Me rn: Sitting here with my friend, Olivia, starting to write this
Olivia says: "Hey marketers, I'm sitting here with my childhood best camp friend...."
Me: **Screams laughing
I guess my intros are, like, memorable?! Anyway....
Hey from NYC,
I hope you are having an incredible Monday.
One thing will always be true: brands that own mindshare, win.
Right now, founders and marketers across B2B are all pushing extra hard on brand awareness. Retentive market share is everything when buyers have options (the current climate we are in with so much dry powder flooding AI startups).
These things must both be true for a brand to actually stick:
Your product works and isn't annoying to use
Your brand pushes loyalty and creates stickiness
In B2B especially, there's a huge investment happening right now in brand awareness. You're seeing startups (big and small) produce low-to-medium cost events on a regular cadence:
Coffee shop hangs (example: Corgi Cafe)
Day trips
Executive dinners
Beer pong tournaments (shoutout to Nick at Sideshift)
Flower giveaways (example: Ramp) — if Ramp can do this and go viral, the bar is not high for B2B brands!
The goal is to do something so delightful it looks non-pushy, makes great social content, and proves your software brand extends to IRL. For this reason, a lot of the examples mentioned today are going to elicit massive amounts of joy.
They aren’t meant to be groundbreaking, just rly fun and easy to do, so you can stack them over the summer.
Customers want to throw their conviction into both a tool and a brand now because being part of a brand that pops off on social is fun.
BTW, it costs minimum $50K to throw up a few ads up in an NYC subway for one month. To fully wrap subway cars its $100K+/mo. The below ideas are under $5K each and the pics you’ll get to post are going to be vibrant.
Here are 8 sick brand awareness plays for B2B:
1. Pickleball or padel tournament (bonus: Have hot coaches)
Somewhat basic but summer is the moment for it. Every ICP in tech is playing right now.
Winner gets something stupid and fun: unlimited tokens for one year to your software, a cool cash prize. The competition creates energy + the energy creates content.
Rent two courts for 3 hours. Bring a photographer. Post the bracket. Tag everyone who played. You now have a week of content + a room full of people who associate your brand with a genuinely good afternoon. If you want to make the bracket spicy, do a fun one that shows all your target brands competing against each other and drum up some competition.
Cost: under $5K for the courts, food/drinks, and prizes.
2. Branded farmers market (literally everything should be about ur company)
Build a branded Saturday morning local farmer's market. Every stand should be something fun, you can have branded tote bags, a few things to giveaway like flowers, snacks, custom drinks, swag (the doooopest swag is made by Merch.com).
Partner with cool local brands to bring the best-of-the best to this farmers market or buy hot items (e.g. On Cloud sneakers) and give them away for a discounted price if someone activates a free trial onsite.
This works for viral content because it's completely non-pushy, totally creative and so fun.
3. “Unstitch your old tech logo” pop-up
Bring in a local artist and let your ICP customize a sneaker, a Patagonia vest (lol), a hat, something they already own.
You could even have someone unstitch old tech logos from Patagonia vests and give people something cool to patch over it with.
The finished product goes home with them and gets posted every single time they wear it.
Pair it with a roaming photographer so every customization gets documented.
Cost: artist day rate ($300 to $800) plus materials.
4. Dog meetup
Everyone loves dogs and meeting each other. See who has the cutest dog among your ICPs, find a park and invite people. Show up with branded bandanas for every dog, a treat station, and a photographer.
Cute dogs are viral content. You can get more genuine, unscripted, joyful footage from 90 minutes at a dog meetup than from most produced brand shoots.
Cost: under $1K for bandanas, treats, and a few branded items.
5. Water balloon fight (or park balloon paint party)
This is one of my favorites.
Show up to a park with thousands of balloons, a photographer, and amazing music. Fully branded + summer vibes. Nobody expects a tech brand to do this. That's exactly why it would be so epic IMO.
If someone told me I could throw water balloons this summer at brands I love and hate, I’d be so down and it would be very cathartic. Imagine if they exploded with paint in your brand colors lol.
The footage will be unhinged and everyone will post it.
Cost: under $100 for balloons.
6. Tech clothing and vintage swap
Pay someone on Fiverr to curate a few racks of vintage tech brand merch: Patagonia vests, hats, startup hoodies. Guests leave with one piece for free.
Add an iron-on patch station or a tailor for on-site customization. The fits people walk out in will get posted. This works because it taps into two things your ICP already cares about: nostalgia and taste. You’re now the curator of both.
Cost: under $2K for the setup and a few anchor pieces. You could even bring in old tech to take fun photos with.
7. Astrology or tarot reader for your future career
I know, a little woo-woo. Stay with me.
Your ICP will lose their mind over this. Line around the block.
You can make this “career” reading totally funny: dress up the tarot reader like an HR person, predict your next promotion, anyone where it comes true wins a cash prize with in 3 months.
Goal: Every single person posts their ridiculous career reading.
In love with your coworker? Find out if its fate.
Looking for that bonus? Know if you need to work harder in the last stretch.
Thinking about a new department? See if your energies collide.
The reading is personal and unpredictable so every guest has something unique to share. That's a content loop that runs for days after the event ends.
Cost: $500-1K for a 3-hour booking.
8. Ice cream truck outside of your competitors office
Park it outside your competitors office, a coworking space, a park your ICP frequents on a hot day.
You’ll give: Free scoops, branded napkins, a videographer. What’s better than a sweet treat in a spicy place?!
There is no activation on this list with a lower cost-to-joy ratio than a well-placed ice cream truck on a hotttttt afternoon.
9. Art gallery night with emerging local artists
Prove that your brand is artsy and can curate stuff.
Rent a space. Hang work from 5 to 10 local artists. Open bar.
This one punches way above its price point. It feels prestigious. It attracts exactly the right people. It gives your brand a cultural identity that paid campaigns can’t.
Invite your ICP to something that’s worth showing up for. Everyone stays longer than they planned because the conversation is actually good.
10. Host a roast for your company, partners, & competitors
Airing out feelings can be so fun. Why not bring your network together and rent a small venue to host a roast. Let people keep it real before your haters online do it first. Who cares..lean in, this would be so funny.
The videos will be unhinged. The crowd energy is real. And the person who did a bit about their Series A rejection will be telling that story at every dinner for the next year, starting with how your brand hosted the night.
Non-negotiables:
Every micro-event lives or dies by what you/your team does after it. Lock this in:
Videographer: Do not rely only on a team member with an iPhone. Grab someone whose job that day is to capture everything with a mini-mic. No videos means it didn't happen!
Everything tastefully branded: Don’t be tech-trashy and brand everything in a gaudy way. Make it tasteful and creative with fun hints.
Your entire team posting ASAP: Every single person on your team posting their own content + tagging the people they met (live and after the event). This is how a 20-person event feels like a 2K-person event online. Not a bad idea to pay some meme accounts to rage-bait pics from your event too if you’re open to it.
An open pics folder from swsh so you can share all pics - they have the best live albums
The B2B brands you see everywhere are documenting 24/7, branding tastefully, and getting their whole team to post online….at minimum.
Well, How'd I Do:
B2B companies need more personality, & these micro-brand awareness campaigns are inexpensive, fun and can be run by your summer intern.
The brands that win this summer will be the ones who are fun AF online. What’s better than your ICP being tagged in awesome photos from events your brand hosted or having FOMO because they weren’t there.
Flood the feeds with good content and create attention.
Showing up with good vibes is the best brand awareness in the game 😎
I hope you have an incredible week ahead.
Julia
