Show Description

Attention all small business owners and marketers! Are you tired of focusing on short-term gains that just don’t seem to add up to much in the long run? Then you need to tune into the latest episode of Brandwidth® ‘Big Ideas on Small Business Marketing’ with Sam McEwin and Dean Millson!

In this episode, Dean Millson drops some serious truth bombs about B2B advertising through the 95:5 rule. That’s right, only 5% of the market is ready to buy at any given time, which means 95% of advertising hits buyers who aren’t in the window… So, forget about trying to get people to engage or download immediately; it’s time to start building familiarity with your target audience.

Dean and Sam go on to discuss how familiarity takes time but can lead to significant returns, especially when it comes to B2B purchasing decisions. They also touch upon the importance of content marketing and the power of providing relevant information that helps your audience be more profitable. 

Throughout the episode, the hosts emphasise the importance of knowing your audience, having clear objectives, and splitting your budget between brand awareness and direct response campaigns. They also caution against the measurability bias and the dangers of hyper-targeted marketing.

So, if you want to gain a competitive advantage, build a strong brand, and be part of the initial consideration set for future customers, you need to listen to this episode now! And don’t forget to share your thoughts and reviews with Sam and Dean; they love to hear from their listeners and will continue the conversation next time.

Episode Timestamps

00:00 – Introduction
01:35 – The 95:5 rule explained
04:02 – Applying big brand thinking to small businesses
07:23 – Building familiarity and trust with your audience
10:15 – Content marketing and its effectiveness
13:50 – The importance of smart objectives
16:25 – Understanding your target audience
19:30 – Brand awareness vs. direct response outcome
22:15 – Closing thoughts and reminders

Resources Mentioned

B2B Institute – How B2B Brands Grow – https://business.linkedin.com/marketing-solutions/b2b-institute/how-b2b-brands-grow

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Transcript

Episode Title: Is The 95:5 Rule The New 60:40 For B2B?

Host(s): Dean Millson, Sam McEwin

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Sam McEwin – 0:0:27
Yes. Welcome to another episode of the Brand Whip Podcast. My name’s Sam Quan, and joining me as always, Dean Nielsen. How are you today, Dean?

Dean Millson – 0:0:34
I am splendid. Sam, really good to be here.

Sam McEwin – 0:0:37
That is good to hear.

Dean Millson – 0:0:38
Really good to see you. Really good to be back in a room together and, uh, and and talking marketing.

Sam McEwin – 0:0:44
Yes. And, um, so, uh, housekeeping, we’ve been told we need to do housekeeping. I think so. Um, firstly, I guess for those joining us for the first time, this is a, uh, podcast about branding and marketing where one of us comes to the party with a topic, uh, topic without notice. Without

Dean Millson – 0:1:5
Notice,

Sam McEwin – 0:1:5
And we see where it takes us. Um,

Dean Millson – 0:1:8
We aim for half an hour and it never seems to go

Sam McEwin – 0:1:10
That short. No. 50 minutes is the new half an hour, I believe, <laugh>, but we’re there. Um, so you’re gonna, you’re gonna throw us a, uh, a topic

Dean Millson – 0:1:19
Today? I am, yeah. We’ll, uh, we’ll, we’ll get right into a, this is such a simple idea. I’m worried it could be our shortest podcast, so we might actually get to, to, to 30 minutes. Cuz there’s, it’s, it’s a really little idea, but I’ll say put on the table now. It’s one of the most powerful ideas I’ve come across. Okay.

Sam McEwin – 0:1:39
So

Dean Millson – 0:1:40
I’m setting this up big.

Sam McEwin – 0:1:41
Yeah, yeah. And, and you’re also setting us up to, to

Dean Millson – 0:1:43
Fail when, yeah. No, I don’t think we’ll fail with this. This is, this is really cool. Um, so I found it a few months ago in a paper, um, by a guy called Professor John Dos from Ehrenberg Bass. And it, it was done through or with the LinkedIn’s B2B Institute. So we’ve talked about these guys before. They, they, they, um, they, they do some great work. They’re probably the best kind of branded <laugh>, um, uh, research institute I reckon. But, um, there’s some, um, there’s some really, you know, interesting content. Um, and so I’ll wind back a little bit. We have, um, talked about a number of times before, um, bonnet and Fields 60 40 rule when it comes to, you know, long term and, and, and, and tactical like brand building versus tactical advertising, which

Sam McEwin – 0:2:30
Is 60% brand, 40%. That’s tactical

Dean Millson – 0:2:34
Direct that, that’s, that’s right. And it’s, I’ve talked about that with clients before, like, and, and I think some of them just glaze over. Like it’s,

Dean Millson – 0:2:42
It makes sense to marketing people. Yeah. Um, but it, there’s a bit to unpack still. Like you can show, you know, we’ve all seen that kind of, that that graph with the, the, the, the, the sore tooth kind of, you know, you can, if you saw the video here, I’d be doing a sore tooth in the air, but, you know, the, the bump that you’re kind of, you know, the, the marketing got when you kind of combine the two and Yeah. And the, the quick drop off when it was just kind of tactical. So, but the idea and principle of, you know, marketing for the long term rather than the short term, you know, as a general rule, you know, obviously makes sense. But he’s reframed a similar concept. This is he John dos, um, professor John dos in a, in a different way, um, and a really much more compelling way, I think. So I’m just gonna read almost verbatim to how he describes

Sam McEwin – 0:3:30
It. And, and you, when you say reframed, he’s reframed for b2b. That’s

Dean Millson – 0:3:34
Right. Sorry. Yeah. For, for, for for B to B. Well, 60 40 B2 B or no, no, no, no. 60 40 was a general rule and it was difficult,

Sam McEwin – 0:3:43
Difficult. B2b, a lot of, a lot of the, um, evidence tends to be very heavy b2 c but it Correct. You know, you, you, you tend to sort of assume Unilever whenever I read something

Dean Millson – 0:3:53
Like that. Yeah, no, they did a B2B one as well, and maybe it was,

Sam McEwin – 0:3:57
I think they may have said as much the same, or

Dean Millson – 0:3:59
It was much the same, or

Sam McEwin – 0:4:0
It might have 6535 or

Dean Millson – 0:4:2
Something. But yeah, I should know that before coming in to do a goddamn podcast on this. But, um, it was about the same, but, so yes, this we’re talking about B2B here, sorry. Um, and, um, but, but which is, you know, like, like a lot of these things we’ve, we’ve talked about this as well, like these rules of thumb and things sometimes are hard to apply to the everyday brands that you and I work on. And often in the B2B space, you know, often quite, quite, quite a lot smaller. So,

Sam McEwin – 0:4:27
And, and I think sometimes when, you know that, that, that the eyes glazing over, like it is ha you know, it happens to me a lot too. You know, I think sometimes that’s be, you know, it’s very easy to go, okay, yeah. Cool. I get that. But, but we are different. It, it doesn’t, doesn’t apply to us. Yeah, yeah,

Dean Millson – 0:4:42
Yeah. No, they do. They do. So I’ll set the scene. Yep. So this is with a few changes for, you know, for talking about it kind of almost word for word for the introduction from the paper. So think about the last time your business made a significant purchase, like a new phone system engaged, a new payroll software vendor signed a contract with a Salesforce IT support company, or perhaps even new bought new carpet for the office, or in, you know, my case engage a brand agency or like, you know these Yeah. If you’ve done that recently, you’ll know that you are not in the market for those items now anymore, nor will you be for quite a while. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, the time between purchases for goods and services is quite long. We can’t argue with that. Corporations change service providers such as their principal bank or law firm once around every five years on average. That means that only 20% of business buyers are in the market over the course of an entire year. So that’s a bit over five years. Um, uh, or to put it another way, something like 5% a quarter, or to put it another way, again, 95% of your market at any given time isn’t in the market.

Sam McEwin – 0:5:45
Yeah. Wow. Okay.

Dean Millson – 0:5:46
So he calls this the, uh, the, I call it the five to 95 rule. Maybe they call it ninety five five. I think the five first is important. Mm. Because what does that actually means is that only 5% of your market right now is ready to buy. And so 95% of all B2B advertising mostly hits buyers who aren’t gonna buy any ti time soon. Yep. And, and so what, what that I, I, you know, when you talk about it like that, I just think it reframes it. And I’ve watched people’s eyes light up in the meeting room, not glaze over, because I think it, it, it, it, it illustrates a point that we all kind of kind of know deep down. But, you know, so it’s the same idea of 60 40 in a sense. You’ve gotta invest more in the long term than in the short term.

Dean Millson – 0:6:31
Yeah. But it talks about the market that’s happening. Uh, you know, that’s in the market right now. Yeah. And when you put it that way, if you are just focusing on, you know, trying to get people to, you know, um, click or engage or, you know, sign a form or download this or, you know, make an appointment or whatever, you, you’re setting yourself up for failure. Yeah. Because it’s only a small minute. And I’ve had a couple of campaigns recently where I’ve, you know, I, I, I’m happy to admit in, in, in hindsight, kind of, you know, maybe set the wrong objectives for thinking that we could kind of, you know, have a buck, you know, or a buck each way mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But really at the end of the day, um, the people that you are, you are advertising in b2b, um, that, that you want your ad to resonate with, it’s gotta resonate with them in the future.

Sam McEwin – 0:7:18
Yeah. That’s five years is a long time. Yeah. Right. Like, yep. Um, that’s, it’s, yeah. That’s, that’s really interesting, isn’t

Dean Millson – 0:7:27
It? Yeah. So, um, you know, to think about another way you, you know, you can’t, it can’t be about stimulating people to buy, um, when they’re not in the market because you actually can’t convince them

Sam McEwin – 0:7:38
No. Because

Dean Millson – 0:7:39
They’re not interested. They’re, they’re, they’re not interested. They’re not interested. So you, you know, you’ve gotta be, um, you’ve gotta be thinking about it, you know, way more in the long term. So how, I think it’s kind of interesting that you’re, you’re looking at building, I think, familiarity. Yeah. And, you know, that’s just, uh, that’s a, you’re looking to communicate with that 95% that in the future will be ready, but now they aren’t. So I had kind of like a, um, we’re working with, I, I love working with like, really, I dunno whether they’d say this, they might, but really kind of boring, <laugh> boring brands. Boring industries. Like, we’re working at the moment with a, with a company who are in the professional soap business for car washes. I think they’re like number three.

Sam McEwin – 0:8:20
I I, I love these businesses too. Yeah.

Dean Millson – 0:8:22
Yeah. They’re, and they’re ripe. But honestly, like, I think this is where, um, where the gold is for, for a lot of business in that area. Yeah. Like they, to, to kind of, you know, to approach things in, in a way that I’d call kind of big brand thinking, you know, when you are, when you are, but, but you know, at a different level, you, it’s the, your competition isn’t doing it. Mainly <laugh>. Yeah. So, um, but yeah, soap, soap for car washes, and I was gonna find the number of, they told me the number of car washes that are done per day in Australia. And I, I’ll put in the show notes cuz I can’t remember, but it’s, it’s huge. Like, you know, of course it’s, um, their main competitor has a foothold in the market, mainly due to the fact that they also sell the carwash machines.

Dean Millson – 0:9:4
Yep. So, um, and but so it’s kind of like a, you buy our machines, you buy our product, but you know, these guys are, um, you know, starting to pick customers off that are unhappy with that incumbent as often happens, you know, pretty big company not getting the kind of service they want. You know, they’re, they’re, you know, they’re starting to become happy but unhappy. But that doesn’t happen overnight. Like, it, it, it takes a while. You don’t wake up in the morning and decide, right. That’s it. I’m changing. Like, it, it’s, it, it takes, it takes time. It happens gradually. It’s a big decision for a business. Like, even if you think about like, the difference options between B2B and b2c, like, you know, me deciding to buy a can of Coke as opposed to a, you know, a can of, um, Sprite, or it’s a, you know, it’s a, it’s a similar price or it’s a couple of bucks, it’s, it’s whatever.

Dean Millson – 0:9:47
But it’s not really in effect my life in the long term, but changing a business supplier, you know, it’s got massive ram Yeah. Ramification. So you can see there’s a, there’s a way different, um, kind of frame a a around all of it. So it’s, um, so it’s a, it ends up being a combination of things. It’s, you’re not gonna also see an ad and go, oh, that looks nice. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, look at that shiny thing. It’s, it’s not gonna happen like that. Um, it’s going to be a combination of things that makes you start thinking about it, and then you start searching. So at that point, if you’ve never heard of an alternative brand, it would take a massive leap of trust to kind of go, oh, and a massive leap of luck even to have a salesman kind of ready to kind of walk in your door when

Sam McEwin – 0:10:26
This is important point, I think. Right. Like, because it’s not like you can say, okay, well that’s all right. We’ll just focus, uh, our advertising on the 5% that are ready to buy. Yeah. Because it’s, you’re talking a big purchase and, and y you know, um, then there’s no familiarity there. You’ve gotta, you’ve gotta, you’ve got a lot to build. Uh, that’s, that’s sort the point, right? Isn’t it? Yeah, no,

Dean Millson – 0:10:47
That, that, that, that is so, you know, that 5% when they’re in the market, who, it’s that 5% that are in the market now, let’s go back to kinda talking about it like that, um, uh, uh, are now kind of ready to buy with the memory structures they already had from five, the last five years. Yeah. So if you are not in that, you know, if you’re not in their head or you’re not in their kind of, you know, frame of reference, then you, you are, you’re behind the eight ball anyway. Yeah. So you, you, you can’t just target that 5% because that 5% existed last year <laugh>.

Sam McEwin – 0:11:19
Exactly. Which, which, which goes to the, uh, my favorite stat that I, I, uh, repeat ad nauseum, which is that, um, 35% of final purchasing decisions come from brands that are included within that initial consideration set. Yeah. And I dare say with b2b, it’s gonna be a lot higher than that. Yeah. Yeah. I think so that’s, that’s the, that’s the general 60 40 type number, right? Yep. Um, yep. So, you know, straight away, well, you know, if you’re not part of that initial consideration set, you’re at a disadvantage. Yep. Um, you know, and b2b, there’s a smaller number of, of purchases, um, you know, in the market anyway.

Dean Millson – 0:11:55
No, that’s, that, that’s right. So, you know, this idea of familiarity, I think is kind of the nice simple idea that’s key. It sounds, I mean, it, it sounds a bit daunting to be fair. Mm-hmm. Like we, we are doing a bit of digital marketing for our, for our, for ourselves at, at, at Demark. And to, to be in the situation of having to use a budget and go, right, I’m gonna spend something now that the end of the day, you know, five years away, I might start to get a return on feel

Sam McEwin – 0:12:21
Great. But No,

Dean Millson – 0:12:22
It is, it is what it is. <laugh>.

Sam McEwin – 0:12:24
So how are you thinking about this then? What’s the, what, uh, am I jumping ahead, Tony?

Dean Millson – 0:12:29
No, no, no. Well, I, I, there’s another analogy I thought of, which might sound really flippant and stupid, but it came to me and I thought, actually, it’s a nice way of thinking about it. Like, that idea of familiarity, taking time. So what I’m thinking is at, at the, at the moment, like, you know, if you are, you know, if you’re a B2B brand, what is that kind of, that, that thing you wanna be known for, that you can just slowly kind of push out the people and continually reinforce it and just kind of be there. And I, I thought of the weirdly, I don’t know why scenario of, you know, if, if I ran up to you on a train, Sam, and just started talking to you and telling you all about myself, you know, getting in your face about, you know, how I am who I am and why we should be friends, you’re probably gonna get annoyed.

Dean Millson – 0:13:12
Yeah. Fair to say. But if you see me every day for the year catching the same train as you one day, we might start talking and, you know, because you know, you’re a bit familiar, and it might even be like, wow, we actually have something in common. Like, we catch the same train and maybe, we’ll, you know, maybe we’ve got something else in common. It’s a weird little analogy I’m not sure of great. But, but I, I kind of think it is, it’s like, it’s just, you know, here we, here I am, you know, I’m not pushing, pushing too hard. I’m, I’m just, I’m, I’m just there. And I think as a, you know, B2B brands have to think a little bit like that. Sure. You’ve gotta be ready to go when that, that call comes in. Um, or you’ve gotta be, but, but at the end of the day, you’re not really convincing someone to, you know, try this now. It’s not like you’re giving away a free sample, so please try my new product. And maybe, you know, you’ll like it and, and, and switch that switch is that switch is big. Um, it’s a big decision.

Sam McEwin – 0:14:3
Yeah. Well, you know, you know, this is the, um, case for content marketing. Yeah.

Dean Millson – 0:14:8
Oh, no. This

Sam McEwin – 0:14:9
Is a case for blogging. So this, um, yeah, true. Okay. You know, I know we follow a few people. There’s a, there’s a few content marketing critics out there, and it sometimes gets wrapped into, uh, you know, some of the satire that gets thrown around, uh, at different cases. But this, this for me is, is the ca is the case for for content marketing Yeah. Because it’s about being part of the discussion, being friendly and helpful and familiar to your audience Yep. Knowing that they’re not in the market yet. Yep. You know, and, and good content marketing and some of the great brands that have done it in our, in MySpace, like I think HubSpot or a Beacon for a brand that was built, not entirely, but, um, to, you know, a large part of that, that brand was built off the back of, you know, huge team of content writers just publishing content that was useful and relevant to their, to their target audience.

Sam McEwin – 0:14:56
Yep. Um, but, but that’s certainly one of those main tactics is saying, okay, well, instead of selling our product when we know that 95% of the per, uh, of our target audience and not in the market, let’s build our brand around being helpful to the a hundred percent of our target audience Yep. With the kinds of problems and that they deal with every day. Yeah. And, and, and in doing so, we’ll become a trusted sort of source of, of information, and maybe they’ll also learn a little bit about our products over those years and, and we can sort of, you know, take the long slow road to, to, um, to turn them into a,

Dean Millson – 0:15:31
Into a customer. Yeah. Part of, we think, so this is a little bit different or even before that, because Sure. The content’s there, but to find it, you’ve gotta go searching. So you already would you, you agree like,

Sam McEwin – 0:15:42
Well, well, it’s how, it’s how you frame it. I mean, we, um, you know, we, we sort of, we spoke a number of years ago to a, um, a mortgage broker. They weren’t, they weren’t a mortgage broker. They were a, um, sort of an aggregator of mortgage brokers. But, but in that same sort of audience anyway. And, um, you know, for, for them it was sort of like, okay, often when you think content marketing, you think straight away, okay. How to choose a mortgage broker or, you know, it’s all about brokering and, and mortgages. Yeah. You know, but, you know, we sort of looked at it and said, okay, who’s your audience? And when are they making decisions about choosing a mortgage broker? Well, they’re often, um, families, you know, they’ve just, you know, when do you buy, when do you think about buying a new home? Okay. I see. And then it’s often like shortly after you’ve got married, maybe it’s your first kid when you upgrade your home, there’s all these sort of life cycle stages. So ultimately who, who are your audiences or their families? So if you are riding content for them, it might be, you know, there’s actually a broad range of of topics that, that interest them when they’re not in the market for a mortgage break.

Dean Millson – 0:16:40
And it’s mortgage broker

Sam McEwin – 0:16:40
It’s mortgage, it might be about, yeah. Okay. Yeah. And you could maybe type back so there’s some relevance to the brand, so the, the sort of the we recommended there Yeah. Or teaching your children about money. Right. You know, or, or some of those sort of life stage things that says, okay, this is, this is a, you know, this is a exactly our target of audience, and these are the kind of questions that they ask when they’re not in the market to buy a mortgage broker. Yeah. You know, and then obviously you can get them to engage, and there’s all sorts of tactical things that you can apply to that around Okay, we know they’re in our target audience, so we can apply retargeting, or we can, you know, we, we can sort of message, you know, we ne they’re known to us, so we can now sort of message to them, but ultimately it also gives some of that familiarity and, you know, it’s a trusted

Dean Millson – 0:17:19
Part. I see what you’re saying. Yeah. In those context. Yeah. I was more, yeah. So, okay. That’s, that’s interesting. I didn’t, I didn’t think about it like that. Um, you are, you are still, so you are, even though you’re searching, you’re not searching for a brand you’re searching for. Yeah.

Sam McEwin – 0:17:31
And you might not be in that, in that case, you’re not searching for a mortgage broker either. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and for, you know, for, for, for example, with your, um, you know, your soap company, you know, okay, well, people aren’t looking for a soap provider very often, you know? No. And most of their audience aren’t, but, you know, know if they provided information, uh, that is relevant to people who run car washes.

Dean Millson – 0:17:54
No, they do. No. And, and that’s absolutely the

Sam McEwin – 0:17:56
Strategy that’s, that’s that connection, you know, and, uh, you know, and, and, and that, you know, for, for me’s

Dean Millson – 0:18:1
All and, and helping those people. I know. And that is actually part of the, the, the, the brand strategy for me working with them, it’s helping them be more profitable in their, you know, I’m That’s right. The guy that owns the, the cut the carwash, so Yeah. Yeah, sure. The soap is the thing, but like, how can you help me? Exactly. You know, um, be more profitable

Sam McEwin – 0:18:17
And business, and maybe they come back to them, or maybe you just, now they’ve made themselves known as like, who would, who would, I don’t know, download the Excel spreadsheet budget planner for carwash businesses Yeah. Other than people who own carwash carwash businesses. So then you can say, okay, great, well we know who they are. Now we can target them with ads for our soap <laugh>, and at some point in the next five years, they might be absolutely in the market for it or whatever. But I mean, for me, it, it’s always been about like the challenge if you understand, I mean, I, you know, um, I sort of knew the 95 5 because I think you shared this document with one of the guys in our team, but I haven’t read it myself yet. Um, but you know, you, as you said, you sort of instinctively understand it, but when it’s put in in such,

Dean Millson – 0:18:58
Well, cause there’s a number there, like you can go, you know, I just, um, yeah. Market for the long term, or I think it was more what changed it for me was I always thought about brand building as kind of a slow, you know, building of familiarity, right? Yeah. But when you are ab actually able to put a kind of a number on just how small, um, yeah. Or large, the future opportunity is small, how the small, the current opportunity is, it kind of, it, it just painted a completely different picture for me. And, um, I think anyone in business can, can understand that you,

Sam McEwin – 0:19:33
That instantly sort of feel to pull back down. Like you instantly just sort of lean into more brand building act like as soon as you sort of pointed out you think, oh yeah, okay, well hey, we can relax. Like, you know, we don’t need, we don’t need that consumer promotion, you know? Yeah. Um, what we, what we need is just to a permission to be part of a conversation. Yeah. And that’s probably the challenge, you know, it’s like, okay, how are we relevant when we know that they’re not interested in our core service? Um, yeah. Bad time for the leaf blower to walk past. Hopefully that’s been picked up in the, in the microphone. But Yeah. You know, that manufacturing, I guess permission to have a conversation with your audience is probably the challenge. Yeah. That’s, that’s where my, and

Dean Millson – 0:20:12
It’s No, no, it is. But I, I think the challenge is though, just understanding you’ve gotta beat the long haul. No one kind of likes to, you know, we’re all, um, uh, you know, so even like, even though I, you know, gonna preach this, having to then do it myself, <laugh> Yeah. <laugh> and realize that that budget I’m putting, putting aside, you know, is, is, is, you know, I’m gonna be looking at kind of three or four years down the track is, um, is, you know, I I guess that’s a bit of, you know, a bit of skin the game from from Yeah. From, from our point of view, from, from my point of view. Like, uh, I’m putting my sh point, my myself in my client’s client’s shoes, uh, is a good thing. It

Sam McEwin – 0:20:48
Certainly shifts the, the, um, focus, I guess to, to, to one of longevity, you know, and, and to, you know, I mean

Dean Millson – 0:20:57
Cost of doing business, it’s almost like a Yeah. A fixed cost.

Sam McEwin – 0:21:0
Yeah. You

Dean Millson – 0:21:1
Just have to plug in and

Sam McEwin – 0:21:3
To potentially postpone your assessment of, uh, the effectiveness of a campaign. You know, like, I mean, it was sort of what you’re saying is that you’re not really gonna fully understand the effectiveness of your advertising for five years and it probably evolves over that time. Yeah,

Dean Millson – 0:21:18
Yeah, yeah. Well, I guess, yeah, you, you’d like to think for year or cut two, you had to see

Sam McEwin – 0:21:23
Something, see something. Yeah.

Dean Millson – 0:21:24
But, uh, but, but I guess that, yeah, it’s a, it’s a good point. It’s, it’s, um, you’ve gotta be prepared to sit back and just let it go and, and, um, and, and relax.

Sam McEwin – 0:21:33
Yeah. Well it’s one for the marketing instincts over the mar of the data analysts, isn’t it? Yeah. You know, and you know, I mean that’s, we, it seems like every podcast we mentioned on here’s a, here’s another topic for a podcast, but, you know, one, one of one of my, um, big things, I’ll definitely do a podcast topic on this at some point, is, is this measurability bias. And, you know, and, and, and what I see, which I think is related to this often is Oh yeah, cool. Yeah. We get the 60 40. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. It’s, it’s long term. We’re gonna long term activity. Um, but what were our direct sales from that last month and, and yeah.

Dean Millson – 0:22:7
Actually happened

Sam McEwin – 0:22:8
And yeah. And this, there has been some studies, you know, the term measurability bias comes from the fact that there’s, there’s been shown to be this huge bias to run the kind of advertising that’s easy to measure, not necessarily what’s effective in, in the long term growth of the, of the business. And, and I think, you know, certainly there’s maybe industries or certain products and types where that direct line to purchase is really easy to measure and it’s also really effective. And that’s, and that’s great, but I guess there’s a certain discipline that’s required if you are in the potentially B2B space to, to, to look beyond that, that measurability.

Dean Millson – 0:22:42
I reckon we should definitely, definitely talk about that. Cuz I’ve, I’ve even, I’m, you know, you mentioned, alright, 60 40, great, we’re gonna do this. It’s almost like I’ve, um, I’ve kind of ticked things off in my head with like, okay, this approach is right. Cool, let’s do it. <laugh>. Yeah. And then, and kind of forgot about. I I, there is the funny joke, I don’t know whether I’ve had this conversation with them on, at, at, at Demark or you and I have had it, but like, you know, um, brand building campaigns are often, they’re called brand building campaigns cuz you know, they haven’t actually done anything.

Sam McEwin – 0:23:11
What, what, what do you call a marketing campaign that doesn’t work?

Dean Millson – 0:23:14
Brand building <laugh>.

Sam McEwin – 0:23:15
Yeah, but that’s a bad joke because it’s wrong. It is, it is. It’s flat out flat. It’s funny.

Dean Millson – 0:23:20
But I think it’s been used sometimes like I I think it’s an excuse. Yeah. Like, uh, you know, I’ve, we’ve all done it, I’m sure. Um, you know, I hasn’t quite, you know, hasn’t quite worked that out. It’s gonna take longer. Like you’ve had an experience. No, not, I’ve got a client at the moment who’s had an experience like this with, um, with a, with a, with a supplier that’s promising leads and things like that. And, um, I, you know, nothing’s gonna happened in the, you know, it’s nowhere near what they promised in the three months. It’s like, well it just takes, takes time, <laugh>. And so it’s either a case of underdeliver un under promising and, uh, and over delivering or you know, someone over promising, but it’d been used, the excuse, you’re right, it’s wrong. But it’s often the joke’s there because,

Sam McEwin – 0:23:57
And that’s why I think objectives are really important, right. And, and, and having smart objectives if you wanna go down that path. Um, although I, I feel like the, all the letters of smart are just too much to, to manage. There’s too, but, um, but you know, having, having an objective, you go into a, to a, a campaign, like if the objectives is leads, then, um, it’s not a brand awareness campaign. You know, like, you know, it, it’s, it either delivers the leads and it was a great campaign or it, it doesn’t, the, the interesting thing from mine is, is I’ve found myself in this situation many times over the years and, and you know, we changed our, as an agency, we changed our approach to this is, is you’d often find it in the briefing stage or when you’re sort of crafting a strategy for a client that, yeah, okay, cool.

Sam McEwin – 0:24:37
Yeah. 60 40, yeah, we get that. Or whatever it is. Oh yeah, we want, or our objectives are part brand awareness and also part, you know, we need to drive this, this outcome. And you know, what I found over, over a long period of time is if you don’t carefully split that budget and say, okay, well what is it? Is it 60 40 or is it 30 70, whatever it is, how much are we, how much of your budget are we directing to brand awareness as an objective verse? You know, that direct response outcome and being really clear with it upfront and, and

Dean Millson – 0:25:13
Crafting that. Cause it doesn’t get really lost in the conversation after all. If,

Sam McEwin – 0:25:16
If we didn’t do that a hundred percent of the time, the whole effectiveness of the campaign would be judged by the direct response outcome. I just, you know, and that’s that measurability bias again, I guess in a different, in a different form is, is, you know, we say we want awareness until you have to measure a campaign by, or whatever. So,

Dean Millson – 0:25:33
Um, yeah. And, and it’s, you’ve just made me think of something else actually. Cuz that example that I’m talking about with the, the person that’s had the, the, um, you know, been disappointed with the leads, they’re a startup.

Sam McEwin – 0:25:42
Yeah.

Dean Millson – 0:25:43
And I didn’t think about this before when I, we’ve telling me the story, but, you know, to to to start a startup and then kind of jump into, you know, get me leads kind of doesn’t make sense. Yeah. In the slightest it’s what you need. You need business Yeah. Of, of, of course. But it’s, um, you’re really up against the wall if no one who’s who you are. And, you know, you’ve gotta kind of get that sell and familiarity and uh, that it really is like the guy on the train running up to you and, and telling you all about about themselves.

Sam McEwin – 0:26:9
So Yeah. It’s, it’s a, it’s a it is. Exactly. So Yeah. Yeah. There, there’s challenges there and I think that’s what it is. I mean that, that reality of, you’re in the moment of oh yeah, we’re a startup, we need leads. You know, that’s what directs you to, I guess putting together a campaign that’s focused on the wrong objective and, and you know, taking your eye, you know, it’s really, it’s really easy to sit there and have a conversation and say, yeah, great, only 5% of your audience are in the market. Um, but those pressures do sometimes take you down the wrong path. And, and um,

Dean Millson – 0:26:36
And I guess with these as well, like it’s still, the pressures are there, they’re not gonna go away. So yeah, it’s the same thing, you know, with, with talking about a lot of this, these kind of rules of thumb, you know, with, you know, the lot of them, you know, the examples are with big consumer brands with massive budgets and, you know, that doesn’t translate to, to someone that doesn’t have a, have a, you know, have a big budget or doesn’t feel. Right. So just because the rule of thumbs there doesn’t mean the challenge goes away. You’ve just gotta kind of

Sam McEwin – 0:27:2
The project. It’s, it’s, I mean, it’s not a case of just, you know, running some, some adss and sitting back and not measuring them, right. Like, you know, it’s not, you just sit back and, and ah, yeah, they’ll, they’ll come. I guess you still need to focus on the 5%. There’s still gotta be a mechanism Yeah. There to, to convert them, you know, and you know, there’s probably a lot more activity that you need to do to be successful, but, you know, it’s not just a case of kicking back

Dean Millson – 0:27:27
And No, no, that No, that’s right. Not, but that, that, that, um, yeah, you, you, you’ve, you, you’ve gotta wait. So I, I just, it’s a, it’s, it’s, it’s a really cool simple idea, um, that um, that um, that I think, um, it’s good. It’s a good one to also talk with, with, with, with clients about, cause I think they can help them. Yeah. So to kind of, to, to kind of summarize, there was kind of three points to kind of rethinking, you know, rethinking everything in, in the lens of this, you know, 5 95 rule. And that was expect sales results mostly in the long term. Um, not in the short term. So,

Sam McEwin – 0:28:3
Yeah. Does that, the, does that also just mean me like changing the length of time that you’re measuring, you know, so I mean, we off, we get caught in quarters and months and Yeah. And financial years and

Dean Millson – 0:28:15
I think we, you’re gonna wanna measure those months, but you probably, you don’t put it to the, you know, don’t to the campaigns like, shit, this isn’t working six months, let’s pull it and try something else. And that is

Sam McEwin – 0:28:25
The, and trends, I guess. Yeah. You know, what you expect is if you’re running a brand campaign for five years, that the trend will be up. Yeah. Yeah. That growth will, uh, you know, each month should be better than the last. Yep. Uh, but, but maybe not, you know, we’re not measuring the whole success of, uh, you know, a specific month’s spend on, you know, the, the month that leads it or something. Well,

Dean Millson – 0:28:45
That’s right. Yeah. So, but this is, this is another interesting thing. Develop creative that will be remembered most by future buyers, not current buyers. So when, you know, the soap guy for example, you know, when those future buyers are in the market, what do we want them to remember? We want them to remember us cuz we’ve given them, you know, we’ve something interesting and creative and it might be funny or it might just be, you know, but it’s gotta be memorable and distinctive. But then, you know, what, what is that thing? And that’s why it’s the, that’s the important part I think, of having a kind of a, a strong kind of brand platform for, for your brand understanding. You know, what it is you want to be remembered for. What’s that one thing? What’s those couple of things you, you know, what is it? So you can make sure that’s a part of your, your your, your your campaign and your cr you know, your career.

Sam McEwin – 0:29:36
And I, I guess just thinking about that now too, like that five year period, there’s, there’s probably a fair portion if I think about some of the sort of business buying decisions that I’ve made, there’s a fair portion of time when you’ve sort of made a commitment that, you know, like when, uh, when, when the time comes that I’m going to purchase this or switch pres providers, it’s probably going to be with this provider. Yep. Yep. But I might, it might be another year or two before I actually get to making that decision. Yeah. You do sit on these things for a long time, don’t you? So I guess there’s, it makes me think there’s, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be focusing on your, you know, benefits and features and benefits. No, no. That, that’s right. And that, that, um, developing those, those, um, mental structures and, and all those kind

Dean Millson – 0:30:24
Of things and they’ve gotta be easy to find, like, you know, that just might be on your website though. Yeah. Like, you know, when someone’s ready to kind of, you know, I’ve heard that, you know, heard that ad, heard that line, whatever, it’s like, I’m gonna, you know, you, I’m gonna find out more now and then, and there it is. You know, you can’t get that all across in, you know, in, in the short amount of time you have. So I, that’s, and I think that’s an interesting one. And, and then the other thing to think about from that is also about a targeting. And Roy Sutherland talks about this a little bit. Um, you know, that that, um, that CFO that you wanna target, you know, at the moment is just an, you know, just a trainee accountant right now or Yeah. You know, that, that, that, um, so that the people that are, the, the, the roles that people are in now aren’t the roles they’re gonna be in five years.

Dean Millson – 0:31:9
So Yeah. And so the leaders of tomorrow, if you are, uh, you know, the business decision makers of tomorrow aren’t business decision makers now. So you’ve, you know, that that’s even an argument about, you know, that hyper-targeted, you know, um, targeting, you know, say LinkedIn for example, which we’ve spoke about before, is, you know, is, is, is, is not as effective as, as you might think, but, you know, targeting or this is part, probably partly why, you know, yes, I know that my buyer is, um, you know, um, a cfo, well, let’s target all the CFOs that all the companies, you know, and why we’ve got a list of all these companies we know, you know, we want, want to use, well, they’re not ready to buy, but the, you know, the, the accountant or the someone in finance or whatever like think creatively about, about what the future’s gonna look like. Yeah. So that we know those people have been familiar. They’ve kind of, and that even goes maybe Sam to the, the content marketing piece. Like, um, you know, helping those people, giving them the tools or giving them the knowledge that, you know, helps them win. Yeah. Helps them feel smart, helps them get ahead. So by the time they’ve, they they get ahead that, um, you know, you’ve been a part of that, you know that, that, that journey.

Sam McEwin – 0:32:17
Yeah. Yeah. And that’s, yeah, I think that’s huge. That’s, that’s, um, yeah. Point well

Dean Millson – 0:32:22
Made. Thank you. Thank you. So that’s, how do we go? That wasn’t, wasn’t

Sam McEwin – 0:32:28
32 minutes. We did

Dean Millson – 0:32:29
Five seconds. There we go. Perfect. So it maybe is one of the shortest, but like a, a little idea. You, we don’t, you know, doesn’t need to be spoken about so much. It’s so simple. And that’s what I, what I, what I love about it. It’s, um, it’s uh, it’s there to be taken and, and used and it’s a great little rule.

Sam McEwin – 0:32:45
And there, there’s a, there’s a reasonably hefty, uh, document that, that, uh, sort of goes over all this in.

Dean Millson – 0:32:51
It’s actually not that hefty. There’s a, there’s a, um, the document has got quite a few different case studies I’ve just got. And so this is a part of it. Um, it’s just called, we’ll put it up in the, in the link, but advertising effective is effectiveness and the 95 5 year, there you go. He calls it 95 5. I like your way. Yeah. Um, most B2B buyers are not in the market right now, and it’s, you know, the papers, what is it? Six pages long. So, and it’s actually, I mean, maybe, um, it’s detriment. It’s only like four or five references. So I think that that idea where that f that that 5% came from is that, you know, you know, five year buying cycle. So that’s not that scientific, but it’s, it’s, it just, there’s a good gut feel about a lot of it and I’m happy to, to, to run with that. Um, look,

Sam McEwin – 0:33:36
And, and as you said, if it helps frame a discussion, if it helps, it helps to, you know, straighten out your thinking a little bit and, you know, cuz there’s a, there’s a fundamental truth there, you know, it’s, it’s obvious. It does. Yeah. It doesn’t need to be more than that. Yep. Um, yeah, it works. So great. That’ll be in the show notes. Uh, I mentioned at the start, housekeeping, we’ve been encouraged by certain members of our team to, to do a little bit of housekeeping and, uh, the, the important one of course is to mention how you can help to support the show. If you love the show, I hope you do love the show and you get something out of it. Um, but the number one way of course is reviews. I know you hear it on every podcast, but, uh, if you could feel to, uh, you know, if you could be encouraged to go to iTunes or wherever you, you download your podcast form and give us a nice healthy five star review, uh, that would of course be, uh, very helpful. Or talk about us, share us, make someone listen. Um, we do this for the love. I think we get a lot out of it regardless, uh, Dean. But we’d certainly love to share

Dean Millson – 0:34:37
If you’ve got something outta this drop, you know, drop us a line, get in. Yes, get in, get in touch. It’s, um, it’s nice to know there are a few of you out there, um, listening to us, but, um, we can see there are so Yep. Um, yeah, so good to, good to see you again mate. Um, good talking about that stuff. And we will, uh, we’ll continue this conversation next time and I can’t wait to hear what you’ve got to share.

Sam McEwin – 0:35:0
Thank you, Dean.