Category: News

In this blog, Whiteoaks’ Finance Director, Adam George shares his insights about how to ensure your PR investments keep your CFO happy, including:

  • Ensuring campaigns are built around business objectives
  • Setting out clear performance metrics
  • Finding a consistent partner

Like many services, PR can often have an intangible quality that is difficult to reconcile for finance leaders. The tendency to lean upon paid marketing where results can be measured and return on investment (ROI) established is a tempting alternative to appeal to the CFO mindset. That’s why if you want your CFO to back your PR spend, you need to position it not as a creative expense, but as the strategic, measurable business investment it is.

Here are some of the ways to make your PR investment CFO-friendly:

Fixed fees for fixed deliverables

It sounds obvious, right? Traditionally, PR has used the retainer model, but this promotes uncertainty and often results in mounting costs without a clearly defined return. Why not seek out an agency offering a fixed cost for clearly defined deliverables? By eliminating the budgetary uncertainty, PR can be factored into annual budgets with certainty, helping your finance leader plan with confidence.

Business-aligned planning

It can sometimes feel difficult to cut through the jargon and waffle associated with marketing and PR. CFOs are driven by the commercial results, not lip-service and hot air. The agency you partner with should build its strategies around your commercial goals – market expansion, growth in share-of-voice, talent acquisition or any other outcomes your business desires. By aligning PR with business strategy, you give your CFO the confidence that every pound spent is tied to measurable commercial objectives – not vanity metrics or vague brand goals.

Clear KPIs and performance reporting

This leads us on to measurement. It’s the bread and butter of any senior finance professional. The inability to measure the success of any spend means it becomes more difficult to justify. With clear KPIs agreed up-front, and concise reporting throughout a campaign, your PR spend ceases to be deemed a money pit from which results are difficult to define. Instead, it becomes a clear, measurable service aligned with your business goals.

Whether it’s share of voice, media coverage, engagement metrics or influence on pipeline, everything is benchmarked and tracked.

ROI accountability – even a money-back guarantee

‘Money back’ is a phrase you will rarely encounter in the PR world. But without this guarantee, value for money and, crucially, accountability, can often be diminished. Contrast this with clear ROI that is reinforced by a money-back guarantee. This gives your CFO peace of mind that their commercial goals are matched by the desire of the agency you engage.

Consistency that protects long-term value

Unlike paid media, your PR agency should be your partner when it comes to building and protecting your brand. PR isn’t a tap you turn on and off. Stop-start campaigns waste money and erode brand equity. If your agency adopts an ‘always-on’ approach, it becomes easier for your CFO to calculate the benefits and long-term growth provided by consistent and long-term partnerships.

PR as something finance can believe in

To keep your CFO happy with your investment, treat PR like a long-term, strategic asset – not a discretionary spend. Build your case around cost-certainty, commercial alignment and measurable impact. When you speak the CFO’s language – outcomes, risk-management, and value – you turn PR into something finance can believe in.

Get in touch to learn more about how we deliver PR campaigns that keep your CFO happy.

In this blog, Creative Director, Mark Wilson, discusses:

  • Why low-cost video animation can carry hidden risks
  • How quality animation can strengthen brand credibility and trust
  • What to consider when choosing between short-term savings and long-term value

A quick Google search for “video animation” and you’ll be met with countless offers of fast-turnaround, super-cheap services. The appeal is obvious, a professionally animated video for a fraction of the price of one done by an established creative agency. For B2B tech organisations with limited budgets or looming deadlines, it can certainly feel like a quick win.

In practice, however, cheap animation often comes at a hidden cost. And we’re not talking here about the upfront production costs. The real danger is that it can harm a brand’s reputation. A video that looks generic and fails to resonate with the desired target audience is not a bargain. It’s wasted effort and, in some cases, a big liability.

Why the cheap option can cost you more

Recent reporting from the BBC highlights how damaging poor or misleading visuals can be. An AI-generated fake image, which showed world leaders waiting in the White House, was shared on various social media platforms millions of times in just a few hours. By the time fact-checkers confirmed the image as fake, it had already been used to drive political narratives across the globe.

This is not an isolated incident. Think of the many deepfake videos that have misled audiences on social media, from fabricated celebrity endorsements to manipulated political clips. Content travels fast and perceptions are shaped in seconds. Whether intentional or not, low-quality or misleading visuals can quickly undermine trust and credibility.

The principle is simple. It’s the same one as when you buy food, clothes or technology: you get what you pay for. Low-cost design platforms and freelance marketplaces tend to deliver transactions rather than partnerships.

They ask for a script, plug it into stock templates and return a video animation quickly. That may technically fulfil the task of “producing a video”, but it rarely achieves much beyond that.

So much more than software

Animation done well is not about dropping images into a piece of software. It is about telling a story that aligns with your wider business strategy, brand messages and goals. A strong animated video is a communication tool with a clear purpose. Stripped of brand narrative, authenticity and a single-minded proposition, animation loses its power to persuade.

High-quality animation is rarely the result of one person’s skillset. It combines writing, storyboarding, illustration, animation, sound design and voiceover. Each requires specialist expertise. A freelancer may be a talented animator but may not have the skills to craft a strong script or the sound design to make the video feel complete.

These gaps in capabilities often show up in the final product. A weak script undermines polished visuals, poor sound design makes a video feel unfinished, while generic characters fail to capture the essence of a brand. Instead of helping you stand out, the content blends into the background.

Short-term savings, long-term risks

The upfront fee for a budget service may be small, but the longer-term costs are greater. Low-cost providers often charge extra for revisions, which means that if the first draft misses the mark, the price quickly climbs.

A bland or confusing video can also mean missed opportunities, delivering little engagement and even less return on investment. Perhaps most damaging of all, poorly produced content can harm brand credibility and put off potential customers, rather than attract. In many cases, looking unprofessional is more costly than producing nothing at all.

By contrast, investing in quality animation means investing in a process as much as a product. That process involves a team of specialists who take the time to understand your objectives, shape a narrative tailored to your audience, design visuals that fit your brand and refine the work through structured rounds of feedback.

A collaborative approach like this ensures the animation works harder for you. It becomes memorable, distinctive and aligned with the outcomes that matter, whether the goal is raising awareness, shifting perception or driving action.

Choosing wisely

This does not mean cheap services have no place. If the stakes are low, such as an internal explainer or a simple visualisation, a fast and inexpensive solution may be appropriate. But when the animation launches a new product, supports brand identity, marketing strategy or customer engagement, the calculation is different.

In those cases, cutting corners can be a false economy. The real question is not “how much does animation cost?” but “what is it worth to the business if this video succeeds or fails?”.

Animation is one of the most versatile and impactful forms of communication available to organisations today. It can enhance credibility, spark engagement and carry messages across borders and industries. But it only delivers when it’s done well.

When it comes to your brand, is a cheap solution really worth the risk or is it time to invest in animation that works? If you’re ready to find out, watch our creative showreel and get in touch.

 

 

Passing the ‘So What?’ test – why a bit of journalistic rigour is vital in B2B tech PR

In this blog, Hugh Cadman, Senior Content Writer, discusses:

  • How his journalism background prepared him for life as a B2B tech writer
  • The importance of answering journalists’ “So What?” questions
  • The unlikely connection between all this and a punk record seized by the police

 

From reporting on TV licence-dodgers to writing about enterprise database management via the odd health furore. There is a common thread that connects my two decades as a journalist with my current role at Whiteoaks and a profane punk record seized by the police.

It’s the “So What?” test. This is the basic threshold that any idea for a piece of content must cross if it is to get into a publication worth reading. Reporters tend to be among the most sceptical people on earth – and if you can’t answer their “So What?” questions, your hopes of coverage are doomed.

It’s a mindset I still share – accepting little at face value and being prepared to unpick the details and ask a few questions. So often that’s all it takes to either destroy a story idea or stand it up.

Journalists want dramatic front-page exclusives, but they may also be eager to fulfil their story quota and keep the website numbers up. Whichever it is, they will apply the “So What?” test to everything – because they know if they don’t, their newsdesk will.

And this is the part that sales and marketing executives sometimes find difficult – it’s not enough to be fired up, making bold claims about being game-changing or disruptive. Journalists have low boredom thresholds and can spot spin a mile off. You have to give them reasons to treat your press release as news, and any article must tell a good story, be accurate and make a convincing case. Journalistic weariness is why research has to generate eye-catching headlines.

Get your ducks in a row

In B2B tech PR, as in news journalism, however, you must always get your ducks in a row before you unleash any kind of content. For me, it is the simple but mildly impertinent questions that get to the point with clients when we initially find we don’t have what the content requires. “Why should a potential customer choose your solution over XYZ when on the surface they seem quite similar?”

It’s where a little journalistic technique comes in handy. Some people need coaxing; others have to forget the hype and plant their feet back on the ground before they can answer.

The three horsemen – jargon, waffle and repetition

Convincing journalists, though, is only part of the job in B2B tech PR. The real audience out there is also asking its own “So What?” questions. Persuading them takes more than a deluge of clichés about “empowering” and “disrupting”, whether in a press release or a 1,500-word article.

In articles especially, language and structure are important. My journalism training and my experience going through other reporters’ articles when I was a news editor made me allergic to jargon, waffle and repetition. I can also spot where there may a copyright infringement or a potential libel, or where a claim could lead to a letter from a rival’s legal department. The obsession with accuracy leads me to double-check the spellings of just about everything, and to be clear about any terminology I use. You have to know the limits of your own knowledge.

What did this technology do for us?

As a reporter, I learned to extract the news nuggets from two-inch-thick NHS or local government policy documents for a broad audience that was only interested in what it would all mean for them and their community. This is not so different from writing for many tech titles, where it is essentially the business outcomes that matter.

Understanding the audience is critical. I’m no longer writing for people of all ages who are skimming between the front page and the property section. My audience usually comprises senior executives who may also have substantial technical knowledge. Anything I write must address what matters to the right segment of this audience and convince them we know what we’re talking about.

Accuracy is essential but so is momentum – the ability to carry forward a story in a way that makes it immediately relevant. Whether on a news website or in a B2B tech title, audiences must want to carry on reading right the way down to a captivating conclusion.

The Anti-Nowhere League

As always, it’s the “So What?” question that we must constantly answer. This is where I defer to the Anti-Nowhere League – a very profane cartoon punk outfit I saw at a gig long ago. They produced a 7” single called So What? that was seized by the police under the Obscene Publications Act. This foul-mouthed ditty was allegedly inspired by two men in a pub trying to outdo one another with their stories. The point is that if B2B tech companies want to avoid going nowhere with their PR they must answer the “So What?” questions that journalists and their audiences ask – and they need to use the right language. Otherwise, they may as well be two sweary men in a pub.

Want help answering the “So What?” questions? Get in touch.

 

 

In this blog, Hugh Cadman, Senior Content Creator, shares his thoughts on:

  • The role of case studies in establishing a brand’s credibility
  • Why they’re the gift that keeps on giving
  • The different formats case studies can take

 

Few pieces of content have the electro-magnetic power of a case study. If expertly written, case studies bring solutions to life and establish credibility, describing how a tech business solved a significant challenge for a customer, achieving real, measurable results.

In the B2B tech market, a single case study published on a website or in a top-tier publication can have the power equivalent to hundreds of five-star customer reviews in the consumer sector. For companies that need to grow fast, a case study gives substance to the claims on their website or their marketing materials.

By detailing first-hand the challenges customers or clients were facing, and providing stats and proof-points, a case study strikes an immediate chord with the right audience segment. Potential customers get a clear picture of how a solution or service works and the ROI it provides.

It’s worth the effort – case studies have a long shelf-life

It is true that for many companies, persuading clients to take part in case studies can be tortuous. For tech companies scaling up, their big-name customers carry huge value but are often reluctant. Much can hang on personal relationships.

It is, however, worth investing time in case studies because they have multiple uses and a long shelf-life. They feed into many other types of public relations and marketing content. Reshaped and reworked, the information and endorsements flourish in social media posts, in blogs, as well as in articles in respected target publications.

They can provide the rocket-fuel for award entries and give an eye-catching focus to discussions or round-table events with journalists and analysts. At conferences and events, a snappy presentation based on a case study has genuine impact.

Podcasts and videos

A case study is also ideal material for podcasts and videos. Short-form videos hosted on a company’s website can act as quick introductions to the challenge, how the company solved it and the results achieved.

A podcast can explore the topic at greater length in a conversational manner. This is engaging, easily-digested content that matches the different needs of audiences.

Shout about your customer success stories

In many sectors, such as cyber security, case studies are not so much gold dust as solid nuggets. Quite understandably, major companies are sometimes uneasy talking about their cyber security set-ups and how a solution has transformed their protection.

But if any tech business struggling to get noticed has a customer willing to endorse it in a case study, it should be ready to shout about it as loud as possible. In areas like data management, analytics, AI and managed services, a tech company’s customers can often see the value to their own reputations in a case study. It will demonstrate their commitment to superior service, greater efficiency or customer-focused innovation. It tells investors they are committed to expansion or greater profitability or have made an important strategic shift.

Writing case studies is an art

It is essential, however, that any case study is drafted by people with experience. In some industries, such as telecommunications, lengthy and technical case studies are highly valued. Prospects always want to see the detail. But many audiences now want to get to the point very quickly before making a decision about whether to invest more time exploring the detail to see if it applies to their own business.

Case studies are truly evergreen content, reaching new audiences across numerous channels to establish a business as an expert in its field. Any opportunity to create one should be seized with both hands.

To find out more about how we can support you to develop attention-grabbing case studies, contact the Whiteoaks team today.

In this blog, Hannah Buckley, Head of Content and Service Development, explores:

  • The role of leadership visibility in building credibility for businesses
  • The growing influence and reach of personal LinkedIn profiles
  • How executive visibility programmes help extend the reach of B2B PR campaigns

“People buy from people” is something we hear a lot in B2B, and it definitely rings true. Today, people don’t just buy from companies, they buy from the people behind the brand. Whether it’s a prospect checking LinkedIn before a meeting, a journalist looking for an expert source or a potential hire deciding where to work, they want to see the people behind the brand.

All this makes it even more important that business leaders and executives are visible. For brands to cut through the noise and make an impression with decision-makers, they must ensure the human voices behind the business are seen, heard and trusted.

When senior figures are visible, they bring authority and authenticity that brand channels alone can’t replicate. They become trusted sources of industry insight, ambassadors for company culture and better able to forge stronger connections. This visibility is what turns awareness into trust and, ultimately, it’s that trust that will drive action.

Trust becomes a competitive advantage

In markets crowded with similar products, services and claims, trust is often the deciding factor. Decision-makers want reassurance that the people they’ll be working with are credible, informed and engaged. When leaders share their expertise and perspective publicly, whether on LinkedIn or in the media, they make that trust easier to build and it then becomes harder for competitors to undermine.

Opportunities start to find you

Media interviews, panel invitations, industry awards, even judging awards are all opportunities that don’t just happen by chance. They’re often the result of being visible and active in the right places. Journalists and event organisers look for experts who are already demonstrating thought leadership and authority in their field

Visibility strengthens your talent pipeline

Top talent wants to work for leaders they admire. When executives are known for their expertise and values, they naturally attract candidates who share those values. This not only helps to improve the quality of new hires, but also reinforces your company culture from the top down.

It amplifies the brand work you’re already doing

Brand PR, marketing campaigns and corporate messaging are vital in building visibility, but are even more effective when they’re supported by strong personal voices from within the business. Leadership visibility adds a human layer that helps brand messages resonate and inspire action.

Why Now?

The digital landscape is noisier than ever as AI-generated content continues to flood feeds, making it harder for generic corporate messages to stand out. Meanwhile, LinkedIn’s algorithms continue to give individual profiles more organic reach than company pages and as has long been the case, journalists look for credible individuals to quote rather than anonymous brand statements.

For B2B organisations, this has created a window of opportunity. Companies with visible, trusted leaders will set themselves apart in every possible way: awareness, influence and impact.

Taking the Next Step

Consistent, strategic leadership visibility doesn’t happen by accident. It requires a plan, the right positioning and content that’s authentic to the individual while aligned with the business.

That’s why we offer the Executive Visibility Programme – a structured, fully managed way to help leaders and executives strengthen their presence on LinkedIn, in the media and in the market, without adding to their already overloaded schedules.

If you’d like to understand how visible your leadership team is right now and where the opportunities lie for both them and your brand, get in touch.

In this blog, Richard Peters, Senior Content Creator at Whiteoaks, discusses:

  • How Performance PR powers inbound lead generation by building visibility and trust
  • Tactics for earning influence through media coverage, peer advocacy and search-optimised content
  • Practical steps to turn thought leadership, case studies and employee-generated social posts into qualified leads

 

Outbound methods of driving leads are under the spotlight. Smarter spam filters and the influx of AI-generated sales emails are pushing cold email strategies to become irrelevant, and even encouraging organisations to go back to cold calling in some cases.

The ongoing expansion of privacy regulations means that buying lists now carries genuine legal and reputational risk, while with today’s tougher email authentication rules, just a few spam complaints can cause every message from a domain to land in recipients’ junk folders.

As outbound strategies face an uncertain future, inbound strategies are coming to the fore. It is an approach that makes perfect sense when you consider that potential future customers often encounter a brand or visit its website before that business proactively contacts them.

In fact, according to 6sense, 69% of the purchase process happens before B2B buyers engage with sellers. So, it is imperative that businesses can draw these prospects in by ensuring that when they get in touch they get a good impression of the organisation and what it does.

The inbound methodology focuses partly on attracting potential customers with relevant content, but it is also, more broadly, about building reputation and influence. Performance PR plays a crucial role across all these areas by building trust with target audiences.

The inbound advantage

Part of this is via secured media engagements. Dedicated teams of B2B media relations specialists leverage their relationships with key journalists, analysts and influencers to secure content placements and opportunities.

Experienced and expert content creators profile executives within an organisation and elevate brands in industry leading publications, through in-depth thought leadership articles, client case studies and whitepapers.

However, inbound lead generation extends beyond media relations and the formal press environment. It’s about finding ways to shape a business’s reputation. At its root, reputation is a collective perception that is made up from a combination of image and reality.

Businesses that want to create a positive impression need to score highly on several key criteria: being seen and understood, establishing points of differentiation, and perhaps most important of all, being well trusted.

Over the past few years, trust has migrated away from institutions and towards a wide range of other audience groups: customers, colleagues, analysts, niche influencers and user communities.

These peer groups play an increasingly important role in inbound lead generation.

Trust-building tactics that work

There are a wide range of PR tactics that could be deployed to harness these groups to help businesses improve their reputation and begin to exert more influence over prospects.

They include everything from encouraging staff to generate their own content on product launches or industry trends on platforms like LinkedIn and Stack; to building video or written case studies for social right through to encouraging users to deliver positive feedback on review platforms.

Performance PR campaigns also focus on enhancing content for search engines with keyword optimised content and relevant backlinks to boost domain authority.

This makes it more likely for target audiences to see expert articles, bold commentary and informative case studies from the brand when searching for a topic or solution online.

Woven together, these elements create a cycle of visibility and trust that guides potential customers from first glance to genuine interest, often before the sales team is aware of them, or even before they first reach the company website.

Ready to let your expertise do the talking? Speak to the Whiteoaks team today.

Five ways to engage your team for high performance in PR

In this blog, Tara Williams, HR Director, explores:

  • The relationship between performance and engagement
  • How to keep the spark alive for high performance teams
  • What Whiteoaks does to keep employees engaged

When it comes to B2B PR, the pressure to deliver results is real. Tight deadlines, demanding clients and a rapidly evolving media landscape all come with the territory. But amidst the drive for performance, it’s easy to overlook the fuel that powers it all: an engaged team.

At Whiteoaks, we know that performance and engagement aren’t separate goals – they’re intrinsically linked. When your team feels valued, connected and clear on their purpose, they don’t just show up – they show up with intent, energy and commitment.

Here are a few ways we focus on keeping our team engaged and performing at their best:

Clarity first, always

Confusion kills motivation. We’re big on setting clear expectations, goals and priorities. Whether it’s a campaign objective or personal development goal, we ensure everyone knows the ‘why’ behind the ‘what’.

Our behaviours and values adorn the office walls, acting as a reminder of what’s important.

Career conversations that count

We hold regular, meaningful career conversations to help our people see a future with us – not just a role. When individuals can map their growth to business goals, performance becomes personal.

With team members having been with the company for up to 28 years, the proof is in the pudding!

Celebrating the wins – big and small

Recognition is a powerful motivator, so we ensure we celebrate success. Whether it’s a game-changing campaign result, a new business win or someone simply stepping up when it counts, a well-timed shout-out can go a long way.

We champion each other and shout about each other’s successes, with our reward and recognition schemes celebrating individuals who go above and beyond. And for team and company-wide successes?

Flexibility and belonging

We’ve recently made changes to our in-office days to bring people together more often. In a hybrid world, face time still matters, not for presenteeism, but for connection, collaboration and culture.

We balance this with flexible working hours, allowing our team to strike a work-life balance that suits them.

Listening, then acting

Engagement isn’t a one-way street. We actively listen to feedback through surveys, one-to-ones and informal check-ins. More importantly, we act on what we hear because listening without action breeds cynicism.

As an employee-owned business, we ensure the mechanisms are in place to allow everyone within the agency to have a voice, with our Employee Council taking the lead on driving changes our employees want to see. So far, that’s resulted in enhancements to our maternity and paternity leave packages, increased holiday allowance and social events ranging from the Crystal Maze to curry nights that bring us all together.

The bottom line?

Engaged teams deliver better results. They’re more resilient, creative and invested in outcomes. At Whiteoaks, we don’t just aim for performance – we aim for sustainable performance, powered by people who feel seen, supported and inspired.

Want to join the Whiteoaks team? Take a look at our latest vacancies or learn more about our team.

In this blog, Richard Peters, Senior Content Creator at Whiteoaks, discusses:

  • Why customer-centred storytelling helps B2B tech brands cut through feature-driven noise
  • How to shape narratives around real-world outcomes, proof points and human insight
  • Practical ways to extend one strong story across channels while supporting wider business goals

 

In a technology market crowded with ‘feeds and speeds’, and lengthy lists of features that look and sound much the same, a compelling story can act as the lever that enables your brand to stand out from the crowd and help you connect with your target audience.

For decades, the importance of storytelling in tech PR has been demonstrated by brands using the approach to foster stronger emotional connections with their customers, build trust and ultimately drive sales.

But it’s the nature of the story they are telling that really makes a difference. For B2B technology companies, successful storytelling is never about simply broadcasting product specs or boasting about speed to market. Instead, the focus should be on weaving narratives that resonate with decision-makers and spark conversations that convert interest into contract wins.

That strong engagement with the end audience is key to successful storytelling, of course. B2B businesses, after all, frequently convince themselves that they have a compelling story to tell but in reality, these stories often struggle to excite external targets.

The launch of a new company website, for example, may seem big news to the business concerned but customers, prospects and partners are likely to be left cold. That’s because, when told straight, the story lacks the “so what?” factor that can translate an internal narrative into a proposition that addresses industry pain points and can make stakeholders across a target market sit up and pay attention.

That doesn’t mean that the story itself has no value but rather that the business needs to find a new angle.


Framing the narrative in a different way

Successful storytelling depends not just on the story but the way that story is told. That’s true even in the case of the new website. It is a dry narrative, if told straight, but shift the angle to the customer benefit: faster self-service, a refreshed knowledge base and improved uptime for support and the same announcement starts to matter.

The most effective examples of storytelling also have a human element. Tech solutions often sound abstract: algorithms, machine learning models, API cycles. Without context, they remain just words on a spec sheet. Good storytelling brings those concepts to life.

By framing your innovation around a customer challenge – whether that’s reducing supply-chain bottlenecks, or powering next-generation healthcare analytics, you highlight tangible outcomes and engage your end audience.

When prospects hear about how a manufacturing firm has reduced downtime by 30% or how a hospital has cut waiting times by 20%, they don’t just see dry statistics, they see real world benefits they can potentially tap into.

This kind of third party endorsement proves that the story the business is telling, and the benefits they are talking about, are true. Audiences are much more likely to start caring about the solution as a result.

                                                                                                     

Building credibility and trust

Trust is earned, not assumed. Peer validation, case studies, testimonials, analyst endorsements play a central role in B2B tech buying decisions. A story rich with credible data points and authentic voices invites readers to believe in your brand.

Openly sharing the challenges that your product team faced and explaining how they subsequently overcame them to develop an innovative new solution, shows transparency. It reassures stakeholders that you understand the market’s demands and have the expertise to deliver.

 

Aligning with business objectives

Effective B2B PR doesn’t exist in a silo. Organisations must always ensure that they clearly align their storytelling efforts with the broader commercial and strategic goals of the business, whether that’s a new product launch, a funding round, or the opening of a new international office.

A well-timed narrative around your latest platform upgrade, for example, has the potential to support investor communications, social media campaigns, keynote presentations and sales collateral in unison. This consistency amplifies impact, ensuring every channel delivers a cohesive message.

 

Engaging through multiple channels

Quality narratives can, and should also have a long shelf life. A single, well-crafted story can fuel diverse content assets: press releases, by-lined articles, multimedia case studies, podcasts and social media posts. B2B tech businesses can, for example, transform a customer success story into a short video that highlights client testimonials, then distil key statistics into an infographic.

By repackaging the core narrative across formats and sharing across owned and earned media, businesses can meet their audience where they consume information, enhancing reach and engagement, and ensuring that the story keeps delivering benefits for them over the longer term.

 

Measuring impact

Storytelling effectiveness can also be measured. Organisations can track media pickup, share of voice, social engagement rates and website traffic to relevant content.

You can even supplement these metrics with qualitative feedback from analysts, messages from prospects or anecdotal evidence from their team. When you see a spike in inbound demo requests following a high-profile thought leadership piece, you know your story has had genuine traction.

For B2B tech companies, storytelling is a strategic imperative. Narratives that humanise technology, reinforce credibility and differentiate your brand can accelerate media coverage, fuel demand generation and strengthen customer relationships.

By consistently applying storytelling best practices across channels and aligning them with business objectives, tech PR teams can turn abstract innovation into compelling reasons for audiences to listen, engage and ultimately act.

Ready to get your tech story heard? Speak to the Whiteoaks team today.

In this blog by Sophie King, Associate Director, we look at:

  • Why owned research is valuable for B2B tech brands
  • Maximising research’s reach
  • Three ways to ensure research produces tangible results

In the competitive world of B2B technology, establishing thought leadership and standing out from the crowd is essential. One powerful tool for achieving this is owned research, designed to generate original thought leadership on topics that matter to your audience. It offers brands an opportunity to deliver unique content that resonates, helps build credibility and drives PR efforts.

However, to maximise the impact of owned research, it should be integrated into a wider marketing strategy, and not just seen as a one-off PR exercise. Here’s how B2B technology brands can use owned research effectively and amplify it across their marketing channels.

Why Owned Research is Valuable for B2B Tech Brands

At its core, owned research refers to custom data gathered through a survey, study or report commissioned by your company. Unlike secondary research, owned research allows brands to address specific challenges or trends relevant to their audience, producing data-driven insights that can be used to generate compelling narratives and content that can be used in all manner of different ways.

For B2B tech companies, owned research is a chance to move beyond general industry reports and provide something new that positions you as a thought leader. But while research is a powerful tool, its success depends on how well it’s integrated into your broader marketing strategy. To achieve maximum impact, the findings can underpin everything from press releases to social media campaigns, ensuring your brand is recognised as a credible, authoritative source in its sector.

Here’s our top tips on how to maximise its reach:

  • Repurpose Content Across Platforms: Don’t limit the research to one format. While the classic eBook format has its place as a hero asset within a lead-gen campaign, there’s value in repurposing key findings into blog posts, videos or even podcast episodes. Each channel reaches a different segment of your audience, ensuring your research has broader visibility.
  • Coordinate with PR Outreach: Use the research as a hook for your PR campaigns. Pitch findings to relevant media outlets and industry publications, offering them exclusive insights or commentary on the results. This creates the opportunity for earned media coverage and can establish your brand as an authority.
  • Align with your Event Calendar: Research insights can form the basis of event concepts and messaging, providing you with an powerful differentiator against a sea of other attendees. The data from surveys can be used to fuel panel discussions or speaker slots, letting you engage directly with your audience while reinforcing your thought leadership position.
  • Engage with Influencers: Industry influencers or thought leaders can help amplify your research. Collaborate with them to share the results on social platforms, extending your reach to their networks.

Starting a research project from scratch can feel daunting, so to ensure your research produces tangible results, keep these tips in mind:

1) Plan for Headlines from the Start
It’s important to start the research process with a clear vision of what you want to achieve. Think about the key insights or headlines you want the media to pick up. Without a clear focus, you might end up with a report full of generic data that doesn’t provide value. Consider what your audience cares about and what gaps exist in the industry. This will guide the creation of meaningful research that generates buzz.

2) Get Senior Stakeholder Buy-In Early
Research projects require a significant investment of time and resources. To ensure alignment with broader company objectives, it’s crucial to get buy-in from senior stakeholders early on. Their involvement helps shape the research and ensures that the findings are closely aligned with your strategic goals, increasing the likelihood of long-term impact.

3) Define Success Metrics
Before the research kicks off, define what success looks like. Will you measure media coverage, social media engagement or lead generation? Setting clear KPIs upfront will allow you to track the effectiveness of your research and optimise for better results. For example, metrics like press coverage, social shares or eBook downloads can indicate how well your content is resonating with the target audience.

Turning Research into Results

Owned research is a valuable tool for any B2B technology brand looking to differentiate itself in a crowded market. However, it’s not solely about the research itself – it’s about how you use it. By integrating it into your broader marketing strategy, from PR content and social media posts to hero eBooks and event collateral, you can maximise its impact and create a strong foundation for long-term thought leadership.

By following best practices and setting clear goals from the outset, B2B tech brands can leverage owned research to build credibility, generate PR narratives and drive engagement across multiple touchpoints.

Find out more about some of our work in this area for clients, including a cybersecurity industry report for Bridewell, which saw us generate 697 pieces of coverage, or our integrated research campaign activity for InterSystems, which saw us deliver a full suite of creative assets.

In this blog by Hayley Goff, CEO, and Sophie King, Associate Director, Whiteoaks, we talk about the key takeways from our recent webinar, including:

  • The importance of tying PR to business objectives
  • How integrated campaigns deliver stronger impact
  • Why measurement should focus on outcomes, not just outputs

 

PR often gets tarnished with the “fluffy” brush. 61% of PR professionals struggle to link PR to business goals, driving the perception that campaigns fail to demonstrate clear, measurable value.

And it’s unfortunately been a very real past experience for some of our clients. We hear of experiences with previous agencies where contracted hours have been used up halfway through a month with little to show for it, with activity then put on pause until the following month. This serves to not only create questions about an agency’s accountability, but about such models themselves.

With mounting pressure on B2B tech brands to prove the impact of every marketing investment, PR needs to connect the dots between activity and outcomes.

In our recent webinar, “If it’s not measurable, it’s meaningless: How to use PR for B2B tech”, Whiteoaks CEO Hayley Goff and Associate Director Sophie King explained how businesses can turn PR into a strategic, measurable asset. Here are some of the key takeaways:

PR with purpose

PR isn’t just how many times the name of a company or spokesperson appears in different media; it has a much greater purpose.

Coverage views on an article are great, but they don’t tell businesses if they’re making any measurable progress towards real outcomes. For example, if the objective of PR activity is to drive consideration for a product launch, supporting content needs to encourage engagement from potential buyers.

Effective measurement begins with clear objectives, whether that’s driving brand awareness, breaking into a new market or even supporting recruitment efforts. And different objectives may have different target audiences, such as customers, investors, analysts or future hires.

That’s why when we embark on a project with a new client, one of the first things we do is connect PR to these business priorities. We then show how our strategy links to those objectives and report back against them, proving our accountability to our clients.

Reaching audiences in different ways

So, what does a measurable campaign look like? Today’s best ones aren’t run in siloes. Whiteoaks’ Performance PR model brings together media relations, content, social and creative in one package.

A B2B tech brand might have a strong news story to share with the press, but it could actually be more impactful if it’s also repurposed on LinkedIn, for example. Shared on a social media platform, it can be backed by a visual campaign, supported by thought leadership content and amplified by colleagues on their personal profiles.

It’s about creating the opportunities for audiences to engage in different ways via a mix of touchpoints.

Audience-centric measurement

Audience-centric measurement is vital to gauge the effectiveness of campaigns, this can include metrics that align with visibility, engagement and impact.

Impact is often considered the holy grail of audience measurement, as it reflects how PR activity has influenced an audience’s perceptions or actions. Impact can be seen in a few different ways, such as changes in brand consideration, reputation, lead generation or new partnerships.

The old perceptions of PR as being based on vanity metrics or impossible to measure are outdated. Proving the business value of PR is entirely possible, with the right strategy behind it. By setting clear objectives from the outset, aligning activity to strategic priorities and measuring what really matters, PR can become a critical part of a brand’s growth story.

When campaigns are integrated, purposeful and designed with impact in mind, they deliver far more than coverage stats. They deliver tangible outcomes.

Want to find out more about how to turn PR into a strategic, measurable asset for your business? Download the full webinar to hear more from Hayley and Sophie.