In 2024, when AI is "flooded", how to do ToB marketing well?

This article is from the WeChat public account: Chen Xiaobu (ID: chenxiaobu16), author: Chen Xiaobu v, original title: "4 Changes in ToB Marketing in 2024: AI, Short Video, Cost Reduction and Efficiency Increase, and Going to Sea", the title picture comes from: Visual China

Since the end of last year, I have been thinking about it, and now I have thought clearly, ToB brand marketing will have 4 obvious changes in 2024.

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The first is the emergence of AI, which will actually bring a lot of changes.

For me, many of the articles I have written before are very long, such as in-depth long essays of tens of thousands of words, and the wording is relatively rigorous. But I later found out that after AI came out, what AI is best at is writing this kind of very standardized article.

For example, if you ask AI: How do ToB companies do marketing? How to do a good video account for ToB enterprises, AI can quickly generate thousands of words of articles that look very professional.

And then at this point I thought, what's the point of me writing this kind of article? AI may write it in a minute, and I will write it for half a month.

So AI will actually have a huge change and impact on writing.

Chatting with my cousin a few days ago, he said that he felt that there were articles written by AI everywhere now, and at a glance, he knew that they were written by AI robots.

So in the era of the proliferation of AI articles, I think that articles should be more human.

In my own feelings, including the fact that we started serving Tencent Advertising at the end of last year, they still like to vote for an account that is a half-Buddha immortal. Half Buddha is talking about human words, which is particularly interesting, and then you know at a glance that it is not written by AI, so he is getting more and more popular, and there are more and more advertisements.

So I wrote the official account this year, and I also adjusted the style, that is, I must speak human words, even colloquialism instead of writing a particularly regular tirade, and don't pursue a too standardized style, which can't do AI.

Including the typesetting of the official account, it is constantly segmented to make it easier to read.

The same is true for marketing content, many of the toB marketing promotional articles are very formal and standardized, but after the emergence of AI, this kind of article will be particularly flooded and common, and it is difficult to have new ideas.

So I think that ToB marketing, if you still want to write articles, you should also be more human, or more interesting, or more diverse, or more down-to-earth, in short, you have to be different from AI, otherwise everyone will have aesthetic fatigue, and the effect will be greatly reduced.

Of course, there are pros and cons to everything, and the proliferation of AI articles and the content to speak human words is not necessarily a bad thing for individuals.

After thinking about it, why do I dare to change it every day? It is also because I have a lot of ideas and a lot of inventory in my brain, and it used to be time-consuming to write standardized articles, but now it is easier to speak human words and write articles faster.

I figured out how to write an article on how to speak, directly use Xunfei's book, talk to him with voice, and then directly generate text. Once the text is generated, check for changes, which is much faster.

And I found that the official account that everyone prefers to read is also more colloquial and eloquent, as if chatting with you, rather than particularly standardized written language. That kind of content, everyone is tired from watching their usual work.

So in the era of AI, how our content speaks to people, how to be more like a real person to express, and how to provide content that readers find more interesting and valuable, this is a change.

Short videos

The second change is short videos.

Short videos bring about a deep change in reading habits.

Have you noticed that after getting used to short videos, you really can't watch long texts again. Short, fast, intense stimulation, no patience, 3 seconds without feeling and rowing away.

So short videos have subtly changed reading habits. People will be more willing to watch the form of videos, like to watch short and fast content, gather a lot of information in a short time, and make you feel very happy.

Including the popularity of short dramas, this is also the truth, without too much foreshadowing, it is a fierce character plot conflict, "Celebrating More Than Years" has both crossing, palace fighting, and funny, as well as fantasy, martial arts, war, murder, reversal, each episode has a cool point.

Therefore, this change in reading habits will bring about two changes in communication:

The first is the growing importance of video-based content.

For example, one of our major ToB customers, in terms of content dissemination, this year clearly requires that the video form account for at least half of the volume, rather than a large amount of graphic content as before.

Because toB has always relied heavily on the ecology of WeChat, it needs a lot of in-depth content, and everyone used to think that 15-second videos like Douyin could not convey such deep and complex content as we toB, so short videos have not been used well.

But the problem is that the arms can't twist the thighs, and you can't withstand the trend of this era, after everyone watches too many short videos, he is not willing to watch this kind of in-depth professional and long-form articles, and this reading habit will make you use more in the form of videos.

Second, even graphic content should be shorter, or more interesting, or even in the form of a comic, or colloquial, everyone is used to short content, not long articles.

Another example is the press conference, which turned out to be a very formal and long-term press conference.

At the current press conference, if there is no celebrity executive "big mouth", no beautiful product manager, and no strong stimulation point, you may not be able to watch it, and it will not be easy to spread.

Combined with the changes in AI, this puts forward higher requirements for the content of brand communication, which should not only be humane and interesting, but also shorter, more exciting, and more topical.

From this, it can also be inferred that the marketing of enterprises is either very good at playing officially, just like the executives of the car circle are learning marketing from Lei Jun; Either spend money to hire interesting self-media to produce content.

In terms of communication, even ToB content has to study how to do a good job of video communication, which is an irreversible trend.

Reduce costs and increase efficiency

The third change is to reduce costs and increase efficiency.

The economy has entered a flat stage from a high-speed growth stage, and this change has already been experienced in Europe, the United States, Japan, and South Korea, and we can only accept this reality and cannot return to the high-speed growth stage of the past.

The marketing and brand budgets of ToB enterprises are becoming more and more tight, either to increase efficiency or to reduce costs.

Perhaps, "increase efficiency and reduce costs" is more accurate.

First of all, can it bring better marketing results, if not, at least cut down the cost, otherwise where is the value of the work?

"The budget is only half of last year's, but the effect should be the same, if not better", is often the reality this year.

The cost is minimized, for example, if you can find a small team studio to do it, you won't find a big 4A.

At the beginning of the year, I participated in an event in Guangzhou for the advertising gate, and the creative director of the original 4A advertising agency could shoot a commercial film for the client for millions of dollars, and then the cycle was very long, but now this kind of work has suddenly become less.

The brand directors of many companies are reluctant to spend this money and take this risk.

In the past, when a company did a press conference, it may have been all-inclusive to a large public relations company, but now he may directly find an event company or even a construction company.

Even when I write, sometimes I will find some part-time people to write to minimize the cost.

Party A will either lay off employees or bargain, in short, to reduce costs.

There is news of layoffs in many enterprises, and there are many new college graduates and graduate students, 10 million a year. The supply of white-collar workers is much higher than the number of jobs, and the abundant low-cost manpower will bring a chain reaction:

1. The work is more volatile, and they are afraid of being laid off;

2. All kinds of digital tools are not so easy to sell, because domestic manpower is too cheap;

3. The requirements for Party B are higher, especially for marketing service companies, in addition to H&H, Xiaoma Song, which have unique competitiveness, a large number of conventional services of Party B companies, not only to accept very low prices, but also to provide good service, but also to survive profitably not to go bankrupt.

For example, self-media placement, I feel that it has been contracted by many companies in Jiangxi, and the office and labor costs in Nanchang are too low.

Party B needs to achieve the same level as before, or even higher than the previous level, at a very low price. This is also a challenge for many B companies.

Of course, I am also a marketing service company, so I know this very well. There are fewer and fewer Party A with a budget, but there are more and more Party B or individuals who can work, so this trend will be irreversible for a while. Complaining won't solve anything, you can only accept it and adapt to it.

Party A kills the price to the end, you can still do a good job, and you can make a little money to ensure the survival of the company, which is a test of Party B's ability. And it's long-term.

Sea

Fourth, it is a particularly popular cross-border going to sea, and the domestic situation has been rolled up, and cross-border going to sea may be the only hope.

So we see that no matter which industry, whether it is new energy, automobiles, or even marketing, there may be a better growth in going overseas, and it will be very popular in China. In fact, now not only industrial products, including various software products, intellectual staff labor, I think there is a surplus in many aspects, so in China are all kinds of involution, the price is very low, the requirements are very high.

Domestic overcapacity, domestic consumption power will not be able to pull up for a while and a half, and going overseas has also become an irreversible trend.

Of course, going to sea is not a matter of one sentence, Europe, South America, North America, Southeast Asia, India, Africa, South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, each region, each country, and various situations are different. Including the Middle East and Russia are particularly hot now, how to achieve going to sea, and then there are a lot of professional companies in terms of going to sea, which companies to cooperate with, with which tools, how to go to sea, and so on.

If there are enterprises or individuals with resources and capabilities in this area, it is a good choice to study and actively go to sea.

At last

The above are some of my personal thoughts, based on these trends and changes, after I think clearly, I started a plan for daily changes.

Overall, I think these four changes are still very obvious.

Finally, a brief review and summary:

The first is AI, which requires more human language. Self-media content is even more colloquial, more like chatting to make content.

The second is the change in reading habits brought about by short videos, or embracing short videos, or making traditional content shorter and more interesting, and less long articles and long press conferences.

The third change, reducing costs and increasing efficiency, and sufficient white-collar manpower, will bring about a chain reaction.

Including myself, I have to improve efficiency and write quickly when writing articles. Enterprise marketing should not only improve efficiency, but also reduce costs, and the work will become more and more volatile.

On the other hand, how can Party B optimize its capabilities and methods to provide customers with customers at a low price and good service, and Party B will have the risk of decline or even bankruptcy if it can't do it, which is a great test for Party B.

The fourth change is that cross-border going to sea, domestic too rolling, excess capacity and manpower, going to sea has become the hope of the whole village, no need to discuss whether to go to sea, just study how to go to sea.

This article is from the WeChat public account: Chen Xiaobu (ID: chenxiaobu16), author: Chen Xiaobu v

This content is the author's independent view and does not represent the position of Tiger Sniff. May not be reproduced without permission, please contact [email protected] for authorization

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