B2B marketing insights for
those targeting a niche
Insights, learnings and stories from the world of B2B marketing and communications, direct from Velo’s B2B agency team
B2B Campaigns, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
What does it take for a B2B buyer to trust you?
What BrightonSEO 2026 made me rethink about search, AI, and the proof buyers need before they take a brand seriously It’s an awkward question to sit with in B2B marketing, because everyone already agrees trust matters. But it’s also one of those things people nod along to without doing much about it, accepted before anyone […]
ABM, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in Insurance, B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Strategy
Why is storytelling vital in ABM?
Storytelling in B2B is often misunderstood. It is not about entertainment for its own sake. It is about making information meaningful, memorable and trusted. After all, even in B2B, there are still people at the other end. At its core, storytelling reflects how people actually make decisions. B2B buying is human, memory-driven and trust-led. Storytelling is the thread that connects those elements. It […]
How ABM can influence the dark funnel
Let’s get one thing straight. The “dark funnel” is not a funnel – it’s what happens when real buying behaviour refuses to fit neatly into your reporting. The dark funnel is everything that happens outside your visibility: the conversations you can’t see, the recommendations you can’t track, and the moments that never show up in your analytics. It is the Slack message between colleagues. […]
B2B Marketing Agency Selection
Why the recommended choice is never a shortcut. It is a quality standard.
When marketers describe how they select an agency, the process sounds structured. Long lists. Formal briefs. Credentials reviewed. Pitches compared. In practice, the journey usually begins somewhere much simpler – with the agencies people have already heard of. A recommendation from a peer. An agency someone used in a previous role. At first glance, this looks like a shortcut. It isn’t. It’s how complex purchasing […]
AI & MarTech for B2B, B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in manufacturing, B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Marketing in Technology, B2B Search, SEO & GEO, B2B Video
How to improve your discoverability in LLMs with YouTube videos
LLMs pick up many of the same signals as SEO, but visibility now extends well beyond your own site, and YouTube carries particular weight with tools like Gemini. This piece sets out how to write titles, descriptions and transcripts that machines can actually parse, and build authority YouTube alone can’t earn.
Is there such a thing as intent in an ABM program?
What your ideal customer really means Intent has become B2B marketing’s favourite shortcut. The promise is seductive. Find the accounts that are “in market”, focus your effort there, and watch conversion rates climb. The problem? B2B buying doesn’t work like that. Intent exists. But not in the neat, predictable, high-confidence way it is often sold. First party intent is the […]
B2B Marketing Agency Selection
Future-proof or already obsolete? How to assess an agency’s shelf life
Appointing an agency is meant to make your life easier. You bring in expertise, fresh thinking and additional capacity. Someone who understands your market, challenges your assumptions and helps move things forward. Yet many agency relationships quietly drift into something else entirely. Instead of shaping strategy, they wait for instructions. Instead of anticipating change, they react to it. Instead of driving results, they produce assets. When […]
Curiosity is eroding inside marketing teams. That should worry you.
Something uncomfortable is happening inside marketing departments. Not a shortage of ambition, tools, or activity, but a quiet erosion of curiosity. Speak to senior marketing leaders and a similar pattern emerges. Candidates appear technically competent. Campaigns get delivered. Teams are busy. But the instinct to explore, question and challenge, the thing that once distinguished great marketers […]
B2B Advocacy, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in manufacturing, B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Marketing in Technology, Customer Experience
Case studies under NDA: how to build credibility when you can’t name names
Practical ways to create compelling content when confidentiality is a genuine constraint Have you ever brought something from Amazon without checking reviews, or booked a hotel without checking TripAdvisor? These days, it’s unlikely. Reviews have become the lifeblood of sales, building customer trust, credibility, and product or services validation. That’s why in B2B marketing, case […]
From pilot to programme: 8-step approach to scalable ABM
Scaling ABM means building a structured, always-on programme, not running bigger one-off campaigns. This piece walks through the eight steps that take a pilot to a repeatable engine: from account selection and data to sales alignment and reporting that proves commercial impact.
B2B Advocacy, B2B Marketing in Professional Services
Does your customer advocacy programme really pay back?
Customer advocacy shapes commercial performance in ways few other initiatives can. Get it right and you strengthen win rates, reduce acquisition cost and protect lifetime value. Get it wrong and margin quickly starts to slip. Buying and renewal decisions are no longer made on spreadsheets alone. They’re influenced by first-hand experience and credible proof of […]
B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in manufacturing
Video is key to making Performance Max work
Performance Max (PMax) is Google’s AI-driven campaign type that serves ads simultaneously across Search, YouTube, Display, Gmail, Maps, and Discover from a single campaign. You provide the budget, the conversion goals, and your creative assets. Google’s machine learning then decides which combinations to serve, to which audiences, and when. The quality of what you put […]
How to choose the right priority accounts for your ABM programme
What your ideal customer really means In account-based marketing, identifying your priority customers is not about building the biggest possible list. It is about making deliberate commercial choices. Your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is the filter that defines where you should focus your effort and, just as importantly, where you should not. It ensures your time, budget and energy […]
Agentic AI: The new co-worker in your B2B team?
AI has been quietly reshaping how we work. But a new flavour of it is now making waves and headlines. It’s called agentic AI. And it’s not just something you ask for help from. It’s something that gets on with the job. Some headlines suggest the robots are taking over. We’ll let you decide. And […]
B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Marketing in Technology, B2B Marketing Leadership, B2B Strategy
Why the orchestration of strategy into activation matters more than ever in B2B marketing
B2B marketing is evolving — because it has to. Economic uncertainty, shifting buyer habits, and a talent gap post-pandemic have reshaped the expectations placed on marketing teams — and the agencies that support them. Today’s successful B2B marketers are prioritising four things: 1 -Agility — to respond quickly in an uncertain macroeconomic climate. This is […]
AI & MarTech for B2B, B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in Insurance, B2B Marketing in manufacturing, B2B Marketing in Technology, B2B Marketing Leadership, B2B Sales Enablement
AI slurry all over LinkedIn? Humans make the best posts
LinkedIn is full of long, lifeless lists, samey headlines and advice that could have come from anyone. This piece argues that authenticity beats algorithmic optimisation: personal connection requests, real engagement and posts that admit to still working things out, rather than polished perfection, are what actually earn attention.
B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Creative, B2B Marketing in Professional Services
What my favourite romantic movies taught me about B2B marketing
(Apparently, all starring one of two Julias – must be my ‘type’!) Romantic films endure for a reason. They understand people – their insecurities, quirks, and moments of connection. Strip away the meet-cutes and soundtracks, and you’re left with something B2B marketing still struggles to get right: how relationships actually work. Valentine’s Day got me thinking… are […]
AI & MarTech for B2B, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
AI Is Changing Organic Searches. Is It Time to Rethink Paid Search Too?
It’s not news that AI is rewriting the rules of online search. But while most B2B marketers have been busy rethinking their organic strategy, paid search has been quietly drifting into dangerous territory. We’ve just wrapped a global paid search campaign on Google Ads for a leading tech brand. When comparing the results from last year […]
B2B Branding, B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Creative
Defying perceptions: Why B2B brands need a little more Elphaba energy
We’re in full Wicked fever again, and while most people are debating Ariana and Cynthia’s weird relationship IRL or that Elphie & Fiyero scene, I keep spotting parallels with B2B marketing. Stay with me – I promise I’m onto something! Because under all the emerald sparkle is a truth every marketer knows too well: being brilliant doesn’t matter if your story isn’t being heard. There’s a […]
B2B Branding, B2B Marketing in Insurance, B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Research, B2B Strategy
Does brand matter when selling into a B2B niche?
Like Brexit-era Boris, there are two short answers here: yes, and no. But in B2B, short answers rarely get you far. No: Specification trumps story In industrial B2B – whether you’re selling sensors, safety signage or software – brand often takes a back seat. Buyers are responsible for production lines, compliance officers and procurement frameworks. […]
12 hard truths for B2B Marketers from 2025, and how to make 2026 easier
Buying cycles are longer. Budgets are smaller. And let’s not even start on the AI-generated content sludge. Sound familiar? B2B marketing in 2026 isn’t broken. But it is being stress-tested. The old playbooks and channels? Under pressure. Attribution models? Struggling to see in the dark. Martech stacks? Getting heavier without pulling harder. Pressure to show […]
B2B Advocacy, B2B Audiences, B2B Branding, B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in Technology
How Tech Marketers should prepare for 2026
Most B2B tech marketers are optimising for the wrong outcome. They’re chasing reach, perfecting attribution models, and testing endless variations of the same campaign. But when a prospect is ready to shortlist, when a customer is asked for a recommendation, when a board member needs a supplier, your brand either comes to mind, or it […]
B2B Advocacy, B2B Audiences, B2B Branding, B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Marketing in Professional Services
How Professional Services Marketers should start 2026
There is a hard truth. Nobody wakes up excited to hire a facilities management company. No finance director celebrates finding a new insurance broker. Building services, business services, B2B insurance – these aren’t impulse purchases. They’re considered decisions about who you’re going to trust with something important: your operations, your risk, your reputation. And when […]
B2B Advocacy, B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Creative, B2B ESG, B2B Marketing in manufacturing
How Manufacturing Marketers should approach 2026
When your value is invisible until something goes wrong The best health and safety equipment never makes the news. Precision-engineered components that perform flawlessly for twenty years earn no headlines. Medical devices that work exactly as designed don’t generate case studies about dramatic turnarounds. In manufacturing sectors where success means nothing goes wrong, marketing faces […]
Christmas comes once every year. In B2B, so does the January scramble – spend December getting ahead.
Here’s the thing: you’ve got a budget sitting there. Money that vanishes towards the end of a quarter. We’ve wrapped up a set of small, strategic projects that you can sign off on today, ensuring your Q1 is calmer, sharper, and more successful with minimal work from you. Think of them as a gift to […]
ABM, B2B Branding, B2B Sales Enablement
What we learned about influencing LinkedIn’s algorithm with an unscientific test using SSI
TL:DR We ran a quick internal test to understand LinkedIn’s Social Selling Index (SSI) and what actually drives influence on the platform. Our goal? To find out whether it’s worth the effort for B2B marketers, especially in niche sectors to invest time into personal posting. The headline takeaway: yes, personal posts often outperform company ones, […]
B2B Advocacy, B2B Audiences, B2B Research
Customer recommendation is the main metric that matters in B2B marketing.
In B2B, there’s one signal that matters. Not your CTR. Not your MQL count. Not even your pipeline size. Just one thing – would your customer recommend you without being asked? If it’s no, the rest of the metrics don’t matter. You’ll have issues with retention and repeat business. Recommendation is the real signal of […]
AI & MarTech for B2B, B2B Marketing in Insurance, B2B Marketing in manufacturing, B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Marketing in Technology, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
How easy is it to influence how you appear within AI search models, and how can you monitor it?
Google might still be the Goliath of search, clocking over 8.3 billion visits a month, while ChatGPT attracts a (comparatively modest) 1.8 billion+. But let’s be honest, what’s more revealing is the rate at which this gap is closing. The real picture is even closer when you add in Claude, Perplexity and other AI tools […]
B2B Research, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
B2B marketing without third-party cookies: three steps to stay smart, sharp and compliant
Third-party cookies were never flashy. But for years, they quietly powered B2B marketing: enabling retargeting, fuelling behavioural targeting, and feeding reports with data we trusted (perhaps more than we should have). It meant we could re-reach visitors to our sites on other websites even if we did not know who they are. These cookies weren’t […]
Why accessibility should shape your brand colours
In B2B, “the colours need to look nice” is not the whole brief. Colour has much heavy lifting to do. It projects brand meaning, and it needs to remain legible, consistent, and cohesive everywhere — and for everyone. From obligation to expectation Accessibility used to be a public-sector box-tick. Now, with the European Accessibility Act […]
ABM, B2B Audiences, B2B Campaigns, B2B Marketing in manufacturing, B2B Marketing in Technology, B2B Research
Targeting Health, Safety, Environment and Compliance Leaders – A B2B Marketing Persona Deep Dive
When safety, compliance and operational continuity are non-negotiable, Health, Safety, Environment and Compliance (HSEC) leaders aren’t just part of your audience — they’re your gatekeepers to trust and long-term business. They sit at the intersection of people, process and policy, with remits that stretch from PPE procurement to incident investigation. Their goal is simple but […]
B2B Campaigns, B2B Marketing in Professional Services, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
The biggest shift in search since “just Google it” – Google AI Mode.
DooH running at London Bridge station, SE1 to mark the launch On 29th July 2025, Google quietly changed the internet. No big reveal. No drumroll. Just a flip of the switch and suddenly, the most powerful search engine in the world stopped being a search engine. It became an answer engine. Welcome to AI […]
B2B Campaigns, B2B Content, B2B Sales Enablement
What a good LinkedIn profile really looks like
In B2B, trust isn’t just nice to have, it’s everything. Deals are rarely won on rational arguments alone. They hinge on familiarity, credibility and chemistry. These aren’t soft skills, they’re decision-making signals. They’re how people decide whether they like you, trust you and want to work with you. The Edelman Trust Barometer shows that individuals […]
What is Google AI Mode, and what could it mean for B2B marketing?
On 29th July 2025, Google began rolling out its most significant search change in a decade: AI Mode. It’s a conversational, generative layer that sits within Google Search, answering your questions directly using Gemini 2.5. Think structured overviews, not blue links. Chat-style clarity, not scroll-and-compare. This isn’t just a UX update. It’s the start of a […]
B2B Research, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
Agentic AI: The new co-worker in your B2B team?
AI has been quietly reshaping how we work. But a new flavour of it is now making waves, and headlines. It’s called agentic AI. And it’s not just something you ask for help, it’s something that gets on with the job. Some headlines suggest it is the robots taking over. We’ll let you decide. And […]
B2B Branding, B2B Content, B2B Creative, B2B Marketing in Technology
Is there a place for characters in B2B marketing?
Not quite a mascot. Not quite a metaphor. But definitely memorable. When we created U.ME for McGraw-Hill — a visual anchor for the next generation of doctors stepping into the world of work — we didn’t realise we’d started something. Then we used the same idea again, in early creative thinking for Bolt EU’s B2B […]
Why so many new B2B start-ups struggle and what it tells us about the importance of brand strength in B2B.
Launching a B2B start-up can feel like pushing a boulder up a mountain. You’ve got a product. You’ve got a proposition. You’ve even got some budget. But the leads don’t come. The sales cycle drags. And doors refuse to open. What gives? Often the founders’ willingness to continue. Here’s the hard truth: most B2B start-ups […]
B2B’s Judgment Day: Marketing during the Rise of the Machines
It is like a science fiction plot. The worst kind. Where Armageddon is on its way, and the world will never be the same. A dystopian future has been thrust on the world, causing destruction everywhere. Where the noise of change drowns out the commonsense calmness and is whipped up into a cacophony of […]
B2B Research, B2B Search, SEO & GEO
How should B2B marketers prepare for Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) alongside their SEO strategy?
Have you noticed that search is falling in your analytics? Yes, us too. B2B buyers increasingly bypass traditional engines and go straight to ChatGPT for quick, authoritative answers. That means your content could remain unseen (unless it’s optimised for how AI discovers and summarises information). Welcome to Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO): the next evolution of […]
B2B exhibitions have changed. Pity most stands haven’t.
There’s a new rhythm to B2B events. The full-day delegate? Rarer than a decent lunch. People now drop in for a few hours, tick off their shortlist, and head back to the inbox. Meetings take place in corridors. Calls happen in stairwells. Out of office? Not really. The vibe is different. The new normal: arrive […]
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