B2B marketing has an unofficial language all its own. Now you too can indulge with this insider’s guide.
Airbag
A subordinate, often identified at the outset of a risky or doomed endeavor, to be expended as necessary to preserve one’s career.
B2B marketing
The process of identifying a common need across groups of businesses and proposing a commercial solution.
Black hole
A zombie or self-licking lollipop that consumes significant amounts of capital and/or labor.
Blind case study
A case study in which the client is unnamed.
Blind survey
A survey in which the sponsor is unnamed.
Booth babe
A professional model (male or female) hired to mind a firm’s trade show exhibit.
Bug slide
The inevitable PowerPoint slide showing an assortment of client logos. So named for its resemblance to a bug-spattered automobile windshield.
Deck o’ death
A presentation of 100 or more slides.
Decoder ring
B2B marketing content that promises interesting insights but devolves into a crummy commercial; thoughtware gone horribly wrong.
Dynamic
1. Information that is generated and presented in real time, usually by accessing a database. 2. Pompous; egotistical.
Endorsed case study
A case study, approved by the client, that identifies the client by name.
Fitz’ razor
A principle stating that when two competing theories explain the same event, the more cynical one is true.
Flead
A faux lead, i.e. a lead with little chance of resulting in a sale. Often the result of ill-designed marketing activity metrics.
Flog
A faux blog, i.e. digital content that looks like a blog but is more or less static.
Hitchens’ razor
A principle stating that what is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence (quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur).
Marketing permissions
The ability to use a business’ name and logo to identify them as your client, subject to any conditions the client defines.
Pileup
An article, white paper or book with an improbable number of credited authors.
POV
(point of view) An opinion about what to do or how to do something, usually expressed in a piece of thoughtware.
Plus-three
A slide with text or detail so small it requires strong reading glasses.
Quals
(qualifications) In B2B marketing, a documented collection of referenceable client implementations.
Quarter-pounder
A 25-slide presentation.
Question beggar
B2B content that violates Hitchens’ razor.
Referenceable client
A client willing to tell others about their positive experience with your business.
Self-licking lollipop
A marketing endeavor evaluated strictly by activity measures.
Shill
Someone (often an intern) who posts information that advances the interests of their employer in a forum that’s supposed to serve the interests of its users.
Social Media
A communication channel where the audience can talk back in such a way that it alters your message.
Solution Brief
A one-page summary of a B2B product or service’s attributes. Also called a product sheet, sell sheet, at-a-glance and (yes) “battlecard.”
Strategist
Someone whose ideas fail only in the execution; a visionary without the track record.
Thoughtware
B2B marketing collateral that indirectly promotes a business by offering useful insight about a relevant idea, process or technology.
Visionary
A strategist responsible for a string of business failures.
Yankeefy
To adapt English-language content for a US audience.
Zombie
An ongoing B2B marketing initiative that has lost any objective business benefit.