I recently attended the excellent Hubspot CX Spotlight 2021 event, at which I was introduced to the idea of BETAs by Jennifer Shaw-Sweet of LinkedIn.*
BETAs are millennials that have now grown up in business.
For a long time, many older marketers appear to have regarded millennials as a strange and different tribe – almost another species. For them, millennials speak a different language and behave in a different way. For many of the rest of us, millennials were just young people doing what young people have always done. Well, either way, millennials have now grown up.
The oldest millennials are now in their early 40’s and many of them are in decision making positions in B2B organisations. As we progress through the 2020’s, most B2B decision makers will be BETAs. So, whether or not we have previously regarded them as a different species, if we want to succeed in the coming decade, we’d better get to understand them.
BETA
BETA is an acronym.
B is for Blurred, Even before the Covid crisis, this group was blurring the home-work boundaries. Not just in terms of working outside office hours or working from home, but also in terms of the tools used; apps like Zoom and WhatsApp being used for personal as well as professional communication.
E is for Evolution, as in self-evolution. This generation started work in the wreckage of the first dot com crash and soon found itself dealing with the bigger wreckage of the financial crisis 2007-8. This is a cohort that defines its identity by personal brand, progressing status and continuous development.
T is for Technology. This is the first cohort to be digitally native in the modern sense and is now assuming senior positions in business. This means that BETAs will look instinctively for digital solutions to business problems.
A is for Action. This is a cohort that demands action on social justice issues. Increasingly, a brand’s stance on ethical and political issues is part of its attraction in the battle for talent.
What you need to do
The key to addressing BETAs is digital. “Show up mobile first, and video-heavy”, said Jennifer, and she’s right. The process of digital transformation of businesses has been gradually happening for some years now. It was accelerated by the Covid crisis, and now becomes imperative for any growing business when we look at how the new generation of business leaders will look to research, buy, and use products and services. It’s (yet) another reason to look at your digital channels and make sure they are working as hard as possible for your business.**
The question of what is modern B2B and B2C marketing has been live for a while now. There is a strong argument to say that they are not much different; B2C marketing is marketing to humans. B2B marketing is marketing to humans who happen to be at work. Either way, a digital presence that connects to people and represents your business in the best possible way must be your top marketing priority.
There’s no doubt in my mind that in the coming decade, the key to great marketing will be to get our customers talking to each other about us. One step to doing this is to understand, and do something about, what’s important to them.
~ Jonathan.
*Jennifer Shaw-Sweet is EMEA lead at the B2B Institute, LinkedIn. Her presentation is highly recommended, and is available on-demand here. My thanks to Jennifer for a fascinating talk.
**Helping you do this is what we do at Growva. Contact us here to discuss your digital challenges and how we might help.
