What’s it like to work in business to business PR and marketing – the good, the bad and the ugly? Let’s explore:

• What is B2B PR and marketing and what does it achieve?
• Why do I like working in this sector?
• Why is it important?

Are you ready for a whistle stop tour through the industry where I discuss what business to business PR and marketing means to me?

 So, what’s it like to work in business to business PR and marketing? Well, let’s say I’m at a party meeting lots of new people and then someone asks ‘So what do you do?’.

This is where I usually end up having to explain what B2B PR and marketing actually is.

It’s easy to explain to people about consumer-based marketing. Let’s face it, there’s no escaping it really unless you live under a rock. We’re all bombarded with ‘buy it now’ messages every single day. But because B2B marketing’s clients are often the ‘business behind the business’, the sector isn’t really at the forefront of a lot of people’s minds. Hence it has a somewhat unfair reputation as being a bit abstract or boring. For those of us who do work in the industry, we know it’s anything but. But before I go into that, let me first explain what I mean by ‘the business behind the business.’

The Business Behind the Business

Imagine it’s a Saturday afternoon and you’ve popped into town for a mooch around the shops. You’ve bagged some great bargains and you decide to grab a McDonald’s for lunch – a cheap, quick option and a guilty pleasure. In a matter of minutes, you’ve devoured a Big Mac and a McFlurry, binned the packaging and left the shop. It’s all over and done with quickly – that’s the idea behind fast food.

But we don’t tend to stop and think about all the processes that have taken place to get that food to our mouths. A company somewhere out there created the machinery which made your burger in a factory. Another company supplied the ingredients for the burger. Those ingredients were transported en masse to the factory, perhaps via a haulage company. Other companies supplied the packaging materials and the machinery that made the packaging.

Think About the Supply Chain

So, you can see how so many other businesses are behind the big-name businesses that we see on the high street. For just one burger a multitude of other businesses are involved, including:

• Packaging.
• Logistics.
• Food processing.
• Farming.

They play a critical part in our economy and account for masses of the UK’s GDP. So, the competition for their services is cut-throat. And this is where B2B PR and marketing comes in.

What Does B2B PR and Marketing Achieve?

In the marketing agency I work for, we work with all sorts of different firms to promote their services and help them gain that crucial competitive advantage using all means at our disposal. A few highlights from our digital marketing arsenal include:

• Sending out mailers.
• Targeted social media messaging.
• Lead generation.
• Traditional PR work which involves writing and sharing press releases, feature articles, case studies and so on with the trade media.

Why Is Business to Business PR and Marketing Important?

There are many other methods we can use as well but the key aims are always to share news – perhaps on new innovations, successes, awards the company has won – and to demonstrate to the world why our client is the expert in its field. All this publicity then generates more happy customers for our clients, which then gives us more success stories to talk about in the media, which then generates more customers for them and so on!

Working in a Business to Business PR and Marketing Agency

It’s said that you learn something new every day. Well, I certainly do in my job! It’s an incredibly varied and interesting sector to work in, which is something I love about the job. A lot of people say they could never work in a place where they had to be sitting at a computer all day. It’s true, I do spend a fair bit of time at my desk. But the variety of topics I get involved with day to day is amazing and sometimes hilarious!

One day I can be blabbing about the best in milking machinery for cows. The next it’s about how someone else is tackling drug abuse in the construction industry. And the next it could be about how wet wipes can be produced sustainably! And all of these topics have to be researched – I have to understand what I’m talking about so I really do learn many new things every day and I communicate with companies from all over the world in the process.

It’s Not Just Desk Work

So yes, I love working in B2B PR and marketing and as well as the desk work, there’s a lot of other stuff involved as well. You might be visiting clients and making new connections at an exhibition. Or having a video call to interview an expert at your client’s company for an article you’re writing. Or phoning up editors to pitch your article into their magazine.

Learning About Niche Industries

We work with several more niche, industrial and manufacturing companies and I enjoy this too, as again I end up learning some really interesting things. As a team we do enjoy rising to the challenge of promoting some of the more specialist technologies. Success comes in ‘cans’ and we don’t take no for an answer. We’ll try, try and try again until we get the word out there and see results for our clients. Helping to establish them as the experts that they are.

Like any sector you might work in, there are good days and bad. It is competitive, it takes time to start seeing the fruit and you’ve got to give it 110%. Plus, you really have to care about what you’re doing if it’s going to work. But when it does, it’s magic! As a team I really feel that we show our mettle and get the results for our clients. We believe in ourselves to the point that we even give a publicity guarantee to all our new clients.

My Journey to PR Executive

I came into working for Allotts in a more basic admin role, from a healthcare background with no prior experience of PR and marketing. I didn’t really know what to expect but I quickly fell in love with the ethos of the team and progressed into working as a PR Executive before not too long. If you’re considering it as a career and you like the sound of the above, then I would say go for it.

Start Your Career in Business to Business PR and Marketing

It’s still one of the few professions that you don’t need a degree for, but where you can still earn a really good salary. Although I have to say, in my role in the company I do a lot of writing. I have a degree in Health and Social Care and all those essays I wrote years ago arguing about the pros and cons of different health initiatives did help to hone my writing skills. But it’s by no means essential. We’ve had apprentices come in at 18 and do brilliantly, working their way up into senior roles.

What you really need is a good work ethic, willingness to work as part of a team that’s contributing to a bigger picture and a good dose of common sense! We each have our own tasks and clients that we look after but there’s no lone rangers! We all work together to deliver the goods and that’s why we were able to win the UK PR and Marketing Agency of the Year for the last couple of years running, as well as several more awards before that!

Need Agency Support?

Perhaps you’re reading this and you’re thinking you could do with a marketing agency to take some of the load off you and put some ideas into action that work. Or you have the ideas but just can’t squeeze in the capacity needed to get them moving. Get in touch with us at Allotts. We will make your B2B marketing interesting, appealing, relevant and influential, so that you win more.

For more information contact us here and start your journey!