Lucy Cunliffe, PR account handler at GyroHSR Manchester, examines findings from the 2009 UK B2B Marketing Insight report.

The report analyses trends, attitudes, approaches and opinions among senior level B-to-B marketers. A total of 211 completed the 30-minute online survey, and respondents came from local, national and international businesses of all sizes, and with annual turnover ranging from 1m to over 40m. The finished product is a 70- page report that covers 9 key subject areas, which has been designed to help with the understanding of this specialist and evolving discipline. The report is available to all businesses to buy throughout the UK at www.b2bm.biz/insight09/. This year the report showed emerging trends, all of which in some way are linked to the current market conditions.

State of the Market: Despite the recession, the market remains buoyant with only one third seeing budget cuts in 2010, with 89% of respondents remaining relatively confident about the future economic climate for their organisations.

Marketing channels: Digital communication methods, perhaps unsurprisingly, showed the largest increase in share of marketers wallets at the expense of print and face-toface communications. This is almost certainly linked to spend and cost effectiveness, but most importantly, its ease of measurability.

Digital: Year on year, respondents are becoming more comfortable with digital techniques, with 78% saying that they feel they are very or fairly well informed with the latest advances in digital marketing techniques Although a third of respondents are not using digital marketing channels in their B-to-B communications a great deal, if at all.

One of the most interesting outtakes in this area is that digitals largest uses are now for awareness raising (32% - which is nearly double last years fi gure) and lead generation (21%).

Measurability: It remains a consistent view by almost three quarters of respondents that marketing performance is ultimately assessed on its return on investment. So, measurement is key; this goes a long way to explaining the growth in digital marketing.

Stakeholder marketing: When asked about marketing to different stakeholders, the majority of respondents said that they do not market to employees, with 24% saying they only market to their customers. There has been a reduction in internal marketing and targeting to shareholders, which could be attributed to reduced budgets and pressure to focus on driving sales.

In todays environmentally conscious climate; A surprising 51% of respondents confirmed that their companies do have a corporate social responsibility programme. It seems B-to-B marketers dont put a huge amount of emphasis on environmental credentials, although according to research carried out by GyroHSR recently this could be a mistake.

Branding: 2009 has seen an increase in the number of marketers who have a defined brand values system (44%) up 12% on 2008. However, of the respondents surveyed, only 6% said that they value their brands on their balance sheet, and only 7% measure the value of brand equity. And we all know: what gets measured gets done.

Summary: The survey shows strong year on year trend data, seemingly accentuated by the recession. On the upside, our respondents remain upbeat about the overall economic climate. Bearing in mind that the research was carried out in February and March this year, it is encouraging to see that the marketplace is displaying strong signs of recovery.