Is B2B Marketing Only Humor Now?

My new theory:

Actual unique brand social media voices are dying.

In a world where social media leads most of the conversations, Meta / X / Instagram / LinkedIn 's algorithms control what we see on the feed.

Most people see the goal and success of any social media strategy via the lens of virality.

The quality of the content matters less. What matters is the viral potential of it.

And what goes viral is the outrageous/hilarious/awful/controversial.

Most companies want to invest in their social presence (some more than others), but considering you can't really be controversial as a business (very few companies are), the outrageous and controversial isn't an option.

So to play the game, you have to be on social.

And to win the game, you have to be hilarious.

That leads to some fun (and stressful) times for us social media people, but it also reduces the actual value people can derive from companies and thought leaders.

And let me tell you - not everyone should be funny.

It's not suitable for every product.

It's not relevant to every industry.

It's not meant for every CEO out there.

What can be done?

First - maintain your tone of voice.

When you look at the most successful creators out there, you see that many of them aren't focused on humor. But for many of them, growing their audiences took a long long time.

That audience, on the other hand, is loyal, engaged, and very connected to them.

It's not people who saw one post, clicked "follow" and forgot about it.

This means that you can still grow; it just won't necessarily be immediate, by coming up with a one-hit wonder.

Second - be on-topic and trendy.

When something happens in the news, you don't have to share a meme about it, you just need to be part of the conversation.

The Super Bowl, with Taylor Swift in the audience, generated a ton of social media chatter.

But if you're an insurance company, you don't have to share a silly gif of her celebrating. You can find an angle discussing how much insurance she pays to cover a stadium concert (or something, I don't know anything about insurance).

Will it garner as many likes as a viral meme? No.

Will it get several people from the insurance industry to see your company as a source of interesting content? Possibly.

And that's OK.

That's the game of organic social media.

Third - quality over quantity

Continuing the previous point - not all followers are created equal.

In 2008, Kevin Kelly introduced the 1,000 True Fans rule.

It basically states that it doesn't matter how many "fans" you have. The question is, how many buy your products, concert tickets, or music?

Now, mind you, this was a different era, with a completely different landscape when it came to mass media and, more particularly, social media.

And I'm NOT (!!!!) claiming you need to measure your social media by sales (that's a sure way to get you nowhere).

But I AM saying that followers just for the sake of followers and likes just for the sake of likes mean nothing if you sacrifice your principles and your voice.

The platform's responsibility

Let's not forget it's also the social media companies' algorithms that amplify certain posts as apposed to others.

Their approach so far has been:

If it gets likes, it means people want more of that type of content.

But looking back, we see now how simplistic this view was and the harm it brings when you simply reward the loudest and craziest voices.

I wanted to share so many other points and elaborate further because I believe this is a deep discussion that touches the SM platforms, businesses, online discussions, marketing strategies, and so much more.

But I'll stop here and hope it gets you thinking about what you post and, perhaps most importantly, what you read.

Have a great rest of the week!☀️