Crossing the floor: The blurred lines between B2B and B2C
The lines between B2B and B2C are blurring as marketers continue to ‘cross the floor’ and cherry pick the best attributes from both sides.
The old jibes about B2B standing for ‘boring to boring’ still get dusted off at regular intervals by B2C devotees. Notions that database marketing lacks emotion, creativity, experience and personality are still commonplace.
There is, however, a growing number of marketers who have crossed the floor from B2C to B2B. In many cases these marketers have found themselves in a working environment with a stronger focus on customer relationships, where brand building is foregrounded and where they can enjoy a far more involved role in an organisation’s strategy and ambitions.
Colin Lewis is CMO at travel industry software supplier OpenJaw Technologies and previously worked at airline BMI Regional, among various other B2C-centred brands.
Lewis believes B2B marketers tend to suffer from an absence of clearly defined frames of reference, which feeds into this idea of the sector lacking dynamism.
