The Business Plus ‘Best in Business Advertising’ awards series highlights effective B2B print advertising. Judging chair Sean Boyle explains why an Evelyn Partners campaign stands out

The next time you are planning a corporate or business to business campaign, take a critical look at the various ads featured in any given copy of Business Plus.

Put yourself in the mind of the person they are trying to speak to. Ask yourself what are they trying to say to you? Why should you listen? Why should you bother paying any attention to what they are trying to communicate?

The winner of this quarter’s Business Plus Best in Business Advertising award is a good example of the value of taking the time to do your marketing right. Get advertising professionals involved, who know what they are at, and don’t be afraid of saying one thing and saying it well.

It doesn’t have to be kooky to be creative, but it does have to be interesting and engaging. You are paying for the media space, so you might as well pay to make sure your content passes muster and doesn’t go largely ignored by people you are targeting.

Evelyn Partners is the new post-merger name for what used to be Tilney and Smith & Williamson. The new brand Evelyn (the ‘Partners’ bit is downplayed visually) is in the business of providing financial advice. The firm and its London ad agency Harbour decided to make their one thing be about the power of good advice.

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The power of good advice is always better from those who know you well. It’s a very simple, perhaps even obvious insight. But it is true, and that is what makes it powerful.

In the Evelyn Partners advertising, there is no kitchen sink, and no bad photos of the company’s principals shaking hands with each other outside their phallically impressive glass building. Neither is there meaningless wittering about ‘navigating change’, ‘endless possibilities, ‘dedicated partnerships’ and other such vacuousness.

Clean design. Clear identity. Consistency of look and tone across the various platforms. It really isn’t rocket science.

This workmanlike campaign is by no means reinventing the advertising wheel. It is using tried and trusted testimonials, but it is using them with a relevance that contributes to the desired brand point-of-view.

You can hear the ‘voice’ of the successful entrepreneurs featured, coming through in the different executions. You are likely to be naturally inquisitive about what has worked well for other people in your position. How did they do it?

Remember, if you’re a ‘business person’, you are also first and foremost a ‘person’, with hopes and dreams and needs and worries. For some reason, B2B advertising seems to constantly forget (or ignore) this fact.

It is rare to see B2B ad work that speaks to the heart and that engenders emotion. It’s almost as if brands in the category are afraid to be ‘human’. In an overall sense, Evelyn is saying, ‘come to us for the best fiscal advice…we’ve been advising our clients for over a hundred years’.

There is an inherent and important commitment and promise here to both existing and future clients, one that the organisation needs to live up to every day. And one that when you look at this work, you can’t help but feel is a promise that they can deliver upon in spades.

• Sean Boyle is a marketing strategist, planner, writer and the host of the podcast ‘A Pint With Seaniebee’. The Business Plus ‘Best in Business Advertising’ award is presented quarterly, with the winner receiving a handsome engraved Tipperary Crystal trophy. A BIBS ad of the year winner will be announced in 2023. To submit B2B print ads for award consideration, email Siobhán O’Connell in Business Plus: siobhan.oconnell@dmgmedia.ie

Photo (l-r): Chris Woodhouse, Group CEO Evelyn Partners; Marc Lowry, Head of Business Development; Grainne Stewart, Partner Assurance; John O’Callaghan, Managing Partner Ireland. (Pic: Tom Honan)