Storytelling for B2B – From Dry SME to Audience Favorite

Logistics, energy suppliers or car parts manufacturers – at first glance, B2B companies do not appear to be suitable for creative and emotional communication. With a focus on facts, figures and analyses, very few companies use the storytelling method. But even or especially technically demanding topics can develop a strong appeal to a large audience through stories. Here we present how companies can successfully integrate storytelling for B2B into their marketing strategy and what needs to be considered:

Use the Niche: Spreading Credible and Targeted Stories

Medium-sized or very specialized companies in particular often ask themselves how they can reach a large audience with few resources. But the question is: do they even have to? In most cases, one channel and an audience of a few hundred are enough to tell stories. The fact that a company operates in a niche makes it even easier for storytelling. The target group is clearly defined, sometimes personally known and their needs, problems and questions are clearly defined.

You can find out more about how small companies can tell big stories here: Storytelling for SMEs.

Employees as Ambassadors: Telling Stories about People

Stories between buyers and sellers, between consultants and customers or between service providers and clients are the main focus in B2B. There is less focus on what happens between the customer and the end product. As a result, customer trust in employees is particularly important and stories about personalities, small and big heroes are the best choice.

Find out here how employees can become and remain brand ambassadors: Corporate Influencer.

Using emotions – Stimulating feelings with Concrete Examples

B2B topics should be fact- and number-oriented in order to be convincing in the long term. But facts can also surprise and generate emotions. Storytelling provides the perfect basis for adding emotion to content. The intention is to get the target group to engage with the topics at all. Emotional storytelling focuses on the benefits for the customer, not the features of the product. Here, stories of a concrete, personal example work better than faceless statistics.

Volvo provided one of the best-known examples with its Live Test Series. In various videos, the company managed to combine emotionality with impressive facts:

Overcoming the Curse of Knowledge: The SUCCESs Formula

Experts like to package their knowledge in complicated terms. Brothers Chip and Dan Heath call this the curse of knowledge and remedy the situation with the SUCCESs formula: Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional and Story. However, simple does not mean formulating a statement in children’s language. It’s about focusing on the core of an idea. One linguistic means of implementing this is the metaphor.

Instead of using complicated formulas, BASF reaches its own customers very successfully with an annual calendar made of chemicals.

BASF: The Chemical Calendar from The Calendar on Vimeo.

Beyond websites: Choosing the Right Channels

Fascinating visual worlds of large cargo ships score points on Instagram, as container ship shipping company Maersk proves. B2B companies also generate an average of 67 percent more leads with their own blog than without one. LinkedIn, on which the industrial machinery manufacturer General Electric is successfully focusing, should also not be overlooked. With the official account, the company not only shares its pioneering developments in the fields of renewable energies, aviation and healthcare with its followers, but also lets faces from outside the industry, such as Wolfgang Puck, tell their stories in order to continuously expand its reach and influence in the industry. This is because storytelling on your own platform also helps to improve visibility in search engines, especially for specialized topics.