that's being bought is about. The brand is all of it. But to have an idea that you can carry through all of it takes an enormous power of will that and organizational structure and belief and also a brilliant idea that's flexible enough to do it. So I taught you mentioned the big long idea. That was my original theory about that very thing. And I've been talking about it for 20, well, not maybe 20 years. Okay. You need the big long idea approach, which unites brand and demand. Okay. So people love the theory, but the times that I actually got to implement one, probably, I don't know, I could, I might be a think backer a few, but it was a hard thing to, it was an easy thing to sell theoretically. It was a very hard thing to get people to deliver in reality. And I'm not sure how many of them are out there to this day. So again, I think the brand and demand debate, is very good and it's the right debate to be having, but at the moment, it's an easy theoretical debate. It's much harder to actually do in practice. It's part of the turning of the ship, isn't it? It's one of the, yeah. Yep. again, and these are the things keep, this is why it's important to keep talking about it. You know, it's, if you're getting bored of brand and demand, the conversation, then, then I hope that you have a really great big long idea in place and you're killing it. Otherwise you've got to, you've got to be part of that conversation, I'm afraid. Yeah, yeah. So I know I used the expression AI already, or maybe I didn't. don't know. But we're going to talk about it. Yeah, so many things. So we're in this age where AI can generate all the things, right? Content, images, video, and with the Gentic systems, even campaigns at scale. um Sorry, I'm a little, yeah. I'll believe it when I see it. um in terms of quality. my question is, how do you think that trend or that movement, that AI powered movement on the creation side changes the value of human creativity? mean, and I'll just kind of lead the question a little or the answer a little bit maybe. I'm thinking that maybe originality and creative thinking are even more important right now in this age of AI. yeah, think, I think, you know, we've got, I am, I'm pausing because I just, I just don't know where to start, but I'll just start. Okay. So let's just, let's go straight in on the, the, the premise of originality, uh, being now the most important, one of the most important skills. I think that is absolutely true. I think, and I don't just think it's true. I know it's true because I'm practicing it and I'm in close contact with people, B2B creative directors who are also practicing it. And I know people now who have become so much more independent because essentially they were the strategic idea person. And suddenly they are empowered with a ton of tools that can actually just create a very, very persuasive, let's take pitch decks, right? This is the lifeblood of the B2B agency universe. So I think back even, mean, I think five years ago, it was still... Yeah, it was still done pretty much the way it was done 25 years ago. And that was, you came up with the idea and you decided on the tactics you were going to distribute that idea across. And then you worked with a good set of people. Some of them could draw, some of them would work the Mac like like a whirling dervish, some of them would write and you would get this system going where it was like, okay, right, you're gonna handle the direct mail piece, right, you guys are on that. Here's what it looks like roughly, okay, this is how we're get the idea across in there. Go, you team DM, go. All right, you guys are on the web experience, right, how are we gonna do this? And it was a hell of a lot of fun and I absolutely loved it and it was such a great community feeling. Um, now I imagine that is still going on to a degree, but I do know this. know creative directors who used to do it that way that can now do that all on their own because they've had an idea. So they've had an idea and they can literally now work with a machine to go, right. I'm these are the tactics I have chosen. I want you to take this idea and I want you to write the copy for the, the, the, the event stand, right? Here it is. And, and then bang. You've got an event stand with words in perfect places, the client's logo where you need it. It's incredible what has happened. So I think that answers the question that right now, if that's true, then which is the valuable part of that? It's the part where you have the idea, right? And I still believe, and I'm trying by the way, I'm trying, I'm trying to get... I'm trying to get Claude and Chat GPT to have really good ideas. But the thing that they can't replicate for me is the unexpected. I still find that it's like a good idea is unexpected. So if you're going to break a B2B category and do something that people go, oh, that's great. I never thought of that, but it's still kind of obvious, but it kind of isn't, right? And that's what makes a great idea. um Then. It's uh nuanced, right? It's something that is based on the flawed thinking or unique ways of thinking that humans bring to uh these sorts of things, right? And it's not a predictive sort of thing necessarily. Yes, no, it's about randomization. know, that's essentially that the human mind is really good at being random when you need it to be. You know, just like, let's do some different, let's try some different combinations, you know? Let's do something, let's connect two worlds that aren't connected. Yeah. So I think people are still better at that than the machines. And so I think your premise is right. think we're, listen, I'll stop there on that question, because I think we're to get some other stuff, because I also, I have warnings for B2B about some of this, but yeah, I agree with the premise that originality is probably the most important thing in the creative space and the strategic space. Yeah, you know, I've always thought of, as I've been experimenting with AI systems for a long time, AI makes you more of what you are, is kind how I think of it. And that if you're a really creative person, you know, you're going to get a lot different outputs than someone who really doesn't know a whole lot about a thing. At best, they're going to get an average output and no one wins with average. And so I think that, that Emphasis on the originality of human idea is persistently valuable. And we're not there yet where that could be in a meaningfully way uh replicated yet, right? If there was that qualifier. in terms of content that is being produced, campaigns are being produced that are heavily AI generated. And I'm seeing companies that are, you know, I mean, a lot of marketers are getting laid off in the US. A lot of marketing departments are getting laid off right now. And companies are investing in agentic systems to automate what should or could be automated. um And that's having a certain kind of impact, especially on the output. So to me, there are tells with AI generated content, kind of like ripples in the matrix, right? um Or it just blends in, right? Because of this average output sort of scenario. And as someone who spent your entire career pushing creative B2B boundaries, um do you think we're at risk of over automating? You um know the concept of filter bubble, right? In terms of algorithms that predictive analytics and that sort of thing that make recommendations based on existing data. And if there's never any new data, how do we come up with original ideas, right? Yeah, sure. Listen, the thing is, I'm less worried about this than some other people. And the reason for that is that having spent my whole career trying to persuade people to be above average and often failing, I think B2B has already got an average problem. Right. It's all it's had an average, you know, the race to the middle has been been on for decades in B2B. and so so I think I think the conversation that you know, now now, agentic AI is going to going to work is a worry because we're all going to get to this very sort of average middle of B2B. We've been there for 25 years, you know, 30 years, 40 years. I think I think if you look back, if you aggregated B2B communication over the last 20 years, you would probably see, and you try, you know, you would see that and go, some average robot did that. And he just, he just kept picking one from here, one from there, changed the hard hat to a nurse's hat or whatever, you know, just so. So I'm less worried about it from a creative point of view. And actually, again, it's a fantastic opportunity for the people that want to be original. Because it is happening. But I think it's happening rather cynically as well. And this is the thing about B2B tanker turnaround because of, you know, because of being more creative, right? We need to be more creative. I think there are cynical people who don't care about that aspect of B2B marketing. And they're going, hang on a minute, I used to employ people to do very average work. Now I can employ a machine to do very average work. And I've always been fine with it and I'm still fine with it. And so, This is why we need to fight for creativity because we're fighting for humans. We're fighting for humans. And I will say, B2B has no one to blame for itself, but itself, that now there's a race of agent robots that can do our job just as well as we could because what we were doing was so bloody average. And so if this isn't a wake-up call, people, to say fight for creativity in B2B because that will save human jobs. Learn to be more creative in B2B. Fight for your place against these damn machines that are just doing our jobs as well as we've done them for decades. That's the terrible truth that I believe. Yeah, well, we'll do our best to get the word out, right? um we need we need to fight these bloody things. But you know, it's when when you know, you go to a cynical CEO and go, we don't don't do this. Don't do this. Look at look at all the amazing things we've done over the last 20 years that couldn't have been done by AI. And he goes, Oh, hang on. No, it's all this. You know, yeah, now we wish now we wish we had an original portfolio for our B2B brands. Right, right. There are bigger fish to fry as in the race to the middle. I love that. um Well, in your role now at the drum, you've got a front row seat to what's happening in the industry globally, literally. And I'm just wondering, what are some of the themes or trends that are getting your attention in B2B marketing the most right now? It's the, so the, one that keeps surfacing and rightly so one of the biggest, one of the biggest, think, you know, we've, we've talked about the creative impact of AI and I think you've got my views there and that's still, that's still a big topic, but I think the, that one of the most interesting things that's happening is, is in the measurement community. So the, the effectiveness and measurement community. are facing the arrival of the the LLM going from what used to be a search journey to now it's we're in the answer journey era because because everybody who's going to enter into a buying process has found this magical tool that takes so much of that pain away and And it's good at it, right? So for me, the B2B measurement community, it's like an alien species has landed right in the middle of it. And everybody's like, uh, what, what does the machine want? How does the machine think? And so for me, is like an arrival moment. And I think this is really interesting. and people are having to find rethink, completely rethink how they're going to measure B2B marketing success. And that for me is a brilliant topic that I'm really interested in. I just did a webinar with LinkedIn about it and I was listening to people, how they're approaching it. Everybody's got a bit of a different view and no one seems to have the whole answer worked out, that's for sure. So I think it's a space that we really need to keep an eye on. Because essentially what is the challenge? We're no longer just marketing to people. We are also marketing to intelligent machines. What do they want from us? the age of the answer uh resonates quite a bit because interestingly, the entire marketing OS that we operate off of is called best answer marketing. And it's about how to architect information and experiences in all the channels that matter. uh that resonate both with humans, but also we're marketing to those agents, right? And one of the pillars of that is a unified analytics approach that helps to answer that question about how can we effectively measure across all these surfaces? Anyway, the answer idea is something that really, really resonates because of that. Yeah, cool. Well, you're going to have to tell me more about your approach. Bring it to my editorial party by all means. That's an open invitation. Okay. So I'm wondering because of your, again, your visibility to what's happening in the industry right now with your role at the drum, is there a recent B2B campaign uh that really made you stop and think like we need to see more of this sort of thing? Yes, yes there is. um There's not enough of them, but let me just say that. So thanks for asking that question. And now let me just do a little pitch as the editorial lead at the drum for B2B. If you've got a brilliant B2B campaign that you want me to place on the drum and celebrate, just send it to me. I'm crying out for this, please. Hahaha love to see it, I'd love to celebrate it. And here's the campaign that I did just that with because I thought it was so brilliant. And that was a campaign for Fiverr. So Fiverr is the freelancer gig economy platform. And they have just launched a new hub full of AI film directors. So directors that work purely in AI. Which is interesting, sign of the times. But what they did to announce this, I don't know whether you heard about it, but they put up a sign in the Hollywood Hills that was as big as the Hollywood sign, right? And you could see the Hollywood sign and you could see this sign and their sign said, Billy Bowman. Okay, just that. It was Billy Bowman and essentially the camp and Billy Bowman is one of their AI directors on the hub. Um, honestly, you could check, check out the work he's doing in AI and honestly, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's far out. You know, you're looking at and going, I'm not sure I could tell. Like, I'm not sure I could tell, you know, it's like, you put that, the real thing in front of me and that thing and ask me which one's the, I'm not, I'm just not sure. No. So it's, getting that good to. and like express human emotion, which I thought was always a thing, know, if ever I've dabbled with it, can't, you know, I can never get, you know, things to, to, to fit together. But the people who are getting good at it, and I'm not sure what tools they're using, are getting really good at it. And, and so this campaign was a, it was calling out Hollywood and saying, your days are numbered. It's the time of guys like Billy Bowman. Right, right. And literally railing against um how expensive and how wasteful it is to make advertising in the Hollywood mode. know, massive production crews, all your sets just go in the bin afterwards, right? And you look at that model and it's like versus one dude who can make this incredible film that it's really hard to tell the difference, you know. The argument for it is really strong. And it's not a popular argument and it's not one that I'm all in on by any means. You know, I value uh traditional production methods because it's done by people. And I still believe that people bring a certain magic and unexpectedness to the film set and everything else like that. I'm not coming down on the side of this. Obviously, I could be independent here now at long last. So, but it was cool. And why was it cool? Why did I think it was good? was because it, not only was it just like a really bold uh thing to do and pull off, the bravery element was to come down on one side of an argument. And B2B's not good at doing that. B2B likes to hedge its bets. It likes to keep everybody happy. Keep everybody happy and we'll be okay. Or... keep everybody happy and no one will notice you is more to the point. And if you can come down on the side of an argument and like Fiverr, their brand, you know, they're saying this, but they've got lots of people who you can hire that are using traditional methods. And I think it was a really mature approach for a B2B brand to go, we're happy to do this, to get a conversation started, right? Cause a conversation is happening, needs to happen. And one view of that conversation is that AI video directors are superior to the traditional methods discuss. And we've done a cool thing to start that discussion. And I thought it was just really, that's what brave looks like, right? People talk about being brave in B2B. That's what brave looks like. It means coming down on the side of an argument and being brave enough to just defend it, to defend that argument, which they did. You know, that notion of bravery is like, you know, if you don't stand for something, you stand for nothing. And how will you ever stand out? Right? Exactly. Yeah, yeah. That sums up what I just said in three or four words. Well done. You a copywriter. You a copy... Uh, brute force copywriter, but I'm a blunt instrument, a copywriter maybe, but I've been practicing and I'm still practicing. so switching gears a little bit, um, at, top rank marketing, the, agency, we've been building influencer programs for like 14 years for B2B brands. And we published multiple research reports on this topic. And we've been seeing an even greater acceleration of interest in discussion around B2B influence, uh, creators, communities, and. and collaborating with trusted experts. And I'm wondering from your perspective, do you think this shift towards more human voices and personalities is connected in some way to a growing hunger for authenticity, uh a hunger for creativity? Yes, I do. I do. think, and I'm really pleased about it, by the way. I, know, QDOT's for you guys to be in front runners, because I think a lot of people are turning on to this now and they're realizing that, so there's a lot of debate in the market about trust. Yeah. So trust is back on the menu big time. Yes, sir. B2B and what's driving it? Let's just look at the things that are driving it. And so I think, and these are just my views, I think that what's driving it is the fact that there's such a proliferation now of decent quality content of all kinds produced by you know who. our friend, your friend and mine AI, that people ask, that is now good quality average content is no longer enough. Whereas five, six years ago it was because it was about consistency and it was about presence and consistency with content that sounded really credible, right? And because that wasn't that easy to produce. It wasn't. You had to think about it. had to write it. You had to get your, you had to go in and grab the people who were the experts, subject matter experts, get them to sit down and do this thing. And they didn't want to do it. They wanted to do their job, right? They don't want to go and do a marketing project. They wanted to do product development of things that they got into the business for. So to create good quality content was difficult. Now, uh I think that, you you talk to Claude or chat GPT and tell them to be a subject matter expert in food ingredients, right? That industry. think it'll again, take the Pepsi challenge with most people in the organization. There'll be sparks that, but. If I was those people, I'd start there and then I'd put my little expert layer on top. And that's, that's exactly what's happening. Let's get it right. So, so we've got a ton of content out there that is very good and credible. Um, you've got this, you've got all the imagery, the AI imagery out there slot on top of decent, you know, informative imagery. Great. Um, and people are going, ah, I don't know, it's all, you know, what, what should I trust here? Back to basics. We trust people, people trust people. And, and, and really, I think honestly, Lee, I think you can just get it right down to that. People trust people. And so I think that is being recognized by all sorts of brands and the creators themselves. And people are seeing the opportunity now to to come into B2B as a genuine creator. So we've got all the types, right? You're seeing people who are coming in and being funny, just like the cool people on TikTok be funny, you know? There's people making fun stuff. And then you've got your subject matter experts, you've got your employee advocates, you've got all sorts of people that are now more valuable than ever and seeing the opportunity to create content and create demand for their product as a human creator. So I think it's a fantastic um consequence of the AI revolution where people are winning because people trust people and they want to hear from them. And so if you're wondering what to do next in your career, my advice is to become a B2B content creator. Well, it's certainly something that's on the rise. And, you know, I think there's an interesting intersection with influencers, influencer content creators, and creativity. So I wanted to bring up some research that reflects this that we've done. And our last research report found 64 % of B2B marketers said that unique content is one of the biggest differentiators in successful influencer programs. And 61 % pointed to creative influencer campaigns specifically. So, you know, my question for you is, you do you think it's the case that creativity plays a role in B2B creator collaborations, right? Like it's one thing to have a credible person say some nice things about your brand or about your category, but it's another thing if they do it creatively. I'm glad you got data on it because, you know, again, I'm talking, I'm giving you my opinion and I've worked with um influencers and what I found was the lesson I learned quickly was don't try and influence them too much on what your brand is, you know, don't, don't, don't make them swallow the drink, the Kool-Aid, right? Don't do it. And don't, don't dictate to them what to say, essentially. That's really what I'm trying to say. Let them stay, give them their intelligent people, their creative people, tell them what it is you're trying to do and get across and your message and your story and let them deliver that in the way they want to. Because that will be They got to where they are. You're talking to them because they're good at that and they're good at being original and they're good at being creative. So the worst thing you can do is try and manipulate that side of them. Give them the brief, tell them what it is you're trying to stand for and why they're involved and then let them do something original. Let them do something that... that is creative. These guys are called creators for a reason, you know? And whoever that be, know, thought leadership is from, you know, from somebody who's doing a comedy skit, which I encourage, get that in your B2B campaign, definitely. But, you know, bringing in thought leaders, let them give you their leading thoughts, you know, not your leading thoughts if you're... if you haven't actually got any, you know, because that might be why you're employing this person, you know. Well, having people parrot brand talking points is the blandest thing ever. The whole reason to engage someone who has their own perspective is to contextualize and validate original ideas that might be born out of the brand's thought leadership or might be an interpretation. And that's the authenticity that... is why that person is influential in the first place. It's the whole reason to engage them is to have them interpret what's valuable about what your category or your company is to their audience. They can translate for them. And then that's why distribution and engagement and trust can be so effective. So we're speaking the same language there. Yeah, the thing is people have, you know, this and that's, again, I encourage everyone working in B2B because I see a lot of editorial content coming through about the same topics in the same way. And I'm like, look, all you need to do is find your own personal way of expressing about this topic. And suddenly it's interesting. Suddenly it becomes interesting. Now use your own, you know, use a story analogy, know, you used to go horse riding as a kid. Tell me how that relates to the topic of of, you know, truth and the rise of all set authenticity or whatever it may be. But you've got to make it interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it reminds me of old sales adage, facts tell, but stories sell, right? You just can't go wrong with stories. absolutely. And I think uh these, these idioms need to be bubbled back up and again, repurposed, repackaged. Yeah. Sure, So in your work, right, you've got visibility in your career across, you UK and European markets and globally, right? And I'm wondering if, you know, because the US has, you know, there's a lot going on, I guess, but to say the least, are there, and from a creative and B2B marketing uh perspective, are there any meaningful differences that you've seen and how B2B creativity is approached? And let's say UK or European markets versus in the US. Yes, definitely. So I, you sent, you sent me this question and I thought, I thought about this. so I, I apologize in advance to everybody. I'm going to have to make generalizations. So, because there's no other way to do that when you're comparing national behavior to national behavior. So, you know, so you've got to let me off the hook here, guys. So let's start with Europe. Over the years, and I think it's still true today, B2B marketing campaigns and marketing campaigns in general, I think, are very visually led. The visual expression is really important. there's that, look at, particularly from... Northern Europe to Southern Europe, I think it's true. And, you know, design's really important, aesthetics are super important. And you look at what's happening culturally in these countries, and there is so much rich cultural visual expression that I think it's ingrained in a way that... So I went to an agency, spent a lot of time at an agency in Italy, loved fantastic people. And I was really struck by just how, so they were so passionate about the art direction and very few words, but everything just was, it had to be perfect. And their craft in creating the visuals for their campaigns. So I would say, I would say that European campaigns and I'm in continental Europe, visually led, visually led and I'm guessing that I think it comes from the rich cultural history going back centuries upon centuries where aesthetics are incredibly important. So now let's go all the way over to the other side, right? Let's go to the other side of the pond. Generalizing here, I think that the majority of the patterns I see in American campaigns are very verbally led. Okay. So I have never seen better headlines in B2B marketing, marketing per se than I have in America. The craft of writing the cute, cool headline is immaculate in the United States of America. There's no one on earth that does this better, okay? Which hurts me as a Brit. And as a copywriter. And as a copywriter. so it's less attention paid to the visual details. And you'll often see B2B campaigns um for B2B brands. see them on the Metro, right? um I get mixed up. Is it the Metro? I'm the subway and the tube. You're the subway, right? Yeah, right. So it's, I got a lot of places. Come on, help me out. So there I am, I'm on the subway and I'm seeing some of the best copy I've ever seen. And I think, so I think as a generalization, America is very verbally led as in the words, in this radio ads, they're outstanding, right? So, and then you come back to Britain and what is it? that Britain uh represents. And I think the tolerance for humor is in B2B, is best in Britain. I think Britain produces some of the more funny campaigns that touch that emotion, know, the humorous side of things. So, you know, if it's like, who's best at what? Europe, visuals. Britain, we're funny. The Americans, sorry, should be doing that. The Americans, just the best words in the world. Anyway, there you go, that's what I think. Okay, I appreciate that. And I think people listening and watching will too. So let's wind down with some advice from you. ah If you were giving advice to a younger B2B marketer that's coming into the industry right now, what skills or habits would you encourage in them to be successful long-term? Yeah, and first I'd like to say to anybody that is joining, welcome, come in, it's fun, it's fun, despite what I've said, we're having a lot of fun here and now's the moment to get involved for all the reasons we've talked about in terms of it's your brain we need, so come bring it. So to that point. What my advice would be and is, is develop your strategic brain. Okay? It doesn't matter which area you're getting into. This is my advice. Whether you're, you know, if you're getting into a strategic side of the business, that's obvious. But even if you're an account, you're starting out as a junior account manager or project manager or a creative in any of these aspects, and you're gonna... come into B2B, develop your appreciation for the transfer of business strategy to brand strategy. Okay? Everybody's allowed to do this and you've got an LLM buddy right now that can teach you the principles of it. You can have that lesson right now. Go do it with Claude. It will be really good. Go do it with ChatGBT. It will be really good and it will start to help you understand it. Because if you don't do that early on, you won't be able to be a part of conversations that are the most important in B2B marketing. And those are the strategic conversations at any level. So get good at that now, because after a while it becomes intimidating and you won't want to be a part. You'll find those conversations above your head and you'll be too scared to contribute and all those things. Whereas if you just start off, because it's not actually rocket science. It can be a bit complicated, but if you start to know how to play the game, it's like chess. If you understand how to play chess, suddenly you can play chess, right? And if you can't, and you sit down at a chess board with a chess player, then yeah, it's gonna be a really sad, intimidating, miserable experience for you. So number one, strategy is always going to be the realm of humans. And the best bits of strategy will come from humanity because those are the little twists of originality you need to be, to make a difference. that, so that's, that's, that's number one. Number two, get on the tools, get involved with the AI tools right now and in every way you possibly can. So if you haven't Vibe coded yet, Vibe code. I've only done one vibe coding project, at least I start, you know, I did it and I'm starting to explore. And, but I'm at the end of my career, right? I'm, I'm, I'm in a place where I don't know whether I'll ever need to vibe code something before, before I actually, you know, before I'm just too old to write another article. Yeah. Can you imagine if we were in our 20s and we had vibe coding available as a resource? Wow, you know, just unbelievable. I'm just saying, I advocate that these tools are there and you've got to use them and have fun with them and get involved and really explore what the possibilities are because then you will be part of the evolving conversation that is by far the most important, probably in the history of B2B marketing. let's face it. So there you go, that's my pieces of advice. Great advice. I appreciate that. And I think people watching listening will too. So thanks for that. So here's our final question. um And this is one I ask uh everyone on the show. uh If you weren't doing this, right? If marketing never happened for you in your career, what would your dream job be? Yeah. Do you know what I think it would be in all honesty? This was the one question that I didn't think about actually. Just so everybody knows, I was sent a previous set of questions and I saw I could think about the answers, is how you should do a podcast by the way, because it's much better for the results. ah But I didn't actually, I didn't think about this one. And so I'm gonna have to... I'm going to have to say, right, it would be one of, right, I'm going to go with two things here because I've always, I just love the outdoors and, I would have, I would have loved to have an outdoorsy job. so park ranger would be my, my top, one of my top jobs for outdoors. Okay. So I'd be a park ranger. I'd love to look after the national parks of Britain. I'd love to come over and look, help consult on how to keep Yellowstone Park pristine and do stuff like that. So I love the outdoors. So that would be, a park ranger. And the other thing, basically, that one of the hardest jobs in the world, which I still might try one day, and that's a novelist. And I don't know, a B2B cop. I don't know B2B copyright that doesn't dream of being a novelist one day. But you know, I'm inspired by my dad, who, funnily enough, started out as a B2B copywriter. And you know how you don't know what your dad did as you were growing up because you just weren't interested. I only learned, realized what he was when I became one myself. so apologies to dad, but he finds it funny. But then... The inspirational part is in his mid fifties, which I'm now approaching, he stopped being a B2B copywriter and became a screenwriter and a playwriter. So he's now had successful plays and films made. it was amazing. It is amazing. That was his second career. And it was a big roll of the dice for him. You know, he'd made enough money to be able to launch that second career, but it was a big roll of the dice, you know, and fair play, it came off. So I have that as inspiration. I apologize. I followed your footsteps by accident, into B2B copywriting, with no idea what it was you were doing. And I may yet follow you as a creative writer ah at some point in the come up with for your novel. So looking forward to it. You're on the hook now, Ruben. yeah, yeah, I've got to do it now. no, I said it on camera. Yeah, you did. So this has been fantastic. I love this conversation and I don't think there's enough that can be said about the importance of creativity and marketing and B2B especially. It's some great opportunities, some great insights that you've shared. Thank you so much. uh Where's the best place for people to connect with you? Oh, so you can you can find me on LinkedIn. So if you just search Ruben Webb at the drum, you'll definitely find me there. And please send me reach out to me there message me if you've got those if you got your B2B campaigns that you think are awesome. Send it to me because if I agree, it's it's going to be up there on the drum platform in a flash. There you go. So yeah, reach out to me on LinkedIn, I'm easy to find. Make sure you spell my name correctly. R-E-U-B-E-N. That's what catches everybody out. But yeah, that's where to find me. Excellent, well thank you so much, I appreciate it. I want to thank you for tuning in to the Beyond B2B Marketing Podcast. Make sure you subscribe so you can stay tuned for our next guest. And remember, there's no better time than now to break free of boring B2B.